Monday 12 August 2013

Confusion - and a rant from IDS

Are Tesco and Next importing foreign workers because they cost less than British ones?  It's the claim by Labour MP Chris Bryant, indignantly denied by the firms concerned, and it's all a bit confused at the moment.  Many of us have little doubt that Bryant is right in general; but it's necessary to get the details absolutely right.
That's never been a consideration for Iain Duncan Smith.  He has penned an extraordinary rant in the Mail today.  The headline is: "For those eyeballing benefits as a one-way ticket to easy street, I have a wake-up call for you: those days are over! Says IAIN DUNCAN SMITH".  That in itself is enough to get jaws dropping among benefits claimants.  But the bizarre statements have yet to come.  Did you know that "there are 4,000 single people making more in benefits than many individual people would earn from work"?  Just try working out what that means.  You'll notice that there's no mention of the fact that this is all down to the cost of rents.  But IDS wants Mail readers to know that by the end of September those people will be subject to a new cap of £18,200.  Then there's the Claimant Commitment" which "transforms the relationship between the claimant and the system.  Claimants will sign an agreement to undertake certain activities in order to get their benefits in return.  Our advisers have the power to sanction people who don't uphold their part of the bargain.  No longer can people just turn up to claim benefits with no onus on them to better their situation."
What can one say to that?  Does he not know that the current system is already exactly what he describes?  And why won't he publish the sanctions figures?  Well, probably, but it's not truth or accuracy which matter, it's feeding the prejudices of the public at large.  And that seems to be the case with yet another poverty entertainment show tonight.  Channel 4, which once did such a good job with Benefit Busters, now prefers to give us a series which harks back to the start of the welfare state in 1949 and see how today's unemployed would fare.  The Mail, of course, has no doubt.  It uses the term "handouts", which had no place in 1940s thinking.  It says that "benefits were originally conceived as a temporary helping hand in times of trouble, not a lifestyle choice".  There's that phrase again, the lie which says that all unemployed people have made a choice to be so.  I won't be watching.
Duncan Smith's past is coming back to haunt him, and I'm starting to understand why he hates the BBC so much.  Well before the scandal broke over MPs' expenses, there was a lesser scandal of MPs employing their relatives on the government payroll, often for doing nothing at all.  One of the MPs caught up in this was IDS himself, who was leader of his party at the time.  The BBC's Michael Crick discovered that he was paying his wife, Betsy, £15k a year.  "Betsygate" was uncomfortable for IDS, but it was worse for some of his staff.  A blog points us to evidence given to Parliament by his aide Dr Vanessa Gearson in October 2003.  It's long and detailed, but well worth a read.

24 comments:

  1. Smith is a ridiculous figure. If he did not exist, then he'd have to be invented as part of some dystopian novel, play, or TV drama!

    All this is down to the silly rhetoric of "making work pay". Of course, the idea is to claw back benefits in order to make even low paid zero-hr. jobs look attractive. Not to make these jobs pay well in the first place. Remember, the Tories were and are still ideologically opposed to the Nat Min Wage.

    The Ch4 program looking at benefits in 1949 Britain seems to have a champion in the equally ridiculous Daily Mail which confidently states as part of it's headline "The results will astonish and infuriate you". Yet again, sections of the media telling people what to think while missing the bigger picture. Little wonder public opinion can be skewed and bent to fit a particular agenda.

    More to the point, is Ch4 also going roll prices back to 1949 as well?

    "Duncan Smith's past is coming back to haunt him, and I'm starting to understand why he hates the BBC so much."

    As well as being caught out employing his wife to do zilch, Smith probably also hates the BBC for discovering that his CV was somewhat "embroidered". BBC2's Newsnight revealed anomalies surrounding his supposed qualifications in 2002.

    More here:

    http://www.bbc.co.uk/pressoffice/pressreleases/stories/2002/12_december/19/newsnight_ids_cv.shtml

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  2. The only benefit that I receive is £71.70 pw "Handout" after paying in for decades,I have a hard time with that statement.I recently sent in a FIO request asking how many bedrooms should MP's be allowed for their second home,the answer is obvious (1) as this is to provide housing while in London,not a pad for family members to use as a free base,the request was denied due to security concerns,my personal feeling is that this response only confirms that the real scroungers are the ones making the most noise.

    After meeting with my Mentor(no longer Adviser)on the WP today I was asked "How went the Interview" I replied the one that was set for last week and I need funding for travel with? Yes,sorry I was on my Hols and only read your (6) E-mail this morning,did it go well? Without funding I did not go! I may have to raise a sanction doubt with the JCP.....And the Beat goes on!

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  3. I'm one of those single people & I can safely say I'm not getting as much on benefits as I would working (full time that is) After bills, rent, council tax, food I have £9 left a fortnight. Now anyone can work out I'd have more left if I were working.
    I've also just come off the WP at A4e and was told straight away by my advisor of the sanctions I would face if I don't do what I'm asked. I'm terrified they might send me a letter about an appointment or something, that I won't get & that's it no benefits. That means no food & I'll probably loose my home as I have to pay towards my rent. These are very scary times we're living in.

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  4. A really thorough insight into Iain Duncan Smith - http://www.newstatesman.com/2013/05/great-crapsy-why-iain-duncan-smith-isnt-all-he-seems

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  5. Hi there. what i am about to tell you, i have already sent to an older post, but it bears repeating because it is happening to me NOW. Basically, i finished with A4E about 3 months ago, and was immediately referred to an "essential employability" course at Sheffield college. To be honest, I didnt really want to do it,as I felt it wouldnt teach me anything i havent learnt 100000 times before, but still resolved to approach it with a positive attitude, and make the most of my free buspass and college fascilities. However, A4E werent finished with me yet. About 3weeks into my course, i was told that i was being sanctioned for 2 weeks, as i missed an appointment A YEAR AGO(even then it was because I had moved, and they were sending post to my old address because they were too lazy/stupid to update their records, despite the fact i told them straightaway i was moving,and my new address)not omnly that, I'M NOT EVEN ON THEIR BOOKS ANYMORE!The upshoot is, I had to take loads of time off of my new course to try and sort things out and lodge an appeal, and got threatened with sanctions AGAIN for missing so much out. I applied for hardship payments but was told i don't qualify, as it only 14 days,so now have to face the possibility of attending acompulsary college course with no food electricity or clean clothes as i dont know anyone i can borrow money off of. Thanks for nothing, A4E. you continue to get in my way and put obsticles in my path, despite the fact i am no longer involved with you. i utterly loathe and despise you.

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    1. If what you say is true (and you've added a bit to the comment you put on another post) I don't understand how they could come up with a sanction doubt so long after the event.

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    2. hiya historian. i dont understand it either. have got the paperwork at home.Basically, I'm being sanctioned because I missed an appointment last year, because they sent the letters to the wrong address as I had moved!This has really puzzled and pissed off a lot of people (inc my adviser) as its interferring with my new course. will find relevant documents, & copy them out for you (if its legal to do that) or email/ scan them for you, hopefully within the week. thanks for your time, keep up the good work.

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    3. Like Polly, below, I'm still confused. "I'm being sanctioned", you say, but have you appealed?

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  6. If you were having to appeal then that is not a sanction doubt, but an actual sanction and no doubt it is DWP who were slow sending out teh paperwork to you. A4e and other providers just send in the original paperwork to DWP saying you missed whatever, you get a sanction doubt to which you reply enclosing evidence and then if it's good they don't sanction you. If they do get sanctioned, then you appeal. You've apparently had to appeal so your evidence for missing the appointment wasn't considered good enough. I don't know how you go about lodging an appeal but for a sanction doubt you'd just enclose evidence of change of address and they'd accept it.

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  7. I went in to see my adviser, and she was very nasty in a nice way.. she kept stressing that universal jobs match should be opened to let the adviser see, I quoted the universal jobsmatch toolkit at her and she backed down.. I said i do not want to share my cv with people i always upload and download a cv to the sites she said well thats limiting your job search..

    so she gave me 2 taskes to do spec emails to 4 places in a week, and to upload my cv to a jobsite..

    what was most telling was she said voluntary work isnt counted, and she said several times well you are getting paid by the tax payer.. essentially trying to guilt me into thinking I am a scrounger.

    Now I got so upset there she phoned the work place psychologist for an appointment for me, then suggested I speak to my doctor, which I did. I broke down there and started crying and told him that this adviser told me to get my hair and beard cut if I wanted a reception job but I was casual no point in shaving unless theres an interview it was also raining and windy so some wind swept hair..I explained to my doctor what went on and he was shocked he said it looks like depression to him so gave me a sick note for a month and some fluoxetine and he arranged a counselling session to be arranged later. I didnt ask for a sick note but got one this post work programme thing pushed me beyond the breaking point.. Sorry for the slightly rambling account.


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    1. Hello, re Annonymouse's post of 12 August, the taxpayer pays for your Advisor to help you. Talk to a sympathtic friend or family member if it helps. Listen to some of your favourite music. Maybe break your routine a bit - go for a brisk walk, do things to take your mind off the preasure if it's getting to you. Keep your chin up!

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    2. Problem is if I go out I am always worried that someone from the dwp will think I not doing my jobsearch, Too afraid to go out incase they catch me, That's the insidious way of it now. You start to feel guilty for not doing everything you can when you know you are but its never good enough.

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    3. You used to be able to have a week's holiday whilst signing on, provided you told them where you'd be staying and could be contacted; and it had to be in Britain. Some friends offered to pay for me to go with them for a week in France. I could get a relative to say I was staying with them if necessary. In other words, lie because so many other people did it. And I nearly agreed - but I knew that, with my luck, I would run into someone from the Jobcentre on the cross-channel ferry, so I didn't go.
      Don't get paranoid.

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  8. I vaguely remember that Chris Grayling is alleged to have bragged that the Tories would slash the costs of paying Benefits quite easily. Allegedly, Grayling boasted that hardly anyone of working age would be claiming Benefits by 2015 because he and his fellow Tory right wingers intended to turn claiming the Benefits into such a miserable, demeaning experience that most people would stop claiming Benefits voluntarily by 2015.

    At the time, I remember thinking that this was an extraordinarily puerile comment by a supposedly capable MP. It was reminiscent of pulling the legs off frogs and other similarly spiteful, immature ideas, it seemed to me. I wondered why DC would have allowed one of his junior Ministers to make such a bizarre boast? I was also fairly sure that the Human Rights Act would probably put a stop to Grayling’s schoolboy savagery even if David Cameron was too wet to deal with it himself. DC would not encourage such spite by his own children, after all.

    Then there is the Kept Man in the shape of IDS. He bragged smugly in the Daily Mail about how he bludged off Betsy for 6 months after IDS was paid off by the Army. Apparently, IDS did not claim the dole because Betsy was doing the doling instead. Most families would have despised IDS and booted him straight off their family payroll as soon as IDS had begun to indulge in his self-admittedly dole-dodging nonsense. My own father would have called IDS a spineless gigolo and shown him swiftly to the door marked “exit.” Dad’s attitude was that his daughter’s tears would soon dry and that Dad would soon find her a less unsatisfactory specimen to play with instead of that drip of a dole-dodger called IDS.

    Over the weekend, I read that the Tories Are Whingeing. Apparently they realize that they have lost the support of the Northerners and allegedly the ethnic minorities are equally suspicious of the Tories. Is the population of Tory Faithful large enough to secure the next General Election for the Tories, I wonder?

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  9. Channel 4's Benefits Britain 1949 had a very interesting statistic. Currently only 48 percent of disabled people work compared to 96 percent in 1948. The programme got a young disabled guy work too.

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    1. The statistic means nothing out of context. What was the definition of "disabled"?

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  10. Perhaps, the reason why less disabled people work now is because there are less job vacancies? Competition for ANY job now is fierce with more and more people in the UK looking for work.

    Being unemployed does NOT imply that you are out of work by choice. You can be both unemployed and genuinely looking for work.

    Indeed, to claim JSA you have to PROVE that you are looking for work. It is this fact that makes the Tory apologists claim that unemployment is a lifestyle choice untenable.

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    1. Up until 1994 employers with 100 employees or more had to employ a qouta of people registered as Disabled - 3 percent. The USA, Australia and other countries have I believe a simillar system too.

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  11. Based on 3 people sharing a 3-bedroom house on a joint tenancy (I'm using a housing trust property as an example) Single person's JSA per year is £3728.40, Housing benefit; £1451.84 per year, council tax benefit; £365.56 per year. This works out at £5545.80 in total for the year, which is less than a third of the £18,200 cap IDS has in mind.

    So as far as his assertion that single people have it easy is concerned, he is way off the mark.



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    1. Single people really don't have it easy on JSA/UB. They have to bear the whole costs of gas, electricity, water, TV licence, telephone rental and calls, maybe Broadband, internal decoration of their accommodation …..

      It's usually inevitable to have to dip into any savings you may have or sell something precious that belongs to you.

      I found it really tough.

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  12. I had been thinking of Justine recently and lo and behold she has posted on her blog she has a job! I just want to say my very best wishes to her. Well done!

    I can't post on her webpage so please Historian/Someone copy/paste my message here and convey it to her.

    Cheers

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  13. I seem to recall that in the thirty years from 1949, Britain had a thriving Manufacturing base ( including research and development ) and a go-ahead Agricultural sector; plenty of available jobs.

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    1. Up here in South Yorkshire the industries we had (Mining, Steel) have been partly replaced by Retail and Call Centre work. There needs to be the opportunity to get work, things like the Job Interview Gaurantee - does it still exist?

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  14. Maybe those 4,000 people who qualify for a higher rate of benefit than they would if in work are also disabled. Disability Living Allowance is paid whether you are employed or not, additional benefits can be applied for too. Rather dubious and not at all surprised by anything most MPs say.

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