My OperaDWP Watch
Sunday, January 20, 2008 5:24:22 PM
I went for an interview on Thursday. It was for a really important course where I would gain all the skills necessary to get myself a well-paid job. Or at least that was the government propaganda.
Looking over the skills list there is pretty much nothing that I have not covered already. I even have qualifications in most of them. So why should I waste the government's money? The answer - dear reader - is compulsion.
Benefit claiments are the current "whipping boys" of the UK powers that be. It has been single mothers, immigrants (illegal or otherwise), the idle poor and .... well any other group that doesn't have the muscle to fight back. There has to be some scape goat else people might actually think that government itself might be responsible (unthinkable!!!).
So the current wisdom (irony!) is that all claimants must attend a training course to make them more acceptable to UK employers. It is a "one size fits all" system (with a brief nod to token tailoring). 30 hours a week wasted in central Wakefield.
At the end of 13 weeks some employer will snap me up. I will have had the equivalent of a tv makeover. All glittering smile, smart suite and loadsamoney - I think not.
Of course the fact that I'm unemployed in the first place is entirely my fault. If only I would get up off my backside and go look for a job (Tebbit's famous 'on your bike') all would be well. The only reason for not working is my idleness.
This presumes that the government of the day (or the previous mob) have no control over employment levels - any economist will tell you that is nonsense. It is no coincidence that employers have the whip hand. So called 'New Labour' have done their damnest to resist beneficial labour laws coming out of Brussels. Thatcher destroyed the power of the Unions. Blair crowed over the number of new jobs in the UK created by EU expansion. It only came out later that the majority had gone to Eastern European immigrants.
And ... oh yes ... the next time they announce the unemployment figures (heavily massaged as the are) listen carefully for the number of vacancies. There's always a shortfall!
Looking over the skills list there is pretty much nothing that I have not covered already. I even have qualifications in most of them. So why should I waste the government's money? The answer - dear reader - is compulsion.
Benefit claiments are the current "whipping boys" of the UK powers that be. It has been single mothers, immigrants (illegal or otherwise), the idle poor and .... well any other group that doesn't have the muscle to fight back. There has to be some scape goat else people might actually think that government itself might be responsible (unthinkable!!!).
So the current wisdom (irony!) is that all claimants must attend a training course to make them more acceptable to UK employers. It is a "one size fits all" system (with a brief nod to token tailoring). 30 hours a week wasted in central Wakefield.
At the end of 13 weeks some employer will snap me up. I will have had the equivalent of a tv makeover. All glittering smile, smart suite and loadsamoney - I think not.
Of course the fact that I'm unemployed in the first place is entirely my fault. If only I would get up off my backside and go look for a job (Tebbit's famous 'on your bike') all would be well. The only reason for not working is my idleness.
This presumes that the government of the day (or the previous mob) have no control over employment levels - any economist will tell you that is nonsense. It is no coincidence that employers have the whip hand. So called 'New Labour' have done their damnest to resist beneficial labour laws coming out of Brussels. Thatcher destroyed the power of the Unions. Blair crowed over the number of new jobs in the UK created by EU expansion. It only came out later that the majority had gone to Eastern European immigrants.
And ... oh yes ... the next time they announce the unemployment figures (heavily massaged as the are) listen carefully for the number of vacancies. There's always a shortfall!
