Since reading this excoriating article by Polly Toynbee in yesterday's Guardian I've been asking myself how I would react if I was still working in the welfare-to-work system. It's many, many years since I worked for a year as a teenager in what was then the Labour Exchange; but only a few years since I worked on the New Deal contracts. There has always been a "sanctions" system. If you weren't available for work or actively seeking work, you lost your benefits. But it took Iain Duncan Smith to introduce a reign of terror and direct staff to throw as many people as possible into destitution.
Toynbee says that jobcentre staff are "mostly decent people", and I would agree. So what do you do, as a decent person, if you find yourself caught up in this? One strategy is to make sure the facts get out there, like the "regular 'deep throat' correspondent" who has described to her how, "You park your conscience at the door".
Part of me thinks I couldn't stay in the job. But walking out isn't that easy, unless you can walk straight into another job (which is unlikely these days). You wouldn't get any benefits for a very long time; and when you were finally eligible to sign on you would have to go to the jobcentre. Not much of an option if you've been loudly blowing the whistle meanwhile. So do you stick it out and try not to become part of the culture? That, according to the informant, leads quickly to losing your job.
It is horribly easy to become part of the culture when something as wicked as this is going on. You start by dehumanising those you deal with. These are not unfortunate people who deserve support and consideration. They are idle scroungers. All of them. That's what you're being told, and what the propaganda has been telling you for years. They are not part of society, as you are, not "hard-working families". So if you treat them like rubbish and they react badly, they just confirm your opinion. History is littered with such treatment of minority groups who have been made scapegoats for other people's sins.
So I don't know what I would do. But I do know where the responsibility for this misery lies. And it's not just on Iain Duncan Smith, guilty as he is. It's on David Cameron, who appointed him and keeps him in his job, presumably because he approves of what he's doing.
It is sad,my adviser is a really nice lady,don't get me wrong,she makes me adhere to my JSA agreement,but also understands that filing application upon application for non existent is a waste of both her time and mine,but it must be done...Why?
ReplyDeleteI've been there. I delivered the WP for a sub contractor to one of the primes. I received a one day company induction and absolutely no training on how to constructively help the hardest to help ( ESA, alcoholic, substance abusers, homeless, victims of violence, mental illness ) that made up 60% of my caseload. When I asked for training I was told I needed to source it myself and there was no budget.
ReplyDeleteFive months into the role I mentioned to the MD when she was visiting our branch that I thought I was failing my customers. 6 months later I was told that I had failed my probation and was gone........
Re treatment of minority groups, the langague that the Tories use to justify the appalling harrassment of the unemployed is same that the South used to justify slavery i.e. that Blacks were inherently lazy and had to be forced to work, for their own good.
ReplyDeleteOf course slavery in the South was much harsher but there is a similarity in langague used to justify the treatment of Blacks and the unemployed. I hope someone with more influence than me has the courage of to make this point.
There was also the excuse that they were bringing the slaves the benefits of Christianity.
Deleteand from the purgatory of WP, I am personally, looking forward to the afterlife.
DeleteI occasionally meet JCP staff and managers. They all swear that they sanction hardly anybody, and when they do, it's for a good reason. Inferences could include that they're honest, and sanctioning is relatively localised (a view that the stats don't really support), or that they're not being entirely frank, possibly because they recognise a degree of injustice in what they're doing.
ReplyDeleteFor the record, this isn't meant to imply that JCP staff and managers are generally dishonest or malign - many aren't. I've met some inspirational ones, but also some who appear to be entirely unequipped for and unsuited to their job. I note that some of the weakest recent posts on this blog have been from someone who purports to work for JCP - borderline illiteracy and 'they're all at it' subjectivity don't inspire much confidence in the quality of support offered.
I just signed on and started claiming JSA after being in work for about three years. It was a totally different experience than the one I remembered- now the process seems to have been designed only to trip people up and engineer sanctions.
ReplyDeleteI have to take 60 steps a week to find work, have to register with two recruitment agencies a week, hand deliver a CV to 8 employers a week and telephone another 8 to make speculative inquiries. The word sanction was mentioned about 20 times on my first visit- and this was only an initial appointment to get my claim up and running! I was also given some paperwork about work placements and the 'benefits' I could gain by working for free! madness!
Scariest of the lot though is that I will be called twice a week by someone from the office to check up on my jobseeking. failure to answer will, of course, raise a doubt that could lead to a sanction!
quick follow up- if somebody could give me a bit of advice it would be very much appreciated. regards the twice-weekly phone calls from JCP.... They will be calling me from an unknown number and the signal in my flat is awful.
DeleteI tried to explain that this might be a problem to the lady who did my interview but was told very bluntly that there was no way around it and that if I didn't answer my phone [or if my phone was not available] a doubt would be raised.
If somebody could let me know if this is legal / in line with JCP regulations that would be very much appreciated. Thanks in advance.
If at all possible, get this conversation in writing. It is an absurd imposition, and I don't think a sanction would stick, not for a first "offence". But it would still put you through a difficult time.
DeleteI dont own or have access to a telephone, does that mean I am sanctioned before I have even left the Jobcentre then?
DeleteJust a quick question, You are to sign up for 2 job agencies a week, Now how many job agencies are where you live, Around me we have Reed, Adecco, Primetime, GPW, Plus a few smaller ones, so say 10 agencies, so in 5 weeks you will have signed up for all of them.. after 6 weeks you cant sign to any more.. as they dont exist.. Phoning 8 companies a week, How many companies are in your area in your field if you are specialised, hand delivering 8 CV's are these to the same 8 you phoned? If they are to call you twice a week, and you are out handing out CV's is that a sanction time?
DeleteAre you supposed to sit there with the phone in front of you, Not go to the bathroom, or to the shops for food or your money? Its getting scarier out there I do not know how much people can take. Yet no one seems to care
In addition, How many other people will be sending CV's phoning, dropping in with CV's. How much time will it cost companies to answer the phone and deal with the CV's before they start to Bin them immediately.
DeleteSay there are 10,000 people looking for work on the new regime, and they each do 8 companies a week, thats 80,000 companies, 80,000 phone calls a week to the entire town. 80,000 CV's I doubt there are 80,000 in a town/area so these companies will be inundated with them (this isnt counting those from other areas, those wanting a job and are in a job or those applying for two part time jobs).
I'm registered with Universal Jobmatch and at my last signing asked if it was mandatory that I applied for any of the self-employed jobs listed there [and I would estimate approximately 30% of the positions listed on UJ are self-employed].
DeleteI asked because my adviser had saved one of these jobs on my account during my last visit and when I applied the company telephoned and told me that a nominal £399 registration fee was required... for 'the paperwork and that...' according to the lady I spoke with. I told them, not all that politely, that they were clearly, in the words of my uncle, having a giraffe.
I told my Jobcentre adviser what had happened and she told me that she wasn't sure whether this amounted to turning down a job but would have to raise a doubt to be sure.
I argued that surely if turning down self-employment is the same as turning down a job then every single unemployed person in the country has turned down work as they have turned down the opportunity to be self-employed... this was met with a blank stare. I asked whether I would still get paid or if my claim has been stopped and of course, they couldn't tell me because it was now in the hands of a decision maker.
So I will find out on Thursday whether I have been sanctioned or not, depending on whether or not my JSA has been paid. I'm not holding out much hope and have already drafted an appeal to hand-deliver on Thursday if this is the case.
Advice most welcome! [in fact, it is more than welcome... you might just be saving my life!]
This is clearly a scam. You say that they told you by phone about the "registration fee". Did you get any address or other instructions? My first thought is, go to your local paper. You need to save others from this scammer. If you get some publicity there won't be a sanction. If you can get to the scammer without paying the money up front - string them along - you'd have an even better story. If you like, you could send me the "job" details via a not-for-publication comment and I'll do a bit of sleuthing myself.
DeleteWhich doesn't help you at the moment. Make sure you have all the details for an appeal if necessary.
I have a sort of similar situation,my WP provider directed that I attend an open day at a local Hotel,I googled it and found out that it belongs to a company(they only own 2) that I have applied for 8 times over the past 3 Months and I was informed when I tried to drop of my application that as I had already been turned down in the past "not to apply again for 6 months" I explained to the adviser and she asked did they accept your application? No they said not to reapply for 6 Months,a doubt will be sent to JCP and I will have to explain why I did not follow directions,I slowly explained again,Do you have written conformation? Of what? That this is Company policy....No..We have no choice,we are required under the guidelines to report this.
DeleteCan I see what guidelines you are referring to? No,its Policy...?????
Hi Historian thank you for your response- the job has since disappeared from UJ searches [I sent an email to the DWP via UJ alerting them that it was possibly fraudulent so at least somebody appears to be listening]... however it is still showing in my saved jobs list, although when I click the link it now leads to a blank page. When the company telephoned me it was on a with-held number so it appears that our joint suspicions were correct.
DeleteI am only glad and can be grateful that I don't suffer from mental health problems or learning disabilities- somebody with either of these issues could very easily have fallen into the trap, particularly when being battered fortnightly with the sanction rhetoric from JCP.
I would imagine that a sanction has indeed been applied- they only use the 'it's up to a decision maker' line when it's bad news- and I am fully ready to challenge any decision. It's laughable that my advisor even decided to raise a doubt.
Quite disgusting that such scams should be allowed to masquerade as genuine opportunities.
DeleteVery similar to a vacancy I applied for some time ago pre UJ. The role was for an SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) specialist. They wanted £2,000 for 'training'. In reality it was a self employed franchise opportunity. however, nowhere was it made clear this was the case in the vacancy text.
I fear we will only see more and more of these dodgy vacancies. Simply down to people becoming more desperate for work and a whilst a draconian sanctions regime is in place pressurising jobseekers into making bad choices.
"I have to take 60 steps a week to find work"
DeleteThat's crazy. Mine asks for 60 steps, but at least per fortnight, rather than trying to cram everything into a single week.
Although she seemed to be losing it a bit this week. She had the wrong person's information on the screen, then started asking why I hadn't carried out a job seekers direction that had been given to someone else.
Its not legal.
ReplyDeleteCheck out "Claiming Benefits: Without an email address or telephone number? Sanctions? Extensive DWP opinions" posted on 07/11/2013 at
ReplyDeletewww.refuted.org.uk/
Izzy x
All great except for the last bit, the reason Cameron keep IDS has been well covered in many political programmes: IDS I'd the poster child of a hardcore of highly right-wing Tories.... Cameron can't afford problems on the back benches so can't shift him.
ReplyDeleteNever, never, never! My conscience does not get parked anywhere, and nobody tells me to shit on other people. I blame all job centre staff who do so. I may be out of work by next March, since my job has temporary funding, and I am already devising a letter to the manager of my local job centre to inform him that, if I end up signing on at his office, if his staff are making war on claimants, I will turn the war back on them. Anybody who attempts to make me destitute will feel my teeth; I will have nothing to lose. I am devising a leaflet to tell people how to avoid being sanctioned by insisting on a jobseekers agreement, or claimant commitment, that is doable and does not set them up to be tripped up. There used to be claimants unions. They faded away during the 80s, but now that job centre staff have been given too much discretion and are encouraged to misuse it, it is time I think for claimants to start organising unions again in their own defence.
ReplyDeleteWatch the language. And go carefully. If you antagonise the Jobcentre staff before you even have to sign on, you are just courting trouble.
Delete