On The Fourth Day of Xmas, My True Love Gave to Me... Four Grades of Unemployment

The unemployment statistics show a rise of 128,000, in the three months to October, meaning a total of 2.51 million people are officially unemployed in this country. 


That is 8.3%, with dramatically bigger rises in London and the North East.  But do people know what the statistics actually mean?  




Employment and Support Allowance is the controversial replacement for Incapacity benefit, brought in by the Labour government in 2008 for new claimants, and gradually extended to all Incapacity Benefit claimants.  



After the first 13 weeks of the claim, the claimant is reassessed,  then put in one of three categories - fit for work (at which point they must find a job or migrate to jobseekers allowance), Work Related Activity group (or WRA) and support group.  Only 7% of claims are awarded support group status - ie judged completely incapable of work (although, as we have seen on Frothers, many of these decisions are reversed on appeal).


 17% of ESA claimants are placed in the WRA group.  This amounts to over 400,000 people who are judged to be fit for work if appropriate adjustments are made, or in the near future.  These people are required to attend work focused interviews where they will discuss how they will get back into work, and can have their benefits docked if they fail to attend. 


These are the people who were described as “work-shy scroungers” in certain papers when the latest set of ESA claimant data was released.  Yet they are not included in the latest unemployment statistics.

“Unemployed” people are jobless, have been actively seeking work in the past four weeks and are available to start work in the next two weeks; or they are out of work, have found a job, and are waiting to start it in the next two weeks. 

As ESA claimants in the work related activity group are not required to actively seek work, only prepare to seek work, they are not counted.  Yet they are legally required to prepare for work.  So, which are they?  


Are they incapable of work, and so not included in unemployment statistics, just the“economically inactive” group (more on which later), or are they able to prepare for work, as they are legally required to do?  This may sound like a dry statistical question, but those 400,000 people in the WRA group are facing uncertainty about their lives - the status is causing confusion and anger amongst some of the most vulnerable sectors of society.



The Economically Inactive group is, by the most up to date statistics, 23% of the population.  These are people who are without paid work, but are not classed as unemployed.  They may be sick or disabled, carers or not seeking work for some other reason.  This does not mean that they don’t wish to work, only that they are not counted as seeking work.  They may in fact be looking for a job, but unable to start in the next two weeks due to other responsibilities.  They may wish to work, but are prevented by disability or high costs of childcare.  Or they may be stay at home parents or carers.  Of course, some will be rich kids living off trust finds, but somehow I doubt that counts for 23% of the population.



Another group to consider is those who are in part time work, but are looking for full time work.  This figure increased by 70,000 in three months to reach 1.28 million, the highest figure since comparable records began in 1992.  Here are more people who are looking for work, but unable to find it, and are not included on the unemployment statistics.  Workers on low wages are still entitled to many income related benefits, and can even sometimes receive more in welfare benefits than someone out of work.  Many part time jobs are unreliable and low paid, yet the workers are not counted in the unemployment statistics. 


In many ways, these can be the most exposed to the twists and turns of the economy, as they face placing new or changed claims if they lose the jobs they do have, but are without the small security that having an established claim can provide.  They find themselves without enough work, but not “unemployed enough” to become a target for the limited amount of work finding schemes that are available.



The unemployment statistics may be awful, but they hide an even more shocking truth.  There are simply not enough jobs in this country, and the statistics show more than we are being led to believe.


We have four groups not included in unemployment statistics:

- the unemployed (about 2.64 million)
- those in Work Related Activity schemes (400,000 people)
- economically inactive (9.33 million)
- part-time workers, looking for full-time work (1.28 million) 

Of those four groups, only the first - the 8.3% of the population (or 2.64 million) are reflected in government unemployment figures. And that figure is estimated to rise in the next year, peaking at an estimated 2.85 million in 2013.

120,000 jobs lost in the public sector, and too few jobs in the private sector. Yet the government still insists that their plan is working, that the employment market is stabilising.

More annoying than that is the comment by Shadow Work and Pensions Minister, Ian Austin who stated that it was, "crystal clear that this government is failing to get people off benefits and into work".

That was a cheap shot, Mr Austin. Try bashing the ConDem government for their policies, instead of the benefit claimants, many of whom would dearly love to have a job.

In some sectors there are over 40 applicants for every job. The politicians on both sides of the spectrum need to accept that most people want to work, there are simply not enough jobs out there.



By Alicia Duffy and MmeLindor

How 'workfare' affects you

It will take several posts to explain the Work Programme: it's hard to believe and the goalposts keep moving. The programme was introduced as part of the New Deal back-to-work initiative several years ago, with the aim of supporting the long-term unemployed and young jobseekers into regular employment. It is still described that way..

The element of 'support' has more or less disappeared now. The new Mandatory Work Programme is not so much about work experience as forced labour. People on benefits - for whatever reason, including illness - will be told to go and work for 'providers' or lose all their benefits. While they're working, they will not be paid by the employer but by the taxpayer, in the form of benefits. From next year, these placements will last for up to two years.

Companies already using workfarers include Tesco, Poundland, Sainsbury's, Reed and A4E. These last two - employment agencies, who are also scheme administrators - do not make their regular vacancies available to workfarers, which seems to show limited commitment to workfare as a route back into regular work.

The DWP refused a Freedom Of Information request about how many long-term real jobs have resulted from workfare. Anecdotal evidence is strong that very few employers have any intention of keeping their workfarers on after placement - well, would you, if you could get an endless stream of free staff, courtesy of the taxpayer?

Not only that, but employers are paid several thousand pounds to get free staff.

Since workfarers are not actually employed by the 'provider', they aren't covered by regular employment law. If they're abused at work, are taken ill or have an accident, they won't be covered by normal procedures and can even have their benefit taken off them. (In many cases, this will also make them homeless.) They don't have normal entitlements to breaks and holidays, etc. Their travel expenses won't be paid, even though they're only getting benefits at less than minimum wage.

Even if claimants have been signed off sick by their doctor, they can still be made to go on workfare:

"If you’re getting Employment and Support Allowance and are in the work-related activity group there are rules about taking part in the Work Programme. You may have to take part from three months before the date your doctor expects you to be fit for work."

 From this directgov page.

It's hard to see how workfare's supposed to improve our economy. Jobs, which could have been available at normal market rates, are being filled by people on benefits: hence fewer jobs, and less money in circulation. When London Underground laid off security staff, they were quickly replaced by people on workfare. In New York, where workfare has been operating for years, it's not uncommon for people to be sent to their old jobs on workfare, after being made redundant.

There's a strong popular myth about the skiving 'sick benefit' (ESA) claimant, however most genuinely are sick and living close to poverty because of it. Somebody who's developed heart disease, say, or a progressive illness, can now be made to go and work in a supermarket warehouse three months before their doctor says they're well. If they can't hack it - which would seem likely under the circumstances - their benefits can be completely stopped. As a result, they're likely to become homeless. They will then  have to be accommodated, at still greater expense to taxpayers.

This is already happening to people you've met, and will be happening to many more in 2012. It could be happening to you if you're made redundant or fall ill.

Frothers will be adding more posts on this topic, and we will link to organisations that provide information. Meanwhile we're asking for first-hand accounts of workfare, whether you're a participant or have worked alongside workfarers in your real job.

Bureaucratic nonsense (waste of money)

Yesterday I got two bizarre letters from the DWP about how I must choose between working (signing off benefits) and reducing my permitted work to less than £20-worth a week.

Considering that I made a £1,900 loss on my work last year - and that they based their decision on my declared earnings for 2007-2008, which were zero and I wasn't even receiving any benefits - this is getting more Kafka-esque by the week.

Last month the JobCentrePlus invited me in for a discussion about my permitted work. I told them about the year's £1900 loss and that I'd been too unwell to work at all from April to October this year. These letters are the results of that interview.

How can I refute an assertion that is based on made-up information?

Can anybody suggest how this process is intended to help me (and people like me) back to self-employment?

Even more crucially, HOW the hell would someone, who is as sick as I was in 2007, be supposed to deal with such accusatory bollocks??

I am at a loss to understand how any of this even aids the national economy, let alone supports people back to work.

It clearly un-supports those trying to forge their way in an enterprise economy, against the barriers of ill health. Yet, simultaneously,  refuses to assist people who need assistance.

What can I do?

Please use the Write To Them box to the right of this page; hassle your MPs and other representatives for more compassion AND logic to the UK's support system.

The Ministers for the DWP are:

• The Right Honourable Iain Duncan Smith MP – Secretary of State for Work and Pensions
• The Right Honourable Chris Grayling MP – Minister for Employment
• Steve Webb MP - Minister for Pensions
• Maria Miller MP - Minister for Disabled People
• Lord Freud - Minister for Welfare Reform

Also see our Petitions page. There's a vote of confidence (ahem) in David Cameron's administration. Petitions of this nature need a lot of signatures in order to carry weight.

Remember - they work for us! Make them get some common sense.

I Used To Froth Alone

Sometimes the British feel it’s not their place to complain – if something doesn’t affect you directly, do you have the right to have an opinion on it? If you weren’t offended by a joke on television until a friend explained why you could be, does that mean you have no right to be offended at all?

I’m not one of the most vulnerable in society. I am not elderly, nor the working poor or disabled. I wasn’t overly worried initially when the coalition government came into power. I thought I hadn’t or wouldn’t be that affected by any cuts. Time has shaken me up.

New graduates with a small child, both my husband and my careers suddenly disappeared in the last few years – My local Council’s plans to train me for a role in Sure Start management quietly disappeared. Sure Start and the work it does helping vulnerable families and children is not a protected area of spending – despite the positive impact they were having. As just one tiny example of the fantastic things they do: one of the major barriers to work for the long time unemployed is poor numeracy and literacy skills – teenagers who left school with no English or Maths qualifications may struggle to ever get a job. Many Sure Start centres offer free numeracy and literacy classes, with free on-site crèche for the kids. Giving parents the chance to get off benefits and into work, and improving their childrens likely futures at the same time. Many councils forced to make budget cuts have made the decision to close or limit the facilities at their centres. 124 Sure Start Centres have closed since the coalition took over.

At the same time my husbands graduate job in the private sector was withdrawn before he could start. Public sector cuts meant his private sector job wasn’t needed anymore, massive job losses in his field followed.

We were lucky, after only a few months my husband found a job in a totally new area and slightly different field, so we got on our hypothetical bikes and moved there to start again. For now at least my career is on hold, childcare costs too high for both of us to work.

Our daughter is only 2, but I cried when I heard about the rise in student fees. What if my daughter wants to be a doctor? We have no spare money to save for her education, rents are high and we have our own student debt to pay off. 7 years of £9k debt, plus maintenance loans, plus interest... currently the deal is that she would not have to pay the loan back unless she was earning well. I say currently, because there is no line in the contract making that deal permanent. Future governments can perfectly legally change their mind and demand the money back in one payment if they so wish, or more likely, demand that repayments start at much lower income levels and with higher rates of interest. Even Universities are changing their fee levels after prospective students have made their choices and committed to a financial option. Would I be right to encourage my child to take this risk at a time when graduate earnings aren’t very much higher (doing some quick maths - only £2.2k per year more, before taking off loan repayments) than non-graduate earnings? No matter how clever or academic she may be? The day after the rise in fees was passed I met Andrew Lansley at a charity concert. Unable to resist the opportunity I asked him which way he had voted. For, he said. I told him that I was extremely disappointed in that. He tried to empathise, and told me he has a child who will have to pay the fees.

He doesn’t though. He’s an extremely wealthy member of parliament. If he has any sense he will pay for his daughter’s University education and let her start her adult life debt free. Do the rest of us have that option? Some do. But no. Not most. It was the moment I realised very clearly that the government just do not understand what life is like on even an average wage of 22k a year – let alone what it is like to be in the poorest 5%.

It’s not just on my families behalf that I froth.

My first childcare related job was in a mainstream state school. Amongst others I worked with several children with a range of disabilities, and as someone who’d known nothing about the funding system behind getting these children the help they needed to fulfil their potentials – the reality of the system seemed insane. Every so often the parents of a child who was permanently incontinent and could never be left unsupervised would let us know all her funding had been revoked and they were in the process of sorting it out, on second inspection whichever government body had decided the child was well enough not to need extra one to one support would realise that of course they did. The stress and the loss of much needed money was always unnecessary but still happened with stunning regularity.

With every change I’ve seen since then to do with Disabled Living Allowance – in all its new forms and acronyms, I have thought of that family and the future of that child. What if when that child grows up they are never able to work? Will they be stuck in the trap between ESA and JSA, with no income for 6 months out of every 18? How will their parents cope?

When I first started talking about working for Sure Start it was children like that who I particularly wanted to help. I still want the chance, and I know having been there once that free access to facilities like the NHS, Educational ‘extras’ like one to one support where needed and Sure Start is hugely important when it comes to making a difference. The very vulnerable and poor don’t have a few pounds a week to give for these services. These services are not and should never be about making money.

As all of this started to sink in I didn’t feel like there was anything I could do but get angry and moan, the next election is a long way away – until #Frothers. It is a great place for a rant – but it’s also about bringing together the campaigns fighting against these cuts. About making people aware of all the little cuts that might have slipped past their radar and not been widely reported, so that one place catalogues the full picture of just how immense the changes are. About putting the general public in contact with their own MPs and letting them have their say outside of one moment at the ballot box.

My role at #Frothers is part of a team of technical support – supporting the dozens of fantastic writers bringing you all the details of how cuts have affected them personally and the campaigns against them.

We are a team that is a mix of those directly affected, partly affected and not affected at all but utterly sympathetic.

With fingers crossed, the cuts won’t ruin my family the way they may ruin others, but I am here all the same, frothing in support -because the other thing that is extraordinarily British besides not wanting to moan too much – is looking after those we feel responsible for, putting the vulnerable first, even if doing so is unpopular or our motivations for doing so aren’t well understood.

The measure of any society is how it treats it’s most vulnerable members, what will our society become if we refuse to fight for them now?

By TeWi, part of #Frothers TechTeam, Frothing for the great and good.

A warning - from 1983

A sad and chillingly prescient speech from Neil Kinnock, from his general election campaign in 1983.  Just substitute the words 'Margaret Thatcher' for 'David Cameron' and 'George Osborne'.  Or even 'Nick Clegg' for the full hat trick:

"If Margaret Thatcher is re-elected as prime minister on Thursday, I warn you.

I warn you that you will have pain–when healing and relief depend upon payment.

I warn you that you will have ignorance–when talents are untended and wits are wasted, when learning is a privilege and not a right.

I warn you that you will have poverty–when pensions slip and benefits are whittled away by a government that won’t pay in an economy that can’t pay.

I warn you that you will be cold–when fuel charges are used as a tax system that the rich don’t notice and the poor can’t afford.

I warn you that you must not expect work–when many cannot spend, more will not be able to earn. When they don’t earn, they don’t spend. When they don’t spend, work dies.

I warn you not to go into the streets alone after dark or into the streets in large crowds of protest in the light.

I warn you that you will be quiet–when the curfew of fear and the gibbet of unemployment make you obedient.

I warn you that you will have defence of a sort–with a risk and at a price that passes all understanding.

I warn you that you will be home-bound–when fares and transport bills kill leisure and lock you up.

I warn you that you will borrow less–when credit, loans, mortgages and easy payments are refused to people on your melting income.

If Margaret Thatcher wins on Thursday–

- I warn you not to be ordinary

- I warn you not to be young

- I warn you not to fall ill

- I warn you not to get old."

Are you sure you're all right (Jack)?

I used to give £50 notes to the homeless people on London pavements. I couldn't think why not: I was wearing £200 shoes and a £200 haircut, weaving my way from a £100 meal that my employers paid for to a £40 taxi home. It was a nice life. I could spare a few notes, and felt sure they weren't all spent on Carling and smack. What if they were, anyway? I spent mine on red wine and Chanel, hardly a morally superior choice.

Most of my friends were amazed - not just that I gave those people cash, but that there were destitute people in London. We all walked the same pavements each day, yet most seemed not to have noticed the bundles of humanity littering their path. "How can you not see them? They're in the way!" I asked. They looked puzzled; "I guess I just step over them. No, I've never seen them."

I wonder if David, Sam, Nick and Miriam ever see who they're stepping over? (Miriam might but, if so, she's not influencing her husband much.) It's becoming patently clear they don't "see" the poor, or notice that they are human and hurting. I recall how nice it feels to be warm enough, clean enough, safe enough, healthy enough and to feel sure of one's place in life; one's worth. How utterly natural it feels to know where you're going, literally and metaphorically, and how to get there. You don't really appreciate that until it all changes.

Bag lady, London

Some things happened to me that shook my sense of 'rightness'. It was shaken hard: I became ill for a very long time. My employers got fed up of fitting in with my erratic health and made me 'redundant'. I still took it for granted that I'd get well again, and made plans accordingly.

I didn't get well. My plans, therefore, turned out to be inappropriate. All my insurance policies (the ones that paid out, that is) proved to be time-limited, or to have tiny but pivotal clauses which meant they didn't have to keep paying.

Bag lady, London

I sold all my investments at a bad time, and ended up losing the flat anyway. Now I had no job, poor health, nothing in the bank and nowhere to live. Friends lent me money (I still owe them!) but no-one else would. Lines of support were suddenly cut off: the bank that couldn't stop giving me free gifts and benefits no longer wanted my custom. I'd completely lost sight of the price of petrol, bus fares; everyday expenses. They now seemed terrifyingly high.

People like me have little knowledge of the benefits system. I now know I was given dreadful advice and baldly lied to, by folks who are paid to 'help' taxpayers in trouble. Now renting and still very ill, I couldn't cope. I asked everywhere for help and they all said No. I didn't know they always say No first! How could I? I'd happily paid nearly half a million in tax and NI while working (I got a statement on redundancy), trusting that this money went to ensure a healthy, functioning society that supports its weaker members. I didn't know it actively works to avoid helping them.

Lifestyle benefits

I became homeless. The entire fall took three and a half years, protracted as it was by my cushions of investment and insurance. Had I known things wouldn't get better I'd have done things differently. But you don't, do you? Nobody sits on their Italian calfskin sofa, quaffing Moulin-a-Vent, thinking "I fancy becoming debilitated, selling everything that makes my life nice, and living on a hundred quid a week off the welfare." You believe you can make things better, because you always have. And you believe your country will lend you a hand if you really need it.

Neither is a given.

If you've got less than I had to start with, you fall even faster and harder.

Those poor people - the scroungers, the feckless, the invisible - they had lives, too, and we paid taxes to make sure they got help when they needed it. But they didn't get help.They just fell and fell.

It can happen to anyone.

Welfare benefits

And, when you've fallen, you might be reeling in shock and you will certainly be unwell. But you'll still have to get to grips with the fact that this welfare state WILL NOT HELP YOU unless you learn its rules; play its game. And when you succeed, this is what you get.

£70 a week, because they don't believe you or your doctors when you say you are ill. It goes up to about £95 after your successful appeal, which takes six months.

This is what the asses running our country think you will give everything up for; what you'll learn to play their convoluted games for; what you're robbing the country for.

Really?

I would like to remind you that people like you live on less than £100 a week because they must, no other reason. We cost the country quite a bit, that's true. It's taxpayers' money - we've paid taxes, too - just like the taxpayers' money we continue to give the banks that continue to give themselves huge bonuses, and just like the taxpayers' money that gives bounties to business to get workers for free, also paid by the taxpayer.

Who would you rather your tax went to? Tesco and Primark, for getting free staff? A bunch of bankers celebrating their bonus with a new yacht? Or the lady in the third picture, who once had a life much like yours?

What Can I Do?

Channel 4 is asking for signatures in support of their Empty Homes Campaign 2 Million families are homeless - 1 million empty homes... it would be an amazing start.