I have been on jobseekers for 2 years while i personally have little issues with them, I know other people go rather angry when money gets stopped etc yet I am always told by them it is because there money has been stopped yet when I ask why ?, The general answer is because I didn't do my job searches. Now I know it is easy for some and hard for others to do those tasks. Then I know that people lose it with the jobcentre but at the end of the day they are also getting pressure from there managers and goverment I am not taking sides I try and see it from both points of view. I know it is easy for me to say because I have not had any issues.

I am curious do you think the jobcentre are being too harsh or making it too easy ??

Also there have been talk of if you unemplyed for more than 2 yrs you may get put on 6 months volunteer placement for 30 hours a week/ sign on every day (mo to fri) or join a training programme.

What are peoples thoughts on this good idea or waste of time??

I think it is both good and bad people may get experiance in areas they need but if they are being made to go they may not have the motivation to want to do it and having benefits held hostage can be scary especially if you are relying on it..

Main reason I mention all this is I watched a documentry on channel 5 about life on the dole in britian

They were people with a large amount of children which I am all for people having kids but if you know you can;t get money to support them dial it down abit

Another guy was on the dole and saying he has big t.v and games consoles and asking why should he NOT have them. Ideally the money is meant to be used to help you get into work and cover living.

There was also people complaining about the housing the had been put in which I thought was unfair if you have large family and you can't come with the amount you have fair enough but when you have enough room and then demand to get more I think that is pushing it

Anywho thoughts ?

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A serious topic? Here?! I love it!

I think the Conservative's stance on jobseekers is ridiculous. I think it's overly harsh and the money they are pulling back from the poor (by denying jobseekers) is there to be advantageous to the rich who could easily take bigger cuts.

Though yes I can confirm those "volunteer placement" programs are in place though they last longer than 6 months, I've heard of upwards of a year of essentially slave labour where the company doesn't pay for people.

It's a bad idea because...well people want to get jobs right? Why would companies EVER pay for people when the government can give them slaves who they'll pay for in their place. It's a detrimental system and it overlooks existing options. My girlfriend worked in a charity shop volunteering while on Jobseekers and they wanted to put her on a work placement elsewhere despite her already doing volunteer work.

It's a horrible cruel system. The people at jobseekers get paid a bonus if they catch someone cheating on benefits. I get it's important to stop benefit cheats but by reinforcing it with bonuses you increase the chances that innocents will get harassed and preyed on far more for it which is why they come across as such horrible places.

As for children I understand some people have children for benefits which is horrible but it's not always a case of "only have as many kids as you can provide for". My girlfriend's mother was part of triplets, that's going to be a massive drain on resources but she couldn't have helped triplets.

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Wow , well I must have an ok jobcentre advisor then because had to go for post-work programme interview and he was really laid back and easy going and he said because you done alot of courses and already doing volunteer work ge will just leave me to your own devices,
When issue of travel to interview money was brought up he told me how the jobcentres stance on it is but discreetly tried to tell me even thought not meant to give him a call and he will try and help. So I think I was lucky guy I have seems to be quite laid back . We did have a long conversation on bad press they got and rumors of targets for sanctions.
I was nto aware of the bonus aspect for benefits cheats but if people are going to cheat the system and they do they should be punished , what I don't like is hearing about people getting sancationed if they are more than 5 mins late to an appointment and I have been told alot of sanactions can be done to poor admin on the jobcentres part.
Fair enough if you plan for kids but have more than you planned it does happen the documntary I watched had a guy with 26 kids all living under same roof minus maybe 2 olders ones. He was DEMANDING the council give him a bigger house :O.

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My Arbeitsamt, you know the place you go to to register when you are unemployed, is completely different. While you do get a certain amount of money if you are unemployed, you only have the right to get it if you have paid into the system priorly, from a previous job and its a percentage of what you previously earned. While there's also money for people who haven't had steady jobs priorly, you aren't entitled to it if you live with someone who "earns too much".

I've been searching for jobs off and on for a good 6 - 7 years now, ever since I finished high school. I went to a junior college once, then an odd job here or there and the cosmetician school, some more odd jobs... but none of those jobs were steady ones, above the minijob line which would've given me social security (I'm currently self-insured I guess you'd call it, although my mother has to pay the monthly fee) and paid into the system. The other type of unemployment money I cannot get because they say my mother earns too much. And while that may be true - we're not rich, we're not poor, but we do live decently enough - that doesn't help the fact that all of that is her money and I don't have unrestricted access to it. So I'm not getting any money. Except for the odd moments of "Take a twenty and buy this, keep the change for yourself" and such.

When I was still registered there, I had bi-weekly meetings that took about 30 minutes where we talked about the jobs I was looking for, in which department, then the guy (or woman, my person kept changing whenever I registered) would spend the next 15 minutes checking on his computer for places and printed them out, telling me I had to apply to those by the next time. Once they also sent me to a workshop on how to improve my actions during an interview but that didn't help much and also an in-house workshop of changing my CV's look and how to write a proper letter of application. Given that I'm still jobless, not sure if those things really helped.

After a while, I unregistered and will not be going back, because those meetings waste my time. It's thirty minutes of someone looking online by inputting the job type I'm trying to apply to and marking them. That's the exact thing I already do at home, so I failed to see the point in going somewhere every two weeks to watch someone else do the same stuff I do, minus the immedate action of applying.

I don't know about those volunteer things, I don't think my place had those. Although I do have to say, what's the point in working there if you don't get paid? I get the experience part, but a little payment would be nice. Doesn't even have to be much, but just something, so you feel like you aren't wasting your time working for someone for free when you could've grabbed a job during the time you were there.

C-A

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Yes by the point where people are having that many children just so they have money from the council I think something should be done. However all the options are horrific considering the circumstances. You could take a child away from the parent which is pretty monstrous or you could refuse and let the children fall into poverty. It's a lose lose situation for the government.

As for your guy yeah he does sound like a pretty chilled advisor but another problem is it's a target-based system. They don't care how likely or whether you are even qualified for a job so long as you meet your quota...which is a problem as it means they care less for the quality of the application and whether you actually get a job. They arguably benefit from you NOT getting a job as it keeps them in business. Some companies (particularly big ones like GAME, Tesco, etc) they get a massive amount of applicants and so to trim down on this process they keep applications sent into them for 6 months. Or at least that's what they say, it might just be a tactic the reduce the sheer number of applications they get. In any case my girlfriend was being told to apply for jobs in those stores WEEKLY even when due to this policy they won't consider the application she sends in.

I'm certain advisers at the job centre aren't bad people...but the might be overly jaded due to dealing with a lot of bad people at times.
Still I have no problem with cheats being punished by no means but by rewarding the person who finds the cheats it encourages them to be harsher and scrutinise everyone. What might be an honest mistake someone didn't notice might be taken for a benefit cheat.



You kinda answered your own question there: Experience.
The government-enforced work experience...yeah it's slave labour basically. You will get your unemployment benefit but not actual pay from the company and from the hours you work? The unemployment benefit will work out as substantially lower than if you had an actual wage now I'm not talking like sweat shop wages literally but basically that.

In other situations volunteer jobs are typically done by places that don't have a lot of money to offer anyway. Charity shops, shelters, animal care units...these places don't make a lot of money on their own and when they do it's for a higher cause so only managerial levels get paid there where others join from the goodness of their heart or for some experience.

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Okay, I probably should've pointed out, I was looking at this thing more from my point of view. If you're someone like me, who isn't getting any unemployment money and has no proper money of their own to spend, such a volunteer thing with no payment seems like a waste of time, no matter how good the Experience is.

C-A

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Unemployment seems an increasing problem in developed countries, and I can see why that is happening. If you have low birth rates and a good education system, you'll most likely create less jobs (because your overall population is decreasing) and set high standards for the people applying for those jobs, because most of them had a good education and you need a criteria (such as experience) to select them. This will lead to the scenario we see today: many people competing for a job that is not even worth their potential, what is very, very sad.

Regarding government's assistance, I'm not against it, I just think its main goal should always be helping people to be self-sufficient (which is what they want anyway). Yeah some people become too laid back or discouraged to search for jobs because government is helping them, but that's a shitty excuse to be against all forms of government assistance. It's very easy to say government assistance shouldn't exist when you were born in a privileged environment.

I am glad this topic is getting replies thanks guys :).

I do volunteer and they couldnt afford to pay me as we rely heavily on donations mainly to get the money we need and have to do things to get money

As for what a previous poster said why would places pay to employ people when they can get people from the jobcentre who have to do it or face losing money . I agree it is a big topic of discussion with some of my friends as we all agree that because places that we want to work because we are able to get people for free from the jobcentre which makes it harder to get work :(.

But it is laughable they call it volunteery placement yet you are being forced into it , so its not volunteery :(

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Agreed though don't worry it's nice to have some proper discussion about real things from time to time.

What's worse is when they rip people out of already existing volunteering jobs and forcing them into ones that might not really be all that useful.

From what I remember, when my girlfriend (barely) escaped the forced labour program they were going to kick her out of a volunteering job she'd gotten herself in a charity shop which is retail experience and put her (and everyone else on the program) into manual labour volunteering.

I mean at a certain point it just comes off as shady, of course my girlfriend is better off getting experience in retail than manual labour. I apologise as I might be talking nonsense here: You don't get any skilled experience from manual labour other than understanding the infrastructure of like a building site or litterpicking. All the experience you get in manual labour you could easily get in the gym working out a bit. They don't care about people's individual talents and the like they just want them shifted out the way so they don't have to deal with them.

It reminds me of the last Quarter of the Shawshank redemption, where the Warden starts organising "community work programs" to develop skills for the inmates when they get out when in actuality he's taking a small cut of the profits in order to provide cheap slave labour for the people whose stuff the inmates build.

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THat is true that is one of my fears I would be ripped from where I am to somewhere else I mentioned this to my advisor and he said since you are already in one you should be fine if someone does try to shift you tell them to speak with me because ultimatly I am responsible for you ( which was nice in a way if any other advisor tells me different to him ( which does happen) I can refer them to him lol .
Well with manual labor now you need a CSCS card ( at least in the uk) without one people can't do it anyway.

I have noticed with some people that the JC doesnt take into account indiviual circumstances a friend of mine has a child yet she is still expected to do 8-5 shifts day and work weekends when she explained her getting childcare is hard for her. Also at the end of the day would suck for a parent to get a job only to then have to pay most of the wages back into childcare which is a annoying cycle.

Lol to the shawshank link :D

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