This post is so important we hope other Bloggers will carry the story that everyone will read it.
From the highly esteemed Blog Vox Political.
The following message appeared on the Vox Political Facebook page. It is reproduced in the hope that somebody from Prospects might have the courage to explain their organisation’s behaviour – and in the hope that this further evidence of the Coalition Government’s inhumanity to the citizens it has a duty to protect may encourage anyone who still thinks it’s a good idea to vote Tory or Lib Dem to think again. Here’s the message [boldings mine]:
I have terminal cancer. My prognosis is 0-3 years and I was diagnosed in March 2014 with my brain stem glioma.
In April 2014 I was placed in the support group for three years and I have gone from being able-bodied to hopelessly disabled. I have many neurological deficits including diploplia, dyspraxia, dysarthria and dysphagia. To save you Googling, this means that I have double vision and am going blind, I’m very clumsy and most days I drop everything I pick up, my speech is failing and one day I won’t be able to communicate verbally at all and I have such difficulty swallowing that I now have a feeding tube. I cannot leave the house alone and I’m at risk of choking and need 24 hour care. They speak of me going into residential care, but they hope to keep me in my own home for as long as possible.
The trouble is degenerative, nothing will get better, only worse, the cancer can’t be cured. I’m 37.
Now, I can deal with all that. I’m alive! And I can still do stuff!
What I cannot deal with is that I am on the work programme! I received this letter today (too late to ring the WP) demanding I come to an appointment with the Work Programme on Tuesday or they’ll stop my benefits.
HOW SICK DOES A PERSON HAVE TO BE BEFORE THE HARASSMENT STOPS?
It should be noted that Ms Ryan did not realise that the letter was for a telephone appointment until it was pointed out to her that she did not have to go to Prospects’ Bristol office. This is because the letter is very poorly-worded, as any reader can see.
Vox Political carries this story as well:
Woman’s benefits sanctioned when she is 23 weeks pregnant
They link to this: The Poor Side of Life.
23 week pregnant woman sanctioned.
The above woman (wearing costume so the Jobcentre staff don’t recognise her) was sanctioned when 23 weeks pregnant. The reason you may ask…. for attending a work fare interview (work for nothing) at B&Q.
Whilst at the interview they noticed that she was pregnant and they said yep we will put you on light duties…. The jobcentre decided otherwise… in their words “we are sanctioning you because you told them that you were pregnant”.
So in other words she was meant to break all health and safety laws in the uk and not declare that she was pregnant. How on earth can this be right? It isn’t. She was heartbroken. She had walked a few miles to this workfare interview and she saw it as her last hope of not being sanctioned.
Ashton Under Lyne Jobcentre knowingly target pregnant women. On one of our demonstrations 3 young women who were pregnant had told us that they were sanctioned. This is so wrong.
When asking the Jobcentre “advisor” how they were going to feed their unborn baby they were told… “tough your not ill your pregnant”.
This is the attitude at Ashton Under Lyne Jobcentre. This is why myself and others demonstrate. We need justice for the normal working class person.
Comment.
As I type this there is a chap at his wits’ end applying and applying for jobs on the library computers.
He has been sanctioned.
Hey, you c***s who work in Ashton Under Lyne Jobcentre – a very unmerry Christmas and a very unhappy new year to you! – BURN IN HELL YOU BASTARDS!
Ashton Under Lyne Jobcentre is staffed by SCUM!!
December 16, 2014 at 11:05 am
I agree: I am shattered by this act of wanton cruelty.
Andrew Coates
December 16, 2014 at 11:18 am
well you do get a few people pushed to the edge that end up taking a jerrycan of petrol and a lighter to their local jobcentre. I seem to remember someone being so stupid at Felixstowe (?) JCP I think it was.
Would that amount to burning in hell? lol
Universal Jobmatch
December 16, 2014 at 6:30 pm
You know ,,if workfare consisted of building hs2 , where the track led to a reopened belsen,, with the promise of carriages full to the brim of conservatives and their supporters,, looking forward to a fab day out soaking up the atmosphere of past torture and misery,, only to be confronted by complicit jobcentre staff manning the showers ,,,, then i would gladly take a pay cut to work on the project !
Blacksheepie
December 16, 2014 at 11:54 am
What kind of a country are we becoming when compassion and decency is so poorly rated. I would love to see these people on the receiving end of this treatment.
Carol Joyce
December 16, 2014 at 12:52 pm
It won’t be too long until they are on the receiving end.
enigma
December 17, 2014 at 11:44 am
Utterly disgusting. The PCS need to get involved. NOW!
ghost whistler
December 16, 2014 at 1:05 pm
When will the nadir of cruel indifference to the poor and the sick be reached?
I keep thinking (for some years now!) it has been reached, only to be continually bombarded with increasingly worse and worse cases…
It is worthwhile at this stage to post a video clip here in which Dennis Skinner MP condemned a case where a pregnant woman on a zero-hours contract job at Sports Direct actually gave birth in a Sports Direct toilet on New Year’s Day:
Is that the nasty nadir of the nasty party? Of course, it will only be a matter of time before something even more horrific comes along.
By the way, I understand the cancer victim’s case has been resolved by the speedy intervention of her MP, but the DWP letter telling the cancer victim to go on the Work Programme should NEVER have been sent in the first place – that is the point!
Tobanem
December 16, 2014 at 1:13 pm
It is high-time these abominable third-party cowboy ‘providers’ and their work programme, workfare crap were driven out of time… these fuckers in Prospects should be dragged from their cushy offices and hanged in the market square – SCUM!!
Hang third-party provider high!
December 16, 2014 at 2:41 pm
Reblogged this on sdbast.
sdbast
December 16, 2014 at 3:00 pm
These people know no boundaries,procedurally,legally or otherwise. the only time they’ve reacted is the mention of an appeal.they will try and getaway with anything they can.
people have said with cancer that they were told they would be better soon by jobcentre staff. its disgusting,barbaric treatment at a very traumatic time. it would shock anyone.
ken
December 16, 2014 at 3:39 pm
Well, we live in a very Politically Correct country.
Immigration is the golden political topic because no one can express how and what they think without being automatically branded a racist. Some racist people exist, but mostly people seem to think agencies shouldn’t be allowed to solely employ people abroad without looking here first – or at all, and hate how many foreign people are exploited on very low wages and poor conditions undercutting everyone else etc.
Anyway, without turning this topic on to immigration, my point is its not solely on a moral level as to why you do not pick on disabled and sick people, but also a political one.
For public sector workers, it should be an instant sacking, its an absolutely disgusting stance to have especially when their weekly death-threat abuse-report is someone dropping a pen on the desk or someone sneezing in front of them with their hands over their nose/face… a completely different world away from a terminal disease or on-going life-changing disability or illness.
Anyone with such an absence of humanity and sympathy, regardless if public sector, private sector or otherwise, who then build upon their evil selfish ways with such additional attacks against such disabled or sick person, should be sentenced to death by firing squad. IMO.
Universal Jobmatch
December 16, 2014 at 6:25 pm
Our view is that the Living Wage should be for all: £7.85 (minimum wage is £6.50) zero hour contracts should be banned, and people should have proper rights at work – making claims for unfair dismissal should be charged for.
“There was a good turnout for the DECENT JOBS WEEK stall in Ipswich on Monday.
We gave out leaflets on low pay and zero-hours contracts and gathered responses from members of the public.
* There are 1.4 million workers on zero-hours contracts, which is creating a two tier workforce, with those doing “precarious” jobs having the worst pay and employment rights.
* Zero-Hours workers earn £300/week less than permanent workers doing the same job
* 2 in 5 Zero-hours workers earn less than £111/week (the threshold for sick pay), compared to 1 in 12 permanent workers.
* Zero-hours contracts aren’t just common in distribution and retailing, they’re increasingly common in Education.
TUC research shows that 63 per cent of FE colleges and more than half of universities use zero-hours contracts, often in large numbers.
Frances O’Grady, TUC general secretary comments:
“The growth of zero-hours contracts, along with other forms of precarious employment, is one of the main reasons why working people have seen their living standards worsen significantly in recent years.”
https://scontent-a-lhr.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-xpa1/v/t1.0-9/10849805_772128972855017_5671818083533985703_n.jpg?oh=f5b355deeb4d73db6a64ca5c6deeb0c4&oe=55416837
Andrew Coates
December 17, 2014 at 11:04 am
I found out something very interesting a few weeks ago.
My understanding was holiday pay to be 5.6 weeks for fulltime, part time pro rata. This apparently is NOT calculated on actual hours worked but contractual hours. (In short, over time is excluded)
For example, if you employed someone for 8 hours per week (contractually), you would only need to pay them a pro rata amount of holiday for those 8 hours, even if they regularly did 28 hours per week.
On this logic, as far as I understand it, means zero hour contract workers would be entitled to no holiday pay at all.
This is a disgusting loophole that has been around for a very long time. This is before considering other NMW violations and the lack of a living wage.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-29896810
I am hoping they outlaw both Zero Hour contracts and contracts below 6-8 hours per week. If they don’t do the latter, it will be a loophole around these zero hour contracts.
Labour seem to be set on banning them (I seem to think they wont completely outlaw them but regulate them heavy so it would have little benefit to an employer) but most of these companies will just offer contracts on a 1-2 hour per week basis to side step it.
As for those avoiding the NMW – the Government has bigger fish to fry than worrying about businesses that exploit the lower end of the labour market. I do not mean tax evasion – something they keep evading to do.
Until they start jailing employers, threats of increased fines are a laughing matter. Anyone crafty enough to exploit workers and get away with it to date, will either shut down their company and open a new one to get around any major fines, or allow the fines to make a loss and reclaim it the following tax year (a fine no longer being a fine!)
Universal Jobmatch
December 17, 2014 at 12:21 pm
The available information as requested is shown in the table below.
JSA Sanction Decisions – Number of individuals with an adverse benefit sanction applied due to Failure to participate in the Community Work Placement, Great Britain by month: 28 April 2014 to 30 June 2014
Total
Apr-14
0
May-14
0
Jun-14
118
Source: DWP: Sanctions and Disallowance Decisions Statistics Database.
http://www.parliament.uk/business/publications/written-questions-answers-statements/written-question/Commons/2014-11-28/216371/
Andrew Coates
December 16, 2014 at 4:30 pm
Interesting that only data is available up to end of June 2014.
Even if the data was done quarterly and takes a month to process, figures for up to end of September should be available by now. I am sure it doesn’t look so good.
Universal Jobmatch
December 16, 2014 at 6:09 pm
When reading shameful accounts such as this poor woman’s, I can’t help but recall Rosa Luxemburg’s quote that “Bourgeois society stands at the crossroads, either transition to socialism or regression into barbarism.”
It appears that IDS and his scumbag mates in parliament, enthusiastically aided and abetted by equally scumbag jobcentre staff, have clearly opted for the latter.
Trevor
December 16, 2014 at 4:50 pm
OT
News – G4S guards Not Guilty over Jimmy Mubenga deportation death:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-30494548
Tobanem
December 16, 2014 at 5:09 pm
Cannot say I am surprised but I am disgusted about this news.
Lets hope it doesn’t turn out like America.
I watched a video on youtube the other day, seems in some areas private security firms have been deployed to act as police. They have SIA licences (which bouncers etc. have to have), basic training as part of getting such licence, but no actual authority to do anything.
Constable -> PCSO -> Private security
Universal Jobmatch
December 16, 2014 at 5:47 pm
I think ‘prospects’ take the piss. No one receiving a letter from them, unemployed, sick or disabled have any prospects going forward with them or the Work Programme they deliver.
This is bizarre, at first look I found it unsure to be a telephone interview due to the stated address and the whole “1:1 appointment” text. Then it states about phone availability… so is an phone interview.
You know if she doesn’t answer they would treat it as not turning up to the appointment and sanction, rather than trying to call her back again.
Never to fear, the letterhead clearly says they are positive about disabled people… Such accreditation appears to be given out like smarties just as much as the Investors in People… I know so many employers holding such accreditation that really don’t give a shit about their employees.
Universal Jobmatch
December 16, 2014 at 5:42 pm
What the fuck is the “1:1” bullshit about – is it some sort of ratio?
Einstein
December 16, 2014 at 6:24 pm
Iain Duncan Smith’s welfare saving in one shaming graph.
Iain Duncan Smith is the architect of the welfare cap.
Last year the Coalition government capped the amount of benefits working-age households could receive to £500 per week for families with children, and £350 per week for single people.
It has so far impacted 27,000 families, and caused a lot of pain. The final slap in the face is that it hasn’t saved the government that much.
Yesterday we finally found out how much it has saved.
Total savings = 0.05% of welfare spending
The welfare cap has so far saved around £100m a year, the Institute for Fiscal Studies says.
It may sound like a lot but it’s just 0.05% of the total welfare budget (£215bn) or 0.1% of its annual bill if we don’t count benefits for pensioners (£94bn).
If the Tories win the election, they have pledged to lower the welfare cap from the current £26,000-a-year per family to £23,000.
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/ampp3d/iain-duncan-smiths-welfare-saving-4818961
IDS is now confirmed as ‘The Architect Clown’ who hasn’t got a clue what he’s doing.
Obi Wan Kenobi
December 16, 2014 at 6:01 pm
I post the BBCs response to this just yesterday, even mentioned how only a feb this year it was quoted at 38’000 families would be effected so where did 11’000 families go that now has those liable to be effected down to 27’000.
Interestingly the BBC stated we spent so far 17 billion on housing yet I have it currently at 4.9 billion so what was 12.1 billion spent on ?
gaia
December 16, 2014 at 6:11 pm
As for Andrews recent post apart from sharing the shock and awe its obvious to see that both will be overturned so why do DWP consistently embarrass themselves as they will still have to give every penny back so their not even saving money.
Now I know some are already doing this but please may I ask you that currently don’t to print this case and others out and post them outside all DWP offices and disused shop windows in towns and cities. When you buy a newspaper, slip one in as many as the others as you can without being seen, If you see a notice board, pin one on it. I believe you get the gist.
If the press and the committee aren’t prepared to act then it is up to us to bring these two and every other case to the publics attention.
gaia
December 16, 2014 at 6:21 pm
Some good ideas of how to get the word out. I really like the newspaper idea.
Universal Jobmatch
December 16, 2014 at 6:33 pm
Reblogged this on Britain Isn't Eating.
A6er
December 16, 2014 at 10:07 pm
FAO “Universal Jobmatch”
I think I posted this clip before for your attention, but after your remarks about a firing squad as the remedy for the crimes against the poor and the sick, there is no harm in doing so again.
Quite a few people are thinking the same way:
Tobanem
December 17, 2014 at 9:02 am
Invitations go out for Conservative fundraiser.
Guests at Black and White Ball in February will pay up to £15,000 for privilege of sharing table with senior Tory minister.
Invitations have been sent out for a Conservative fundraising event due to be held in February at a five-star London hotel, where donors have been asked to pay up to £1,500 a head for a ticket.
The lucrative and glitzy evening – the party’s Black and White Election Fundraiser – will be one of the party’s principal fundraising events in the run up to next May’s general election.
http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2014/dec/16/conservative-fundraiser-black-and-white-ball-invitations
I’ll bet they won’t even spare a though for the homeless or people who can’t even afford to eat right this Christmas.
TORY SNOUTS IN THE TROUGH!
Obi Wan Kenobi
December 17, 2014 at 11:32 am
We need to gatecrash the party. Some undercover filming. A protest.
Would be horrible publicity before the 2015 General Election a few months away after that event. These fundraising events is all about people trying to buy influence… £15k buys you nothing, but an arrangement of what you can expect in return for the guarantee of investing substantial sums of money.
Universal Jobmatch
December 17, 2014 at 11:56 am
Legislating against homelessness
December the 15th
” For some 17 years, Christopher Ubsdell was periodically homeless and struggling to survive on the streets of London, often wandering around the Charing Cross area of the British capital. He says that in recent years he has witnessed attitudes hardening toward the poorest people in society.
“What you have is a wide-ranging political agenda across the whole spectrum of government, where they are criminalizing homeless people and criminalizing people on benefits. If anything goes wrong in society they always blame it on the people who cannot defend themselves, and homeless is one of those categories,” the 31-year-old told MintPress.
Ubsdell is greatly concerned over the criminalization of homelessness in Britain. As in parts of the United States, where homeless people are harassed by the authorities via bans on loitering, panhandling and sleeping in public places, the U.K. government seems increasingly intent on making life intolerable for people who do not have a home. The problem is particularly acute in London, where there is little affordable housing at a time when rents are rocketing — a toxic combination that’s forced poorer people onto the streets where life is increasingly fraught.”
http://www.mintpressnews.com/the-uk-is-outlawing-homelessness/199886/
Andrew Coates
December 17, 2014 at 12:02 pm
Andy, I was watching that documentary about Oxford Street.
Whereas, I appreciate tourists, residents and businesses alike do not want to see homeless people in the street – sleeping rough is apparently an anti-social crime. Anyhow, the police approached a man and banned him from the area for 2 days! This cannot be legal.
I know anti-homeless laws (such as vagrants – although no evidence to suggest this man I am referring to, has ever begged for money) have gone back hundreds of years.
One guy got jailed for 2 weeks for breaching the 40 (?) hour ban (also missed a court hearing I believe).
The other groups they also approach are largely Romanian – this is why I am anti-EU. You cannot blame these people coming here looking for a better life. As long as we are part of the EU, these poor people have to be treated like our very own – and why not, they are just as human – so attitudes to rid them off the street is ludicrous.
EU wont allow the control of our borders. Its not about stopping European immigrants “stealing our jobs” as one of the infamous expressions go; but to ensure they can afford to live here (even on a shoe string budget, with a roof over their head). As long as the Government wants to remain in the EU, they need to then fork the costs to eliminating overseas residents taking to the streets as their home – and doing something to house them.
As for UK-based homelessness, it is being more and more criminalised as time goes on. Not so long ago Westminster (surprise, surprise) began to move the homeless out
https://intensiveactivity.wordpress.com/2010/12/15/westminster-council-to-cleanse-borough-of-homeless-benefit-claimants/ I guess to be fair, being in the same Borough as Parliament and Whitehall gives politicians a guilty conscience and as anyone can appreciate this is against their rights, no one well-paid and in a position of power should have to put up with this in the workplace and in the vicinity of the workplace. *cough*
Universal Jobmatch
December 17, 2014 at 1:03 pm
People aggressively accosting you for money round Dog’s Head Street/Tacket Street can be very unpleasant – and I wouldn’t like to be an elderly woman approached by them.
I am pro-European Union – we need rights and good jobs for all. We need to bring standards – pay and benefits – up to the best levels.
Once we start fighting among ourselves where does it end? The list of groups to pick on would be endless.
UKIP is the anti-EU campaign distilled and they hate all the unemployed: they want workfare for everybody on the dole.
While the Suffolk Tories live on many times our incomes in their chocolate box villages outside of Ipswich.
One chap I know who has become homeless is now in the Christmas Night Shelter and out on the streets during the day.
I have not incidentally seen non-UK homeless people in Ipswich – the Big Issue sellers you are talking about are not ‘homeless’.
The Big Issue is a con through and through – and the problem there is the vanity and money-making schemes of John Bird covered by his friends in the government.
Andrew Coates
December 17, 2014 at 5:38 pm
I better point out I am NOT in favour of UKIP. (Don’t want anyone getting the wrong idea!) They are basically the Eurosceptic conservatives. The only thing they have is wanting “independence” that alone is not enough.
We need strong ties with Europe but I feel it can be more on the basis of the United Nations (which was basically a replacement for the early concept organisation League of Nations) rather than the whole EU system which is more geared over other states deciding what is best and dissolving the whole concept of being a sovereign nation.
I am very fond of the United Nations (ILO, WHO etc) which most countries are member states (only a few that haven’t joined) and international co-operation is extremely important. Its a shame that the EU couldn’t have been more UN-like, but maybe that will change over time?
I happen to think politicians over the years have got more and more lazy, only implementing EU directives etc. and ECJ/ECHR judgements rather than new laws for the benefit of all.
I agree about the Big Issue.
Andy, would you say the beggars in that part of town have increased in recent times? I seem to have avoided them quite a bit (apart from the Big Issue sellers always around Sainsburys or Buttermarket – its the same woman who has been doing that for years!) but a couple of years ago a guy basically followed me from Sainsburys (was walking from Dog Head Street) up to the top end of Upper Brook Street.
I can understand how many would feel insecure. At first it was the most sincere ask, followed by the “second swipe” (i.e. for those who half felt like giving money but decided not to) by asking again. Fair play. Then being harassed all the way up the street really wasn’t pleasant. It was like being forced to give money (I had no money on my person anyhow) By the time I got past Buttermarket/Caffe Nero – I was preparing for a fight. I thought he would probably attempt to assault me (as he hadn’t given up, likely to rob) so I was focused and prepared to hit him if he came within 50cms of me. Time I got to Northgate Street he left me alone.
Universal Jobmatch
December 17, 2014 at 6:38 pm
Some of them have disappeared – there were court cases (not just about that alone).
But just after writing the comment I saw a chap in a sleeping bag outside the mini-Waitrose by the Corn Exchange.
It’s a real problem and it’s not going away.
As I live by the centre I see it a lot.
Nobody seems to know how to help them get out this position.
Well – how about some permanent Hostel and some minimum benefits.
Andrew Coates
December 18, 2014 at 11:40 am
What about the “beggars” sat right next to the ATM machines – intimidating or what?
ATM
December 17, 2014 at 10:17 pm
YES LOWER BROOK STREET AND CARR STREET
atm2
December 18, 2014 at 8:37 am
THERE IS THE OLD FONTAIN BAR IN OLD FOUNDRY ROAD NEXT TO THE VILSON CAR WASH OPPOSITE THE LIBRARY. THAT COULD BE EASILY MADE AVAILABLE PLUS THE FORMER FAIRFIELDS CARE HOME ON TUDDENHAM ROAD JUST PASSED CHRISTCHURCH PARK. THATS EMPTY NOW TOO
NORTHOLT
December 18, 2014 at 12:51 pm
Exactly ATM – but the best known one is ‘not around’ now.
Andrew Coates
December 18, 2014 at 12:49 pm
baby shower centerpieces for tables
Dying Woman Forced onto Work Programme: How Far Can Cruelty Go? | Ipswich Unemployed Action.
baby shower centerpieces for tables
February 10, 2015 at 7:36 pm