Empowerment and benefits reform

nobody@vox.com(liberal provocateur) — Fri, 09 Nov 2007 02:25:59 -0800

All the parties are talking about 'Empowerment and choice', shame none seem to walk the walk when it comes to actually reforming the benefits systems.

As it stands the benefit systems only benefits two sets of people, neither of whom are supposed to be served by it -- DWP Middle Management and Fraudsters, who both game the system for their own ends.

Unemployment benefit (or jobseekers allowance, or whatever name they choose this few years) and job centres are based around anybody who doesn't have job waiting, queuing, and dossing rather than doing anything useful with their time. Training is based on a limited choice of mickey mouse courses, designed to fill low paid and part time work in call centres or stacking shelves.

The whole system is in need of total reworking to suit the needs of people looking for or unable to work.

* unemployment benefit should be about actively seeking work not 'being available for work' - an afternoon a week applying for jobs is better than all week watching jeremy kyle and this morning - you should be able to spend a 'reasonable' ammount of time on education or care or voluntary work without being penalised instead of being limited to 8 hours a week.
* training should be about getting a good job, not call centres - graduates and other experienced or highly skilled jobseekers should be able to get appropriate training, not mickey mouse nvq courses, there are a wide range of fulltime and parttime courses, both onsite and from home - better to send people on the right course than have a hundred more people with the same useless handful of NVQs
* anybody with a disability applying for benefits should be provided with support and help in their application, everybody applying for benefits should receive help and support with their application, preventing fraud comes after delivering the service - not before!
* The job centre should take an active role in helping people who are unemployed, they should be scouting for voluntary work, courses, grants for businesses or projects, etc to help make people either more employable or more useful. Currently this isn't the case at all - I've never seen anybody in a job centre say "I found this that could help you" it's always "well you'll have to do this <insert mickey mouse course, or a job on the checkout in a supermarket>" regardless of qualifications, interests, skills, experience or age.

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Liberal Provocateur

Empowerment and benefits reform