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Benefits System overhaul

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Oneeyedvic | 16:21 Mon 21st Jul 2008 | News
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http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7516551 .stm

Benefit claimants could be forced to pick up litter and erase graffiti under plans to be unveiled by ministers.

The Welfare Green Paper is set to include proposals to force those unemployed for more than two years to work full-time in the community.

Incapacity benefit will be scrapped as part of a scheme to get more people claiming the benefit back to work.

Minister James Purnell says the plans are "revolutionary". The Tories say they had many of the ideas first.

This shake-up will apply to all 4.5 million people on out-of-work benefits, but is expected to impact most on those on Jobseekers Allowance.

Conservative support

Under plans laid out in the Green Paper, claimants will have to carry out four weeks' community work once they have been unemployed for more than a year.

After two years, they will be ordered to work full-time in the community.

Incapacity Benefit claimants will all move to the new Employment Support Allowance by 2013, which ministers hope will be regarded, for all but the most disabled people, as a temporary benefit

About time?

Is this far enough?
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No the scheme does not go far enough. The American model stopped all payments after a period of time and people had to rely on soup kitchens to survive. We should do the same!

Before welfare payments were so readily available this country had full employment.

If they were to adopt strict measures the same should exist for employers to take on skilled workers and not throw them on the rubbish heap at 45 or below..
Yeah lets all do the same as America, because there it's so great, people robbing grocery stores to feed their families. What an example to choose, widely known as the most ineffective system in the world... I really just don't have the words.
Before welfare payments were so readily available this country had full employment.


Oh no it didn't. In the UK in 1932 unemployment was 22%.
No DSS then.
>people robbing grocery stores to feed their families.

Yes we have such a great benefit system here in the UK that nobody ever robs grocery stores, post offices, banks, pubs, garages or off licenses do they !!
>Benefit claimants could be forced to pick up litter and erase graffiti under plans to be unveiled by ministers.

The reason this system NEVER works is that somebody has to watch the person picking up the litter or clearing up graffiti to make sure they do it.

What is the point of paying somone just to watch others pick up litter. And if the person does not want to pick up litter they just wont do it.

I saw on the news a woman who said her son got community service and had to do so many hundred hours.

Each day he was suppoed to do it he got a phone call in the morning saying dont bother to turn up, there is nobody to monitor you.

Give claiments 3 months to find a "proper" job, and then stop the payments.

Hundreds of thousands of people have come to this country in the last few years from other EU countries and found work, so anyone who is on the dole for over 3 months is just a scrounger.
There is a lot of critisism from people on answerbank about immigrants (from myself included).

But every day I get leaflets through my door with details of a new indian restaurant, or local ethnic take away, or other ethnic business.

At least some of these people WANT to run a business, WANT to earn money, WANT to make something of their lives. So much so that they pound the streets putting leaflets through everyones door.

How many white English people sit on the ar5e in the pub moaning that they have not got a job, or no one is starting up any local businesses.

How many of them get of their backside and actually START a business.
The whole system needs a serious rethink, for most on benefits will be worse off if they go to work, so they stay on benefits, and if they do find a job, will it be full time? no supermarkets take on full time staff anymore, so are most employers, they all want part time, more staff to choose from and easier to get rid of in most cases.

Most on benfits have no required skills,and if they live in an area like the one I live in, public transport is virtually nil, it will take years to sort this mess out, to me this government are just trying to deflect criticism for all the bloody mess they are making, so pick on the ones at the bottom of society, easy target. the ones claiming falsely, are the ones they need to target, and give the others some incentive to try and get back into work, but we need industry first to employ them, so the wheel keeps turning, will it ever be sorted? NO
I have a democratic right to be a lazy ba4tard if I want & I intend to exercise it !
About time. The benefits system does need a serious re-think, but anyone fit to work should be made to work full time in return for their benefits. No work, no pay. And they should be made to clock in and out, with money deducted if they're off without a doctor's certificate, so no sciving either. VHG talks about a lack of supervision, but our hospitals, which already have supervisors in place, could do with a lot more help with cleaning - and painting and decorating.

VHG, nice idea, but it's not so easy to go into business unless you have a bit of money to start with.
And mothers whose youngest is 7 years or older will be included.

Guess what SOME of them will do?
The problem with forcing those on benefits to work full time is that the market rate for the job will fall.

Take for instance an unemployed person who is forced to take a job street sweeping, and that job normally pays (say) �7 per hour. If an unemployed person was forced to take the job for a rate a lot less than that, what happens to those ready and willing to do the job in the first place?

Wouldn't they be forced out of the job market?

I think it's a fantastic headline -grabber for the Labour Party, but I'd like to hear about how the mechanics would work practically.
Whilst I agree that there are those that cheat the system, I think they should also be looking at why people haven't gone back to work and are still claiming incapacity benefit. My sister has been on incapacity benefit for about 10 year. Yet her GP and the hospital have given up on her and aren't interested in doing anything. She has gynaecological problems some doctors say she needs a hysterectomy yet the surgeon won't do one because she is too young so she has been left in pain and with no future prospects all because she is too young and might want to have children. Whereas now she has no life, no social life, no boyfriend, is in constant pain and this has led to a string of other ailments, illnesses and depression etc. If she had been given the hysterectomy she would hopefully have got better and been back to work years ago, she's been left for too long in this state and isn't capable of working now. I won't bore you with all the details but her problems have escalated because noone seems interested in her anymore and how can you make the doctor or hospital give you treatment. The cost of the hysterectomy would have surely have been cheaper than her long term medication and benefits she could be back at work and contributing back into the system
If people do have problems who is going to employ them and if they are then likely to be off sick a lot because of their problems won't they lose their job and be back to square one again.
I think they should monitor new claimants more closely and look at why long term claimants are still claiming have they had the medical help they need to get themselves better
That's possible, SP, but conversely, would the person on benefits resent working for less than the �7 his workmates are earnng, and decide it would be more profitable to come off benefits and get a proper job?

Incidentally, I'd like to hear how the mechanics will work practically too. I can't say I have the greatest faith in this government's schemes.
a friend of mines son is on a work ''training'' scheme he was put on there by the job centre to learn kerb laying and general groundwork because that is what he is interested in doing....he get an extra �30.00 a fortnight to supplement his jobseekers allowance..this is a job centre initiative and he has not done 1 days training in that sphere he has been out cutting hedges,mowing old peoples gardens and finishing these tasks at lunchtime then spends the afternoon playing football.he was threatened that if he did not take this course he would have his jobseekers allowance stopped he says it is a total waste of time is this what will happen to those that will be forced tp ''work'' for their payments?anyway i thought that 1 of the criteria of claming jobseekers allowance that is ''THAT YOU WILL BE AVAILABLE FOR FULL TIME WORK'' how will they meet that rule when they are out doing meaningless jobs which the people on community service,who have been punished by the courts do anyway?..............................
I suspect BillySuggers tongue was firmly planted in his cheek when he posted he had a right to be a lazy b4stard and intended to exercise that right, and I for one wholeheartedly agree.

If people don't want to work then I see absolutely no reason why they should.

However, if they do choose not to work, then the lazy b4stards should not receive one penny from the state.

It really really p1sses me off that I go to work to provide the best lifestyle I can for my family, and then part of the extortionate amount I pay in tax goes to pay for benefits for those that can't be bothered.

They are invariably scum pikey chavs with loads of kids living in a house I pay for, wearing clothes I pay, eating food I pay for, smoking fags I pay for and drinking white lightning that I pay for.

Their kids will see this and do the same - monkey see monkey do - and thus it continues.

They contribute nothing to society and are just simply pointless - personally I couldn't give a tinker's cuss if they were all wiped of the face off the planet.
I think if they're forced into community work they will suddenly find a "real" job.

marvellous, everyone's a winner!
flip flop

i really must take issue with you on your comments regarding scum pikey chavs etc and your generalisatiion,

i once met a scum pikey chav who wasnt swigging white lightning that we have paid for,



he was swigging special brew,

I do agree with lots of things said here. But I believe first and the most important thing is the self respect. In the years gone people use to be proud of earning for their off springs. And it was like planting a tree for the others to come as you benefited from the tree planted by the one before you. So I am still of the same mind that instead of sitting there and get paid I would rather do the job which no one else wants to do to bring my children up on what I earned and not begged.

Other thing is as raysparx1 said, for people to work there has to be industry to work in. Every body in this world is not a doctor. People may not mind sweeping the streets as I myself said I would do it, but if I have some sort of special skill then I would rather (if I have choice) work in that field. And I am sure that would benefit the society more.

Then finally I agree that people who are not skilled and are just happy to sit there and try not to learn a skill or do any other unskilled work, where people with skills are sweeping the roads, then those people should not be given a penny. Because most of the time that money is spent for the cigis and booze any way.
well in glasgow white lightning is considered something of a luxury!! its more super lager or buckfast for the neds and wastes of clothes up here!!!
The answer is simple - make it more attractive to work. Raise the lower income threshold, introduce lower tax bands (not abolish it like the clowns currently in power did) and give incentives to married couples not to single parents. Reduce benefits to a minumum, ie �5.00 a week pocket money and the rest in tokens or direct payment to the landlord/utility company etc.

Provide state care for young children (rate dependant on your pay) and force schools to have affordable before and after school care

For those genuinley in need this could be relaxed, but independant asses,ents every 3 months are requierd unless it is a recognized long term illness ie you have no hands.

Taking other peoples jobs will do nothing.

Oh, and stop paying out almost immediatley to immigrants and teenagers who see pregancy as a way to the top of the list. Put them in hostels.

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