John Hutton to take benefits away from "hardcore unemployed"

[girasol]

No. Cos then the people who payed the most taxes could fund what they see as important and there views are likely to be dictated by there experiences and lack of experiences.

Not necessarily.

Let's say you had a multiple choice selection:
1) Social benefits (welfare, housing, education, health)
2) Transport
3) Security
etc
And that you could chose which percentage of your taxes went to which service... Surely an improvement and quite empowering too. Also an indirect way of voting, giving everywhere control where it really matters, distribution of wealth.

In reality it would probably fail, but if I'm going to dream I might as well dream big

 

[girasol]

not really, over 4 million people read the mail and aover 8 million read the sun... do you really want those people choosing what to spend their taxes on too...

Surely it can't be worse than the people who are doing this job right now? At least it would be a choice of the people rather than a bunch of dickheads.

 

[Bernie Gunther]

that's all well and good and i applude the actions if you are serious i cannto see how you can at one point be against they system which condems you to this and at the same time expect the system you condem to support you however...

care to explain...

We live within an economic system which is optimised around maximising the return on capital investment and which seems to treat this as the highest moral value, outweighing all other ethical considerations in the minds of our rulers and often in our culture in general. Ultimately, that's what I'm against. In more immediate practical terms though, I think such measures are against my interests and probably yours too if you work for a wage like most of us. Here's why I think so.

In order to maximise return on investment, this system has to keep wage costs low. In order to keep wages low the system maintains, among other things a supply of unemployed and has to steer a line between actually starving them to death or causing a revolution or anything like that, and providing them with sufficiently generous support that accepting social security is more attractive than any form of work that's currently on offer to them.

Making work more attractive is costly to employers and cuts into their profits, diminishing the return on capital invested in their businesses, all the more so in proportion to the level of support available to the unemployed, so naturally the preferred tactic is to get the government to make the support provided by the state for the unemployed less appealing, so they'll take a job at almost any wage in almost any conditions and hence by competition drive the overall wage levels and working conditions down for the rest of us.

This works pretty well in terms of driving wage bills down and increasing the return on investment. It avoids causing political problems though, only for as long as waged workers are in the majority and as long as they can be convinced by propaganda that a) they'll never find themselves on the wrong end of these measures due to a change either in their personal fortunes or in the economy as a whole and b) that the people being so treated are not only somehow fundamentally different, but also somehow morally deficient and hence deserving of harsh treatment.

I do not believe that poverty and/or unemployment is something that can't happen to me. In fact, I think that sooner or later we may all be experiencing the sort of economic disaster that we haven't seen since the 1930's, to say nothing of more fundamental ecological disasters, so I don't find it at all easy to accept what the propaganda is telling me about people who are long-term unemployed, nor to see them as fundamentally different from me, nor as morally flawed and in need of punishment of some kind. I see them, on the whole, as people who have been fucked over by our current system and the values that it incorporates and I see the attempts to get them to accept lower wages and worse conditions as ultimately affecting my wages and working conditions for the worst. So think that it's not in my interests for a variety of reasons, to say nothing of the ethics of the matter, to see the government promoting such policies with hardly anyone having the sense to oppose them and a number of people here apparently cheering them on.

 

[tbaldwin]

not really, over 4 million people read the mail and aover 8 million read the sun... do you really want those people choosing what to spend their taxes on too...

So Garfield you would rather the decisions were taken by a Liberal elite....Now isnt that a suprise.........

 

[liampreston]

One group of people argue, as I understand the first poster does here, "why do I want to be a shelf stacker" etc. I have worked from when I left college at 20 to now, feels a lot longer, and I struggle with bills, rent, cost of living just as anyother worker does. It matters not what my politics is, where I position myself on the spectrum of beliefs or politics, but given how hard I work, how much I earn (and it's not much), it does annoy me when this group - I think the term "hardcore" is accurate - are unwilling to do anything just because of some stubborn attitude or naive political belief.

If a person is merely saying "no" to an offer of work merely to prove a point rather than put something back into society, then surely society can demand a little bit back. I remain fairly "of the left", for all it matters, but working full time has emboldened the attitude of "working life is not for me" really not washing.

 

[ViolentPanda]

But is being a welfare scrounger any worse than say somebody working in the advertising industry?

Nice try, but I think you'll find that Kyser left the ad industry quite a while ago.

 

[Tom A]

Tom A, that is really not helpful, many of those 800,000 claimants will have 'hidden disabilities or comittments.

Yup, that is very true, there are 101 reasons why they aren't in work which doesn't include that they are just "workshy".

What is worrying is this is exactly what they did in the 30's when they introduced the means test. Then there was massive opposition and resistance, now passivity, atomisation, anomie and crucuially silence from the left, very depressing.

What the "left" does is neither here or there. I only hope that soon that there is a backlash from the underclass who are being forced further below the poverty line because of all this, but at this present time the implications of all this have mostly yet to raise its ugly head.

The way I see it the government is trying to force many people into work that shouldn't be in work, for valid reasons like you just said. I am not saying that people have a right to be lazy.

 

[Paulie Tandoori]

If a person is merely saying "no" to an offer of work merely to prove a point rather than put something back into society, then surely society can demand a little bit back. I remain fairly "of the left", for all it matters, but working full time has emboldened the attitude of "working life is not for me" really not washing.

The fact of the matter is though that the DWP can already sanction (reduce/remove) any claimant's jsa if they believe that they are avoiding work - there is already a need for people to sign regularly, to demonstrate that they are seeking work and to take suitable work when it is offered. The actual application of those requirements may be variable, according to local conditions and so on, but this notion that there are hordes of "hardcore claimants" with a "can work, won't work" attitude is mainly pie in the sky. I think Bernie Gunther above makes a good and rational analysis of why government wants to force people off benefits and into low-paid work.

 

[GarfieldLeChat]

So Garfield you would rather the decisions were taken by a Liberal elite....Now isnt that a suprise.........

well yeah actually, that's pretty much consistant with my viewpoint execpt i'd not allow the liberals a say either....

voting on most thigns should be limtied tot hose who actually know fucka ll abotu the subejct there should be some sor tof qualifiying that if you don't fucking know you don't get a say... in recent surveys if we went down the route of allowing the current populace to have frere reigne then the death penalty would be bought back with even less than there ever was protection for miscarrages of justice...

I cannot see that 80 % of the populace of this country is truely awake to the realities of the governement or the media indoctrination that they recieve on a daily indeed hourly basis, some simply don't care some simply are in capable of reasoning past the fabric lies which they have invest an large percentage of their lives beleiving in... this is why conspriscy theories amass isn't it...people knwo summit afoot but cannot work out what it is and then seek to find indoctrinated 'safe' 'accepted' belifes to fill that void...

you can read articules ina newspapaer and know it's utter fabricatin from begining to end yet turnt he page and take it for granted that the follwing story where you knowthing of the facts is indeed perfectly soruces and accurate... that conditioning is so adept...

so would i want a load of people brainwashed into thinking in a certain manner or methodology making descions which would influnece the rest of us...

might as well ask me if think tony blair really does know what's best for the country...

fuck democracy fuck equal rights for alternative postitions too this presuposition assumes intrinsitcally that boths sides are to be equally weight and have the same vaule... which of corse they don't examle there is no inherent vaule in racism it's not equal to intergration therefore there is no need to have a debate on equal terms one concept is vaild the other is fundamentally flawed....

most people are too stupid to lazy and to wrapped up into just getting on witht hings to bother to research things with enogh effort to actually know about the subject matter they then attempt to influnce...

as i have said before to others would you presume to attmept to point out flaws to stephen hawking about quantum physics... no then waht the fuck makes you quailifed to actually have a say in that debate... apply this larger principal to the wider audeince why should some know nothing poorly educated neanderthal be allowed to make descions about whether we should spend more in schools or even be represent to put forward their viewpoints to a wider audence?

why should some moroinic conceptualised ideal of humanity which acutally on practical application fails on all levels be enforced by the will of a small few... such as communism... where is the allowence for the indivual with in any of those systems?

collective good is another form of dicatiorship with great recycleable packaging... it has little intrst in reality and has all to do with transference of power from one asigned percieved group of good guys and giving it to another...

 

[SubZeroCat]

But is being a welfare scrounger any worse than say somebody working in the advertising industry?

That's a really good argument you have going there...

Benefits should not be taken away from long-term unemployed people but wasn't this system put in place to provide support for the working classes when they found themselves without a job rather than as a very low income way of life?

Personally I don't agree with "If I don't want to work, I won't" attitude because anyone who lives in a society cannot be 'one man for himself' - it's kind of arrogant to assume that you should be able to live in a society amongst others and not have to contribute in the slightest.

I don't have the solution but there definitely needs to be more support and better prospects for those who are not attracted by the idea of working for a living.

 

[Tom A]

this notion that there are hordes of "hardcore claimants" with a "can work, won't work" attitude is mainly pie in the sky. I think Bernie Gunther above makes a good and rational analysis of why government wants to force people off benefits and into low-paid work.

Spot on. The problem is that right-wing rags such as the Scum and HateMail have manged to whip up this mass fervour that every dole claimant is of the "can work, won't work" mentality, in the vast majority of cases it's more "can't work, won't work".

 

[treelover]

Hutton is standing down after the next election, better watch his back then after that, he is bringing in some of the most brutal welfare reform since the 1930's.

I bet hundreds of his unemployed ship-building constituents are feeling ashamed they voted for him. Thank fuck he’s standing down at the next election.

 

[Jografer]

Surely it can't be worse than the people who are doing this job right now? At least it would be a choice of the people rather than a bunch of dickheads.

How about a referendum on capital punishment, or castration of paedophiles, or giving aid to developing countries, or accepting any asylum seekers, or payment of dole money after 6 months.... as a few examples...

Don't have any off-the-shelf solutions, but do not have any illusions about the inherent 'niceness' of my fellow men & women I'm afraid...

... obviously getting old <sigh>

 

[GarfieldLeChat]

I do not believe that poverty and/or unemployment is something that can't happen to me. In fact, I think that sooner or later we may all be experiencing the sort of economic disaster that we haven't seen since the 1930's, to say nothing of more fundamental ecological disasters, so I don't find it at all easy to accept what the propaganda is telling me about people who are long-term unemployed, nor to see them as fundamentally different from me, nor as morally flawed and in need of punishment of some kind. I see them, on the whole, as people who have been fucked over by our current system and the values that it incorporates and I see the attempts to get them to accept lower wages and worse conditions as ultimately affecting my wages and working conditions for the worst. So think that it's not in my interests for a variety of reasons, to say nothing of the ethics of the matter, to see the government promoting such policies with hardly anyone having the sense to oppose them and a number of people here apparently cheering them on.

fair point.

the issue i see it though is the only group of people i can ever see who might be intentionaly unemployed and add nothing back to their society i can work won't work as opposed to say can work but am working in some sort of community based activity which would be severly affected if i did work in effect my dole is my social wage for my 'unpaid' work but people who cannot be arsed who as i have siad is prolly so minimal as there may actually be more posts on this thread than it covers...regardless the mentalitiy of the absolute can work won't work., fuck em you want' to opt out self exile from society off you go... don't ask the soctiey you have slefishly rejected and have no instrest in changing to be closer the one you have a conecualisation of then fuck you you get nothing, you are an extra burden on every other person on the planet.

 

[kyser_soze]

But is being a welfare scrounger any worse than say somebody working in the advertising industry?

Well, as VP pointed out if it's a snide directed at me it's out of time, but when you look at it from the perspective of the social value of work - which is what you're implying - then the majority of jobs currently available are socially irrelevant. For example - a car plant worker is actually employed in an industry that helps destroy the environment, is a rapacious consumer of raw materials, to produce a product that were it socially controlled and allocated would probably require an industry about 1/10 of it's current productive capacity.

I also suspect that you are criticising advertising from the 'middle man' perspective, and it's role in 'brainwashing' consumers into buying stuff...well the only reason ad agencies exist is because it's cheaper (altho efficiency arguments) for clients than having a permanent member or team of staff who won't be used for about 2/3 of the year. Altho obviously if you hold that advertising in and of itself is immoral, well...

 

[treelover]

Good post BG, shame the TUC and the Unions don't think like you, the unemployed and the disabled on benefits are basically on their own and that is shaming.

 

[Tom A]

the issue i see it though is the only group of people i can ever see who might be intentionaly unemployed and add nothing back to their society i can work won't work as opposed to say can work but am working in some sort of community based activity which would be severly affected if i did work in effect my dole is my social wage for my 'unpaid' work

Yup, sounds reasonable, shame the UK govt is obsessed with tarring all dole claimants with the same brush.

but people who cannot be arsed who as i have siad is prolly so minimal as there may actually be more posts on this thread than it covers...regardless the mentalitiy of the absolute can work won't work., fuck em you want' to opt out self exile from society off you go... don't ask the soctiey you have slefishly rejected and have no instrest in changing to be closer the one you have a conecualisation of then fuck you you get nothing, you are an extra burden on every other person on the planet.

Well IMO everyone has a duty to the community, and for the third time, I will cite the "each to their ability..." line. I would define work as being more than just paid work, I would feel I would have contributed more doing volunteering for a conservation project, for example, while having dole (or in my case, incap) to ensure that I am fed and have a roof over me, than breaking my back stacking shelves in Tescos. I confess I was a bum for the year between degrees, but I had a lot of horrible stuff happen to me towards the end and in the 6 months immediately after I finished uni (compounded with the afforementioned Asperger Syndrome), which meant I need to decide what I needed to do without the pressure of working.

Unfortunately the govt would rather everyone did the latter over the former. Captialism. Great innit?

 

[kyser_soze]

I see them, on the whole, as people who have been fucked over by our current system and the values that it incorporates

Unfortunately my personal experience of such matters is far from this - not just my immediate family but from years of being around the squat party scene and having met people who genuinely opt-out of the whole merry go round and actually find ways of supporting themselves that they are happy with, but more people for whom the political arguments are window dressing for not wanting to work.

I'm not making a moral judgement on anyone - people's choices are their own to make and who am I to judge - I just think that if you are to claim a 'benefit' from society then you need to make some kind of contribution to that society. I'm completely in support of fundamental change in the way benefits are worked out so that it doesn't penalise people in volountary work and all the other stupid ways and means that people are prevented from doing such things (e.g. someone who is unemployed doing a degree and being unable to claim benefits - ridiculous). The state should support and reward people and activity that benefits others and society - but it shouldn't be there as an option for life which many of the people I've met who are LTE have said it is.

What I do like about this debate as well is that those against this kind of reform are always instantly 'The daily mail and sun promote this idea of workshy scroungers but here's some unsupported evidence that most of them are disabled or otherwise have a good reason they can't work'...

 

[kyser_soze]

Good post BG, shame the TUC and the Unions don't think like you, the unemployed and the disabled on benefits are basically on their own and that is shaming.

Well maybe you should stop complaining about what is happening and start organising all these people who won't work because they can't on a local, regional and maybe national scale and start protesting, group support etc.

You've been on this tip for a while now, and while I agree with what you say about the mainstream left which seems completely lost in other issues at the moment, why don't you DO something about it - same goes for anyone else who thinks the same; there's much talk on this site about self-organisation and other stuff but rarely is there any action.

Give the unemployed/underemployed a realistic voice to represent their interests instead of some liberal/lefty m/c uni person - themselves.

 

[GarfieldLeChat]

Yup, sounds reasonable, shame the UK govt is obsessed with tarring all dole claimants with the same brush.

yup but this is a releic of the torys let's face it unemployment polcy hasn't changed much since the 70's ...

Well IMO everyone has a duty to the community, and for the third time, I will cite the "each to their ability..." line. I would define work as being more than just paid work, I would feel I would have contributed more doing volunteering for a conservation project, for example, while having dole (or in my case, incap) to ensure that I am fed and have a roof over me, than breaking my back stacking shelves in Tescos.

yeah but this isn't to my view can work wont' work this is can work but that would affect the community work i do do. I'd gladly see longer term unemployed can work won't work (all 7 of them nation wide ) put to use like clearing the canals or planeting trees reivating green space socail working...

now if some of the welfare to work schemes added value back into their local community then (aside for the obvious ise of enforce cheap/slave labour) at least this would in effect be of some provision. I'd like to see education oppertunties with real qualifications widened too...

Unfortunately the govt would rather everyone did the latter over the former. Captialism. Great innit?

better than anythign else we have atm tbh...

 

[Tom A]

I just think that if you are to claim a 'benefit' from society then you need to make some kind of contribution to that society. I'm completely in support of fundamental change in the way benefits are worked out so that it doesn't penalise people in volountary work and all the other stupid ways and means that people are prevented from doing such things (e.g. someone who is unemployed doing a degree and being unable to claim benefits - ridiculous). The state should support and reward people and activity that benefits others and society - but it shouldn't be there as an option for life which many of the people I've met who are LTE have said it is.

Ok, good points made, I made a crap job of explaining myself in my OP, and I thorougly agree the benefits system should take into account voluntary work that people do, the voluntary sector is highly important in maintain services not avalilable though the government.

What I do like about this debate as well is that those against this kind of reform are always instantly 'The daily mail and sun promote this idea of workshy scroungers but here's some unsupported evidence that most of them are disabled or otherwise have a good reason they can't work'...

But neither are the vast majority "workshy scroungers" either. I don't support maintaining the status quo, but Hutton's ideas of "reform" will make the lives of many working class people a lot worse, and it won't just (if at all) be the "scroungers" who are affected. I don't think that the "reforms" he has in mind are anything like the reforms you are proposing, which I think are a bloody good idea.

 

[Bernie Gunther]

Unfortunately my personal experience of such matters is far from this - not just my immediate family but from years of being around the squat party scene and having met people who genuinely opt-out of the whole merry go round and actually find ways of supporting themselves that they are happy with, but more people for whom the political arguments are window dressing for not wanting to work.<snip>

In theory though, what's wrong with the idea that work should be more intrinsically appealing than loafing around doing drugs or whatever?

That it's not in many cases, surely is to some significant degree due to the downward pressure exerted on wages and conditions within our economic system. A system which is explictly optimising for higher return on investment rather than improved quality of life.

 

[kyser_soze]

In theory though, what's wrong with the idea that work should be more intrinsically appealing than loafing around doing drugs or whatever?

Nothing at all - and I don't disagree that at present the system is too optimised toward the needs of capital, however I have met very, very few people who have been convincing using your argument - that they won't work because of 'the system', and it still doesn't address the point that to take a benefit from society you should contribute to that society as well.

 

[oldpunkette]

Can't understand why this is an argument. If you don't want to work because the only available jobs are too crappy for you that's fine. But why on earth would you expect to get a hand-out from the Govt (i.e. me and other taxpayers) for sitting on your arse skinning up and watching Tricia.

To be honest, I'd rather clean toilets for a living than take a Govt handout and I would consider any able-bodied person who felt differently to be scum. Go and live somewhere else in the world and see how much you get from the Govt there.

 

[Jografer]

In theory though, what's wrong with the idea that work should be more intrinsically appealing than loafing around doing drugs or whatever?

Nothing at all, what's wrong is that some people expect to be subsidised in that lifestyle by the rest of us, and then <takes a deep breath> sneer at the rest of us for being 'wage slaves'....

 

[Loki]

Just a few days ago, the Serious Fraud Office was told to shut up and stop investigating the millions of pounds of taxpayers' money that allegedly vanished into the pockets of shady arms dealer middlemen.

And now here we are, debating about really small time fiddling fraud instead.

I'm suggesting that this is what the government was hoping for when it launched this campaign.

 

[Fruitloop]

There's work and work, of course. Why would selling your labour to the man be appealing? I find it sucks.

 

[GarfieldLeChat]

There's work and work, of course. Why would selling your labour to the man be appealing? I find it sucks.

so sell it to the other man or your fellow man... or get over yourself.

 

[kyser_soze]

There's work and work, of course. Why would selling your labour to the man be appealing? I find it sucks.

Find something you're good and useful at and work for yourself; join a commune of group of people where your skillset (or one you could learn) would be usuable as barter.

I don't find cleaning the toilet to be appealing; I don't really enjoy washing dishes either, but they both have to be done.

 

[Bernie Gunther]

Nothing at all - and I don't disagree that at present the system is too optimised toward the needs of capital, however I have met very, very few people who have been convincing using your argument - that they won't work because of 'the system', and it still doesn't address the point that to take a benefit from society you should contribute to that society as well.

Well, I think the earlier part of the argument does sort of address that point, although maybe I need to make it a bit more explicit.

Maintaining a 'reserve army' of unemployed and latterly, of impoverished and desperate people around the world who can be pressed into service in a similar way, are intrinsic requirements of our present economic system.

Without them, growing wage bills would eat up all the surplus value available and investors would not get the lush returns to which they have become accustomed. By keeping a significant number of our fellow humans in a miserable unfulfilled and impoverished state however, wage bills can be kept down and investments can yield a healthy return. However, as the historical record shows, it is possible that a tipping point can be reached. If the system pushes wages and conditions low enough by these and similar means, for enough people, or if it contracts and dumps too many workers into that 'reserve army' then that very system itself becomes endangered.

In other words, the maintainance of a significant number of unemployed is a necessary condition for the maintainance of the system which permits a healthy return on investment. Hence, it's not unreasonable to ask why financing the maintainance of this 'reserve army' isn't done directly by means of increased taxes on investment profits?

The reason why I think this is an interesting question is that underpinning the propaganda used to justify worsening the conditions of the unemployed in order to degrade wages and working conditions of those in work, is the clever trick of paying for their upkeep by taxes on those who are in work rather than those who are directly benefiting from the situation. That facilitates the construction of an 'us vs them' theme, in which the people who are most disadvantaged by this state of affairs are blamed by those who are somewhat less disadvantaged, but still net losers, to the exclusion of those who are benefiting from what both waged workers and the unemployed are losing.