Channel Four to Screen Hate Attack on Unemployed.
How Johnny Void sees it.
Channel Four ”Tricks of the Dole Cheats”,
Reporter Morland Sanders investigates Jobcentre Plus, the organisation tasked with getting Britain back to work and cracking down on dole cheats. With the help of jobseekers, undercover filming and a former insider, the programme reveals the shirkers’ tricks that make it easy to cheat the system.
And for the next trick Channel Four has a go at all those dodgey crips and spazs…
Me old Grannie would say, Channel Four is bleeding filth.
Categories: Campaigns for Unemployed, Cuts
Channel Four, dole, media
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More money goes unclaimed that could be claimed legitimately than is lost through benefit fraud. Often this is because of the sheer complexity of the forms claimants have to fill in, or because people simply feel “uncomfortable” about claiming. But this is rarely stated in the media, particularly the tabloids, so the misconceptions about “rampant” fraud in the system go on unchallenged.
And as for the cost of tax evasion…
Channel Four is bleeding filth. Now… where did I put me bleeding teef…
On the same day as Channel 4′s Dispatches programme, Jobcentre staff go on strike over call centre conditions:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2012/aug/13/jobcentre-staff-strike?CMP=twt_fd
Meanwhile, over at the Daily Mail, “disgusted” Emma Harrison justifies herself over that incredible 8.6 Million salary:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2187087/A4e-Emma-Harrison-Paying-8-6m-tax-payers-money-right-thing-do.html?ITO=1490
Note, the Daily Mail are unable to accept comments on that story because of “legal reasons”!!
Interesting to note that call centre staff are on strike due to ‘An oppressive regime’ and ‘Unrealistic targets’. Now they know how the unemployed feel when they have to deal with the DWP. Now that’s what I call Karma!
Meanwhile at the Daily Mail it is still playing 3rd Reich and Roll
http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/greenslade/2012/aug/13/dailymail-twitter?newsfeed=true
Slight change of subject here: A VICTORY OVER ATOS
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/disabled-woman-took-on-welfare-system–and-won-8037165.html
Back to channel 4′s programme last night.
Right at the start the reporter said “if Jobcentre Plus does not work, then Britain does not work”.
What claptrap. Given that two thirds of all jobs don’t get advertised in the first place, and further given that Jobcentre Plus don’t get all of the remaining third, then it is absurd to say that Jobcentre Plus is indispensable in geting Britain back to work.
If Jobcentre Plus only advertises a small fraction of all availalble jobs in the first place, then it can be no wonder the result is that Jobcentre Plus only manages to get a small fraction of unemployed people into work.
The only solution is to have an adequate level of real jobs available to all of the unemployed. If these real jobs don’t exist in adequate numbers – and they don’t – then all the rest is smoke and mirrors, conjuring tricks, propaganda and lies!
It seemps pretty pointless to me to have the Tories push their benefit-cutting ideology at a time when quite simply there are not enough proper paid jobs around for all of the unemployed. But no one will listen to the voice of plain reason – not surprisingly, because the DWP, ATOS and the privatised Welfare-to-Work Industry are not part of the world of plain reason!
I watched this programme with interest last night. From the title I expected it to be attacking unemployed people, labelling them lazy scroungers. I feel it should have been called ‘The incompetence of the Job Centres’ or ‘Job Centres – fit for purpose?’. Everything that was revealed showed just how useless the Job Centres really are. A former Job Centre Adviser said he had received no training on how to help people find work, and he also said that if he was looking for a job he would not use the Job Centre. An employer also said she would not use the Job Centre after bad experiences. Channel 4 even set up its own Job Centre for a day using experienced employment consultants, and the people who used it said it was very helpful and nothing like the ‘normal’ Job Centre. For me the best part was when the person in overall charge of the Job Centre network was interviewed towards the end where she tried to blag her way out of everything. She referred to things that were blatantly wrong as ‘disappointing’ and made herself look stupid when she tried to claim that jobs working in the Job Centre itself were advertised in the Job Centre, when clearly they were not. She went away for quite a while and returned with printouts. The printouts she produced were from January but the interviewer had mentioned May. In the time she was gone she could have created them there and then and put them on the system herself. I wondered why Duncan-Smith or Grayling weren’t being interviewed, perhaps it was because they couldn’t have a go at unemployed people when the department they are responsible for was shown as being totally incompetent.
Personally I thought the whole programme was incredibly amateurish. The stuff you mention Blackpool about the employer sounded to me like typical boss whingeing. I would lay a heavy bet that most of their claims would not stand serious investigation.
Definitely an attack on the JCP rather than a broadside at the unemployed – that much is a relief. But I just wonder whether this marks the start of a campaign or softeneing up process to privatise most of the remaining functions of the job centre.
Another pay day in the offing for pimps?
Channel Four now want to get stuck into the Private Providers, because they are much much worse at getting the unemployed into work than the Jobcentre ever has been.
I have some sympathy with the employer. Several years ago I worked in a HR department, dealing primarily with recruitment. After I had been there several weeks I advised managers not to place their vacancies in the Job Centre (use local media instead). This was due to the cost involved in sending out application packs, many of which never came back completed, or of those that did come back the applicants were clearly not qualified/interested in the job. The vast majority of these were from Job Centre applicants, and I took the view that people were only applying to meet the conditions of their Job Seekers Agreement. When I have signed on in the past I have always made this point to Job Centre staff but their reply has always been ‘If you don’t apply we will stop your benefit’. Since the introduction of the Job Seekers Act in 1996 the number of private employment agencies has grown exponentially. I believe this is due to the fact that employers would prefer to pay a fee to agencies, rather than use Job Centres where the service is marketed as free but in reality the cost, in terms of materials, time and postage, is actually higher.
Months ago I was refused a job log from the jobcentre and was told that all of my job searching must be handled by my WP provider as the job centre was no longer responsible for it.
Last week out of the blue when I went to sign on I was threatened with benefit sanctions because I didn’t have my job log with me. Now I know why