Sunday 22 December 2013

Tidings of comfort and joy

After I had read this piece in the Observer last night, I put it together with something a friend had told me the day before.  The friend had been helping to set things up for Christmas at her local church, when a woman came in looking for "the food bank".  She was very pale and looked ill and exhausted.  There isn't a food bank in that part of the city, so my friend volunteered to drive her home.  In the process she learned something of her story.  It was the usual thing - very long delays and complications in getting her benefits through.  That's one of the problems which the Trussell Trust want to discuss with Iain Duncan Smith.  But he's refusing to meet them, accusing them of publicity-seeking, scaremongering and having a clear political agenda.  Not, of course, like the political agenda which led the UK government to turn down a £22m grant from the European Aid for the Most Deprived fund specifically for food banks.
I am no longer a Christian by most people's definition; but I still regard Christian values, and the teachings of the gospels, as a pretty good guide for living.  Iain Duncan Smith does profess to be a Christian - a Roman Catholic.  Maybe he went to Mass this morning.  So I wonder how he squares that supposed faith with his actions and attitudes.  Oh yes, I know that terrible things have been done in the name of Christianity, and of every religion.  He's hardly unique.  But the psychology is fascinating.  I could cite any number of passages in the gospels which should give him pause for thought.  How about Matthew chapter 25, starting at verse 34?  Or if you prefer one of the Old Testament prophets, there's a piece of advice in Micah, 6 v.8.  In the old translation it says, "What doth the Lord require of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God."  The three qualities - justice, mercy and humility - seem entirely lacking in IDS.
When IDS or the DWP mess up, the cost falls on the hapless benefit claimant and / or taxpayer.  Hugh Muir in the Guardian returns to the story of the botched procurement process for the Universal Jobmatch site.  He originally reported back in March this year that there were three bidders at the start, Steria Ltd, Methods and Monster Worldwide.  Steria challenged the evaluation process, so it was run again, but Methods started legal procedures and were paid off.  The DWP wouldn't say how much it had cost to stay out of court.  But now, with the DWP annual report published (very late) there's a clue.  There's a payment of £950,000 "to compensate a supplier for reasonable costs incurred in connection with procurement activities".

20 comments:

  1. A very nasty man. A very nasty party. I have no faith whatsoever in Labour to repeal any of this stuff though. So, we’re stuck with what we’ve got already and there’s much worse to come.

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  2. IDS and the Tories want to end to the welfare state and replace it with a set of expensive, private schemes. I do not believe that this would be the intention of the Labour party. I agree that they will probably not repeal the benefit changes that have been made but I doubt that they would end the NI scheme. I also do not believe that the TU's would allow them to introduce or support a workfare scheme, at least one that does not pay the minimum wage.

    There is a choice and if the Tories continue to ignore criticism they will lose the next GE. They are simply not listening to the people.

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    1. Remember that Labour introduced the first workfare scheme. It was called "work for your benefit" and was piloted before they lost the 2010 election.

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    2. Not only that but Workfare was around for most of the previous Labour government already.

      To be fair to Labour, the political makeup of the front bench was further to the right than it is now, but I am very sceptical the future DWP minister Labour or no will resist the urge to further entrench workfare policies, especially given that the true purpose of Workfare is to catch those who cheat the system by working cash in hand whilst claiming. Of course, ministers can't outright admit that's the reason Workfare goes on despite the fact all the evidence says Workfare does little to nothing for someone's chances of employment. So the line always remains an unconvincing one of ''Work place skills'' and ''instilling work ethic''.

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    3. I believe that Labour party policy is to pay the minimum wage for anyone over 25 on any Workfare project. I have no problem with this if the work is genuine, training is given and there is a job at the end of it.

      At the time the New Deal was introduced I was actually in work! and to be honest I had no idea it ever existed. Which reflects rather badly on me. Of course now I know better. However, I still maintain that the Tories objective is fundementally different to that of Labour.

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  3. "Iain Duncan Smith does profess to be a Christian - a Roman Catholic. Maybe he went to Mass this morning. So I wonder how he squares that supposed faith with his actions and attitudes."

    With Nelson Mandella's recent passing, one is reminded that those whites who still support Apartheid (such as supporters of the fascist AWB) would in an instant call themselves honest god fearing Christian folk.

    In a rebuttal the biblical quotes provided by Historian, Smith would probably say "God helps those who help themselves". (Even though that quote is not in the Bible and can be attributed to Benjamin Franklin). He'd see the failing WP and the over budget UC as part of this approach.

    Smith seems to be one of those people whose belief system (both religious and ideological) makes them inflexible and unable to compromise. This in part is the fault of the British political system which sees flexibility and compromising as u-turns, flip-flopping and overall weakness.

    We all know Smith does not listen. Even when confronted with problems that are of his own making he casually brushes them aside, blames others and carries on regardless.

    Perhaps his Catholicism beliefs convinces Smith he is doing the right thing. If so, then it is time for the church and the Catholic church in particular to speak out more in favour of those made ever more desperate, destitute and hungry due to the tougher benefit rules. I would love to know what Smith's local priest thinks of the actions of one of his flock!

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    1. See http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-25488875

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    2. Well it's good, and in fact right and proper for the church to get involved in issues such as this. Otherwise, what are they for? That goes for Jewish and Islamic clergy as well.

      I have heard the current Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby as well as his predecessor Rowan Williams take the government to task on issues regarding poverty and welfare. No doubt seen as 'do gooders' by some, at least they're speaking up.

      Whether it is enough however....

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  4. Surprisingly sympathetic article in the Mail:

    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2528083/Britain-isnt-eating-Duncan-Smiths-fury-Churchs-advent-campaign-says-benefit-cuts-forcing-poor-use-food-banks.html

    IDS going mental [of course] because the church have released an ad campaign demanding that something be done about benefit reform as so many are knocking on their doors for food charity. IDS response = 'It's scaremongering, political, etc etc etc....'

    The man is pathological. Anybody who watched the old BBC drama House of Cards [several shades above the recent American adaptation as it happens] will see several similarities between IDS and Francis Urqhart, the protagonist of the series.

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    1. There are some key differences though; Urquhart is amoral rather than mistakenly believing he is fighting the good fight; Urquhart is urbane, sophisticated and would fit in pretty much anywhere; despite being a psychopath, Urquhart is a captivating character and compelling antihero rather than a ludicrous and hoarse nonentity.

      Crucially,Urquhart above all is competent and achieves what he sets out to do, one way or another. I don't think anyone could, with the best will in the world, say the same of IDS.

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  5. An old friend of mine seems to be a staunch Tory supporter. According to him, the present govt’s program of Welfare Reform is “fair” to about 80% of Benefits claimants. Therefore my friend excuses the blunders made by IDS & his acolytes on the basis that to end up with only 20% unfairness and money-wastage rates are reasonably good results.

    It is true that no Parliament ever gets things 100% right but this imperfect system is called “democracy.”

    My friend lives near Winchester in Hampshire – part of the traditional Tory heartlands, I suspect. I live a bit further South, towards but not in Southampton, in Neanderthal territory that is controlled convincingly by the Lib-Dems politically. In Southampton itself about half of the MPs are Labour. I don’t know the extent to which this sort of ‘geo-political ribbon’ is typical in the UK.

    What I, personally, think of the present bunch of Tory MPs is unprintable. Especially IDS because his policies affect me directly but they have no effect on my Winchester-based friend’s life.

    Therefore, I think we all need to take a step back from the vicissitudes imposed on Benefits claimants by the Tories. The ideology of right-winger Tories includes smashing up the concept of the Welfare State. Apparently, even the Chingford Skinhead approved of the deeply dim, dishonest and deluded IDS because IDS was/is so rabidly right-wing:

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iain_Duncan_Smith

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  6. Ironically, they claim that Labour was "something for nothing", yet New Deal was sending people on Work Placements for anything from six to three months, yet the Work Programme didn't require work placements at all. Even Flexible New Deal required four weeks of work placement.

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    1. What you have to remember is that the Work Programme was supposedly the cheapest of recent programmes, so it's quite possible that there wasn't enough money in the pot to put people on placements. You do remember what many people's answer to the question "what training is available?" was, don't you?

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    2. I think that probably has a lot to do with it. Various employers & organisations I am or have been associated with have been approached about hosting placements at various points. Putting aside the rights and wrongs of hosting compulsory placements (for the record, none of them did and none of them will, as long as I have any say) the amount on offer has been pitiful, whether it's been MWA, some local pilot schemes within the Work Programme or (most recently) CWP. Figures of £4-10 per week were not uncommon.

      Now, that might work for you if you're planning on displacing paid employees or offering a very bare-bones placement, but if you're a VCS organisation wanting to offer something that people may actually benefit from, it doesn't stack up financially, unless you've additional funding to make the placements useful. And if you did have additional funding, the best thing to do would be offer something voluntary and avoid the ethical problems and risk to reputation of being involved in a mandatory DWP programme.

      The point about the Work Programme being cheap though is important. I've tried without success to find the source, but I recall reading a paper a while ago that illustrated that UK spending on employment support is somewhat low by EU standards. The study was somewhat limited because of the difficulty in comparing spending power across different countries using different and often complex systems, but it made the point quite clearly that we keep asking more of jobseekers, whilst offering them very little in return.

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    3. Further to previous comment, I haven't been able to find the blog post or paper that I mentioned, but this chart illustrates that many countries with comparable unemployment rates spend a higher proportion of GDP on employment support / labour market programmes: http://epp.eurostat.ec.europa.eu/statistics_explained/index.php?title=File:LMP_expenditure_and_unemployment_rate,_2011.png&filetimestamp=20131111103949 - although that's for 2011.

      Full page is here: http://epp.eurostat.ec.europa.eu/statistics_explained/index.php/Labour_market_policy_expenditure - a wealth of interesting information.

      Finally, seasonal wishes to all and historian in particular for providing an excellent resource. To all posters and readers who come here because they're on the Work Programme or are otherwise looking for work, I hope 2014 works out well for you.

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    4. Thanks, Badger. Your wisdom and knowledge has been invaluable over the last year.

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  7. Error? http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-25504977 Don't you just love the DWP .....

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  8. It seems that the Tories have decided to clobber frail, vulnerable, elderly OAPs, just at the time when the weather might turn nasty:

    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/healthnews/10530467/Ministers-scrap-20m-scheme-to-keep-elderly-warm.html

    It is impossible to bury bad news by trying to hide it on Boxing Day.

    Luckily for me, I am not responsible for any OAPs so I have been able to focus on the new Habitual Residence Test instead:

    http://unemploymentmovement.com/forum/chat-a-rap/8243-uk-immigration-bill-could-create-climate-of-ethnic-profiling--unhcr

    This new Test purports to create two different classes of British Citizen, it appears. I am told that the EC and the UNHCR are both complaining and threatening Cameron Minor & Co, the immature stupidity of whom is amazing, imho.

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  9. I was a Roman Catholic, Technically i still am, but i call myself a humanist now, I personally dont believe in any divinity but i do believe that some people are inherently good, some try to be good and then theres the truly evil.. I try to help people when i can but i was helping so many that i was fading i had nothing left for me, I still help today but on my terms. Then you have certain groups who I believe IDS is one, who like the puritans think that this world is where people suffer then when they die they go to a better place. I quote these.

    And the LORD says, “What sorrow awaits Jehoiakim, who builds his palace with forced labor. He builds injustice into its walls, for he makes his neighbors work for nothing. He does not pay them for their labor. Jeremiah 22:13

    “There are six things that the Lord hates, seven that are an abomination to him: haughty eyes, a lying tongue, and hands that shed innocent blood, a heart that devises wicked plans, feet that make haste to run to evil, a false witness who breathes out lies, and one who sows discord among brothers. Proverbs 6:16-19.

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  10. Excellent. Incidentally, IDS occasionally attends (and speaks at) an RC church in Buckinghamshire a couple of friends go to. Being somewhat indisposed to religion and entirely antipathetic towards IDS I've never enquired too deeply into the content of his contributions, but I get the impression they're largely as one would expect in a church largely full with prosperous home county inhabitants with possibly limited personal experience of the social security system or of the impact of 'welfare reform'.

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