TWO-WEEK UNPAID PLACEMENT AT DISCOUNT STORE MAY HAVE BEEN ILLEGAL
A graduate is suing the government over an unpaid two-week work placement at Poundland which she was told to complete by her local job centre – or face losing her Jobseeker’s Allowance (JSA).
Cait Reilly, 22 — a geology graduate from Birmingham University — had been seeking experience in the museum sector, but was told she must complete a “mandatory” fortnight at the discount high street store instead, or forfeit her £53 a week JSA.
The job centre — in King’s Heath, Birmingham — was acting under the government’s highly controversial Work Programme, in which young jobseekers are denied their right to the National Minimum Wage for up to eight weeks and forced to work in supermarkets and other high-street brands in order to keep their benefits.
Cait told the BBC:
“My adviser told me that there was an open day to find out about retail jobs. When I actually found out that it was a work experience placement that could take up to six weeks of unpaid work, I approached her and told her i wasn’t sure whether I wanted to go ahead with it. At which point she said “Well it is mandatory and if you don’t complete it you will lose your JSA benefits.”
She said that being forced to take unpaid work in a field unrelated to her career plans was “frustrating” — and raised questions about who was really benefitting from these mandatory placements:
“We had been promised training in various retail roles, but in actual fact all we did was what seemed like the labour that other people weren’t doing. I want to get into the museum world. Working at Poundland gave me no relevant experience towards that career at all. I was taken away from work placements at museums, given no valuable experience or training and potentially missed a lot of opportunities in the field I was interested in.”
Yesterday on Graduate Fog, we wrote about our growing concerns that some brands — particularly high street retailers — appear to be taking advantage of government-backed employment schemes in order to cut staff costs and boost profits. We are worried that they are using schemes to replace proper, paid shop jobs with unpaid or low-paid apprentices and Work Programme jobseekers. But Poundland hit back against this suggestion, saying:
“We work in partnership with JobCentre Plus and other government funded organisations to implement a comprehensive work placement programme designed to provide on-the-job training for those looking to retail as a career opportunity.
“Our partnership with JobCentre Plus is a positive step to get people back into work. It doesn’t replace our recruitment activity, but adds to the number of colleagues we have working with us.”
Public Interest lawyers, acting on Cat’s behalf, have sent a letter-before-action, the first stage in a potential judicial review, challenging the Jobseeker’s Allowance (Employment, Skills and Enterprise) Regulations 2011. The Secretary of State for Work and Pensions is due to respond to Ms Reilly’s case on 14 December. Outlining her reasons for pursuing legal actions, Cait said:
“We’re hoping we can approach the government and ask them to maybe think about how they’re putting these plans into action.
In what Graduate Fog sees as the start of a backlash against a government policy which ignores young people’s right to fair pay for their work, Cait has become the first young jobseeker to publicly take a stand against this appalling treatment. We support her 100%, wish her the very best of luck and will keep you updated with her progress.
(This blog post was originally published on 7 December 2011. The sudden flurry of publicity around it is because the right-wing press has only just noticed the story and twigged how important it is!)
*Would you accept a “mandatory” internship at Poundland?
Who benefits the most from these unpaid placements – jobseekers or retailers? Are you pleased Cait is taking a stand? Have you been told to complete a compulsory internship as part of the Work Programme?
Is it wrong that I agree with this measure by the government to avoid graduates sitting around and doing nothing on Jobseekers’, like grads I know did?
I don’t suppose you have the article link?
@josie elle
sorry, i should have included that:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-birmingham-16037332
Yet another hilariously sad and open failure of Job Centre Plus. Yes, perhaps getting Cait out of the house is good but at what cost? Being on JobSeekers is a last resort for many graduates and the fact that the organisation provides both little encouragement or demonstration of knowledge regarding what they’re doing, this then results is a great lack of faith in how one will ever find a decent job if the money that is helping towards paying for decent interviews for relevant jobs will be cut off due to refusal of irrelevant roles, particularly unpaid ones!
I feel so lucky that I’ve never had anything but positive experiences with the Job Centre. Sure no one likes going there and no one likes being unemployed, but the staff have always been civil and helpful to me.
Particularly regarding work experience, I was able to arrange my own four week placement in a company very relevant to my career aspirations and claim JSA at the same time, the staff were really helpful about it. However, I was made aware that if I dropped out of my self arranged placement I would risk losing my JSA, the same thing that happens with these Poundland placements. My work exp and this Poundland thing are part of almost exactly the same work experience programme!
I did have to look for work at the same time as my placement and still sign on, but that was easily doable.
I think I am a case study of how the Job Centre intended to implement the work experience programme, just a shame that nearly every other Job Centre bar mine seems to get it right!
From interview feedback I’ve had, employers prefer you to have taken Jobseeker’s and got relevant experience, rather than giving up on your skills, knowledge and ambition and just taken any old job. With regard to the education that’s gone into your brain, they know that if you don’t use it, you lose it.
Saying that, we are not going to win any support by talking about our chosen career or chosen sector. We need to argue that the country has an interest in not throwing away the investment made in our education, so we need to make the case that work experience should be relevant to our proven skills and abilities, rather than subject content or what we would like to do.
A couple of other points, if you’re interested:
Whilst I’m not eligible for The Work Programme, my Jobcentre Plus advisor says getting work experience whilst claiming is not allowed as you have to be seeking work full time. You’re only allowed to volunteer a maximum 16 hours of your time a week.
Also, when I was on the dole last time, the job centre placed me on a scheme to get a CSCS card (construction safety card so I could work on building sites). To qualify for the card, I had to have achieved the equivalent of GCSE English and Maths, grade C or above, in the last 2 years. To prove I was capable, I had to go through a 6 week course with LearnDirect at the tax payers expense. I have a Masters in Architecture from The University of Sheffield.
Although the ability of Job Centre Plus to despatch the unemployed to mandatory work experience is not frankly helpful, particularly given that the candidate would be effectively occupying a job which could be easily occupied by another unemployed candidate, as with any interns, the issue is nothing new.
When Labour introduced the Flexible New Deal, long term unemployed were despatched to Third Party Agencies (such as A4E and Working Links), and if the Admin Clerks within A4E and Working Links (despite doing a job which previously had been done by Admin Staff within Job Centre Plus – but they awarded themselves the Ego Boosting Job Title of Consultant – pure BS) could not persuade the candidate to commit to 13 weeks “Volountary Work”, they were shunted into a classroom.
Graduates would thus share the 13 weeks with ex offenders, those with abuse issues, the unskilled, pregnant women as with unemployed Professionals. In the time they spent in the “classroom”, candidates were treat with utter disdain and contempt, and the classroom felt like you were in kindergarten. And, last but not least, whereas Tutors delivered some “Employability Training”, it was made clear through the recruitment process by the agency recruiting staff to deliver “Employability Training” that candidates need not be Qualified Teachers nor possess any Teaching Qualifications.
Youtube even has a number of videos which demonstrate how utterly mindblowing the scheme was.
Thankfully, the Conservatives cancelled the Flexible New Deal when they came into office, and effectively cut off the Gravy Train to the agencies involved.
From the Agency perspective, every time the agency persuaded a candidate to do voluntary work, it would be classified as a “Successful Outcome”, and a bonus awarded to the agency -and given that the clerks may not have possessed the basic level of competence to pick up a telephone to speak to an employer on behalf of the candidate to arrange an interview, the fast tracking of candidates to any “Voluntary Work” assignment (an oxymoron since Voluntary Work isn’t Voluntary if the candidate is compelled to do it).
…. represented an easy way to make a profit from a candidate without the clerk doing any work.
Cait Reilly, I salute you (and your lovely lawyers). I really hope you know how many people will be behind you on this and hope you win.
xx
Surely it is simple, National Mimimum Wage applies. So you get real experience of a job, including a wage.
And I quote:
“Entitlement to the NMW does not depend on your job title. For example you are not prevented from qualifying for the NMW by:
being called a work experience trainee, an unpaid intern or a volunteer
having your role in the business described as a placement or internship, or unpaid work
If you are entitled to the NMW, you cannot give up your entitlement even if you agree with your employer to be paid a wage below the NMW.”
http://www.direct.gov.uk/en/Employment/Employees/TheNationalMinimumWage/DG_198089
What is the actual issue here is that she refused a scheme intended to help her back into work, what people need to realise is that job seekers allowance is a benefit paid to people that can’t (not won’t) find a job, there are conditions attached to this, I should imagine that it is terrible to have to work outside your chosen career but it’s also pretty terrible to receive tax payers money while refusing work that isn’t quite up her street, I hate my job but I do it in order to eat – end of – I hope she loses and has to pay the legal costs and doesn’t receive another penny of the state until she changes her attitude – lazy cow
You get paid for your work Ian, people who work for these companies don’t – and they should.
Incidentally, have you ever considered couching your opinions in less intemperate language?
People are being offered the chance to gain experience of going to work in return they receive out of pocket expenses in addition to their jobseekers allowance, this is not working for nothing it is a scheme that they are expected to participate in return for the jobseekers allowance. This individual thinks she is above the system and is “too good to stack shelves”, when she eventually grows up she will realise that life doesn’t always turn out the way you would expect, how many scientists and athletes end up as science and PE teachers ?
Her position is an insult to people who do stack shelves for a living and to anyone that does a job that is “beneath them”. If she stopped for a moment and looked at paid graduate schemes in the retail world she would see that management trainees are expected to familiarise themselves with all aspects of a company.
Sorry to rant but this young lady’s attitude stinks and is an insult to those of us that actually do get up every day and go to work many of us in jobs that are unpleasant and not fun – that’s life !
There’s always one…
JSA is hardly a liveable amount of money is it? When she ‘gets into the real world’ perhaps she’ll realise that EVEN stacking shelves earns you more money than that. So why should she be willing to work for free? She’s young and bright and yes life is hard, but why shouldn’t she expect better when she’s already worked so hard? No, life doesn’t always turn out the way you planned, but that doesn’t mean you need to take any rubbish that comes your way ‘just because’. Finally, it comes down the lack of common sense surrounding the whole Jobcentre/JSA system, the whole point of which is supposed to be support, which they definitely do not live up to and make it unnecessarily difficult for some people and ridiculously easy for others.
Ruth in response to your comment, no JSA is not a lot of money, HOWEVER we live in a country where we are able to feed our unwaged and for that we should be grateful, the scheme that this young lady has fallen into is intended to help young people gain workplace experience (i.e getting up and having to turn up, clocking in and out etc) and probably is a bit beneath her however it is mandatory and a condition of the JSA that she receives, what annoys me is that rather than getting on with it she feels the need to waste resources on litigation – surely the sensible thing would have been to just do the work, it’s not like she didn’t have the time
The only plus to this is that hopefully due to infamy she will gain, no one will want to give a job to someone that is so workshy and a troublemaker
You seem very aggressive Ian, yet you still haven’t explained why when the workers next to the individuals on this scheme are being paid a minimum amount, the same work done by those on the scheme miraculously does not merit the same pay.
The Minimum Wage gives people dignity, it is a basic right that isn’t abrogated just because someone is desperate or long term unemployed. Why should Poundland profit from the misfortune of others in this way?
You really don’t get it do you ? What angers me is that this person feels she has the right to refuse to work until she is able to gain employment in her chosen field, in the meantime she expects to be cared for (albeit poorly) by the state until she is able to get what SHE wants, it is an unfortunate fact that in most of the world you don’t work you don’t eat, the least she can do is turn up for a few weeks of work experience in exchange for the handout she receives, lets not forget these schemes aren’t mandatory until you’ve been unemployed for a while, the system will never fit everybody like a glove but we have rules and they need to be obeyed unless you are willing to face the consequences, the consequences are that she is going to have a cut in her JSA, I’m sure it will be reinstated as soon as she see’s fit to take up her placement or perhaps another way out of it would be to take ANY job until her dream job comes up.
No you are definitely not getting it Ian, there is no reason to be angry. Here is the issue:
I walk into a grocery store with my resume asking for work as a shelf stacker. They agree to hire me, they pay me minimum wage.
I walk into a grocery store as a “job experience candidate”. Not only am I doing work that is completely unrelated to my field BUT I don’t even get paid for it.
What you aren’t understanding is the reason why people agree to work for free is because they are hoping to do something related to their career (and even then I don’t agree with it) What it sounds like you’re saying is that because someone refuses to stack shelves for free that they are some self entitled brat. I used to nanny throughout university to make extra cash. Should I have offered to watch people’s kids for free for “work experience”? It’s the exact same thing. When I couldn’t find work, I wasn’t above nannying, telemarketing, and working retail. But I was paid at least minimum wage each time I did it.
Oh and by the way you’re off about the whole “management trainee” thing. Saks has a management trainee program that is a full time job; trainees experience different parts of the business and are trained from the ground up but they are paid a SALARY. Definitely above minimum wage.
And P.S. “Work experience” in a grocery store is only useful if you’re 14 and have never had a job before. Most people in uni have had at least one part time job in their life.
You are still missing my point, which is that JSA is conditional on actively looking for work (and not just jobs that suit you) part of that process is going on courses and schemes that are run for JOBSEEKERS, refusal to either look for work or attend a course/scheme/interview is a valid reason for removal of JSA whether you consider that fair or not it’s the rules. This person feels she is above the rules that govern the rest of us and decides it’s not for her, fair enough but don’t expect to receive the JSA, but what really winds me up is the money that is going to be wasted on this litigation and who is paying for it – ME and the rest of the taxpayers in this country ALL BECAUSE A SILLY LITTLE GIRL THINKS SHE HAS THE RIGHT TO ONLY TAKE A JOB SHE LIKES
I’m off to work now so that Cait Reilly and others like her don’t have to
If you just wound down the self-induced anger and stopped feeling misunderstood, you may understand what people are saying Ian. And that is that this is not about JSA or refusing to work, it is about people getting a fair day’s pay for a fair days work.
Do a day’s work at Poundland as a worker and everyone – even this young lady – deserves the dignity of a fair day’s pay.
Is it about a fair days pay for a fair days work ?
16 hours maximum a week ?
Seems a very reasonable idea for anyone (and that includes graduates) who has never had a paid, start and finish on time, job before.
The primciple applies, whether it is days or weeks or hours. Why should their sixteen hours pay be stolen from them by Poundland or any other employer, just because they are desperate for experience?
“People are being offered the chance to gain experience of going to work in return they receive out of pocket expenses in addition to their jobseekers allowance, this is not working for nothing it is a scheme that they are expected to participate in return for the jobseekers allowance.”
Where they should be paid not JSA but at least the minimum wage – that of course being the law of the land.
So stop worrying about work-shy scroungers and start worry about those who are trying to break employment laws.
We get it that it is not good for people to waste their lives on the dole but that is only part of this case.
A scheme intended to help her back into work? More like free labour for Poundland. I don’t blame her for not wanting to work for free. Us young people are constantly being told that you don’t get something for nothing. Its about time these employers realised that.
Ian, I get that you need to work jobs you may not like to receive JSA. No one is discounting the fact that sometimes to get ahead in life, you have to do things you don’t like. No one is arguing that she shouldn’t start at the bottom and work her way up. I’m not British, but from what I understand JSA is a scheme that is meant to make people out of work productive instead of stagnant and give them work experience. In exchange, they forfeit their right to minimum wage.
What I don’t understand is how anyone can categorize working in a grocery store (that’s what Poundland is, correct?) as work experience. Before you jump down my throat, here’s why.
For someone who is in their 20s, most of us have had some sort of job whether it’s part time or full time. We know how to get to work, clock in, and do the job. However just like with any job, you want to advance. In order to advance, you need NEW skills. Unless you have never had a job before, you already know the basics of going to work. So that’s where internships come in. We hope to expand on our skills while working.
The reason I have a problem with this Poundland scheme is because this young lady is NOT benefiting from working for them for free. She already knows how to stack shelves and clean aisles. What would be more useful is if she say was in corporate learning how to place ads or learning new software. The only people benefiting are the Poundland people. They get to increase their profits by not paying someone for their labour. THAT’S why it riles so many people up (myself included).
No disrespect to employees of Poundland, but that is not a skilled profession. Anyone can do the job and anyone else gets paid for it… except for this girl. So I think she has a right to turn this down if she feels it is exploitative. The turnover rate in retail is exceptionally high partly because the job sucks and the higher ups really have no motivation to change conditions. If someone quits, fine hire someone else.
I get taxed heavily in Canada and have a huge problem with my tax dollars being wasted on people who like to sponge off the system. However, the government isn’t even paying her a livable wage so how can you have a problem with that? If they were paying her minimum wage and she STILL turned down the Poundland work scheme for 2 weeks, then you would have a right to have a problem with her. But you aren’t even paying her lifestyle.
Something to point out is that is she was getting paid for this experience minimum wage then because she’s earning over a certain limit she would forfeit her right to receive any JSA and associated benefits – This would mean the loss of council tax benefit and any housing benefit being paid as well – so although she may not be receiving all of these benefits some people in the same situation will be – and losing having your rent paid/subsidized, council tax waived and JSA will leave them a hundred times worse off. But hey at least the 16 hours of minimum wage per week will see them through….
Years ago when I lived in the NW of England I went through the same process and had a 4 week placement for which i was unpaid. I thought it was beneath me and I was too good for I was doing, it wasn’t what I wanted to be doing but you know what? I learned a lot, the more I learned the more I was motivated and the more effort I put in.
At the end of the placement the boss called me in and apologized that he would be unable to give me a “proper” job but said he knew someone back in London he’d mentioned me to, and if I’d like an interview set up with him.(He even paid the train fare). So I ended up back in London working in a job which I did like. When you leave Uni and end up being long term unemployed take the risk – you never know what will happen. Stop thinking that everything should be on a plate waiting for you because you’ve spent 4 years at uni.
I understand Ian entirely – The JSA regulations and schemes have to be a “one size fits all” they cannot operate based on individual and bespoke requirements for each graduate who finds themselves in an oversubscribed job market. I understand his anger – People spend decades grinding away just to cover their bills and follow the system is 2 weeks too much to ask? You never know having a degree in a little more marketable job may help as well.
Ian, i hope you get made redundant due to an influx of graduate working schemes doing your job for £50 a week. Then you too can find youself in the same position.. I doubt that would happen though because obviously you’re a stallion of a work horse and any employer would be lucky to have you so you’d find a job that day wouldn’t you. I think not. The same people taking the view of you are the same people that bumbled out of uni in to a job 20 years ago, over estimated their wages and got themselves in to debt they could never afford adding to the mess we’re in now. Again i don’t expect this to be you as apparently all your wages are spent on food to eat, you’re either morbidly obese or are receiving the wages of a third world Kenyan, either way i think your vehemence is melodramatic. Nice touch on wishing someone to have to pay the legal fees for challenging a multi million pound business such as pound land and to never be able get a job, that
is the positive attitude that will help the world and hence why I hope you are made redundant. I can’t wish you much more wrong doing as i too have to go to work too to feed the super tennant drinking, uneducated graduates of today…
Hi Kerry, FYI I was unable to bumble out of uni to a well paid job as my parents couldn’t afford for me to stay at school as my younger sister was still at school, so I joined the forces and served in 2 combat theatres during which I was rendered deaf, from there I was lucky enough to find work as a meat inspector in an abbatoir but was forced to leave as I damaged my back in an industrial accident, I now run my own business and have been unable to take time off during my last 8 weeks of cancer treatment, and not once have I had a single penny that I didn’t earn for myself, so how dare you insinuate that I or my generation have an easy life, so yes I do feel I have a right to criticise a lazy bint that won’t attend a mandatatory course in order to receive her benefits, the same girl doesn’t think she should have to take a job outside her field of interest. Angry, yes I am seething about this
You need perspective not everyone in the world is you. I too have never had a penny that i didn’t earn, i too am currently in the forces, so don’t pull that trump card, and i am finishing my degree off my own back because a degree is what you need in britain right now to even get on a work placement scheme if you’re young. Yes cait could join the forces and do what i am doing but she again is not me, and if everyone was me we’d have a lot of educated soldiers with no civilians and who also hate being there. People have a right to choose their job aslong as their willing to gain the required attributes for it which she has. life isn’t something that you must wake up everyday hating because ian says so. You do not know anything bar an article about cait and you are assuming things about her character that are false. Does she appear to be bearing six unwanted children, an alcohol dependency and smoking sterlings whilst kicking stones at your window. No. So you’re just personally attacking someone who has bothered to go to university with the ambition to get a job but not be exploited by companies that could just as well easily hire her and get her off jsa, otherwise you’re just feeding a catch 22 situation. If you bothered to read more cait actually volunteers in a museum, something which adheres to ‘the big society’ cameron wanted and is gaining experience that way, to stop this to work at a private company seems illogical. Work experience…but not that work experience. You would of had to have had a pretty cushty upbringing if by the time you were 21 you have never had work experience in retail or similiar part time jobs already anyway.
The argument is with the where you are working, as in private companies, not the act of working.
You people are so missing the argument, unfortunately there aren’t a lot of jobs around – fact, people are having to sign on – fact, there are conditions to receiving that benefit – fact, these courses are mandatory – fact.
What she should have done is attend the course (it’s only a few weeks) then complain afterwards, but no she thinks she is above, fair enough we live in a free country, however the cost of that decision is to lose her benefit – live with it
@Kerry and Ian
Great discussion! Don’t kill each other though? ; )
I actually think this would make a great subject for a Graduate Fog Debate page – so maybe you guys want to call a truce for the time being and resume battle then? Alternatively, if you’d prefer to slug it out to the death now, feel free…
Peace and love (!)
Tanya
It bothers me how the job centre is mis-selling its work programmes , really does make it feel like a scam. But, the graduate in question should have continued on the course, whilst giving her formal complaint about how she was misled.
When I signed on I was very skeptical about the job centre so I made sure to read in depth the terms and conditions and fulfill my end of the deal. The JSA is NOT free money (which I believe is the point Ian is arguing, and I agree).
Most importantly – you can organise your own mandatory job centre placements under the same conditions. The grad in question could’ve approached local museums for a work placement rather than being forced into an irrelevant one, that is what I did.
Am I the only person who thinks the employer should pay their employees’ wages?!
If we cracked down on unpaid internships (forcing employers to pay the NMW to all employees doing real, useful work for them – as they should be doing already), there would be no question of the government / taxpayer being asked to provide Cait with additional financial support while she works full-time- she shouldn’t need it.
And it would be crystal clear that ‘internships’, ‘placements’ or whatever you want to call them are illegal and should not be happening, whether as a private arrangement between worker and employer, or arranged by a job centre. We already have a NMW law to guard against this insane situation. To my mind, the only question is, why isn’t it being enforced?
While I realise interns can’t live on air while they’re working unpaid, I have serious reservations about the idea that the government / taxpayer should be supporting them during this time. I just don’t see why my taxes should be used to help Cait to work for free, for Poundland OR a museum. In my opinion, it is the employers who should be paying their staff, and nobody else.
NMW works out at £250 a week – whereas JSA is what, £52 a week? It seems like a no-brainer to me as to what we should be pushing for here…
Tanya – You cannot look at JSA alone as a source of income. I have a friend in a similar situation and he receives his £52 a week and has his full rent of £750pm covered by Housing benefit due to being on JSA. Lets say with Council Tax relief that’s equivalent to £12k a year. Based on an average working week of 35 hours it works out about £6.50ph which is just above minimum wage.
The support they are receiving from the benefits package as a whole is equivalent to minimum wage therefore there’s no real reason to object to having to do an unpaid placement.
Apologies for double posting but also something to think about is these schemes tend to kick in after a long period of being on benefits 6 or 12 months.. I’m sorry but if your desired job doesn’t come up after a certain point of time surely it’s your duty to look at other things in the interim rather than have the tax payer fund you waiting for the dream job to come up. Of course don’t give up your hopes and dreams but at least play a part in society. You can still look for the desired job while supporting yourself.
@Rob
That’s really interesting about how benefits add up – thanks. i must admit I’m not an expert in this area – and i know it’s pretty confusing if you are!
But I wonder what Cait would rather have – housing benefit and £52 a week from the government / taxpayer, or minimum wage from her employer, and she can decide how she spends it? I really dont’ know – but I know which I would rather have. I want my living costs to be paid for by the company I am working for, nobody else.
Also, we don’t even know that she is claiming housing benefit, do we? In the BBC interview that sounds like a Birmingham accent to me, and her placement was in Birmingham, so it is quite likely she’s living at home, and not claiming housing benefit at all. In which case, she HAS just done a fortnight’s work for just £104. Were she earning the money the NMW law says she is entitled to, she would have earned £500.
And for the record, I do agree that we need some major reform of the welfare system – in particular housing benefit. I am uneasy about the fact that it has become totally accepted that the government / taxpayers’ money should be used to subsidise low wages that nobody can possibly live on. This seems unsustainable – and is papering over a far greater problem, which is that wages are too low and the cost of living is too high – there is a huge mismatch between the two.
On the other hand, I think the system has been allowed to get into such a mess (during the good times) that reforming it now (in the bad times) so that it’s fair will prove be extremely difficult, for all sorts of complicated reasons – too many to go into here!
@ Rob
Again, I agree with you – to an extent! I don’t think the govt / taxpayer should have to endlessly fund someone’s dreams, however unlikely they are to come off. If i said I wanted to become a rock star but I can’t find any vacancies, i wouldn’t expect someone to pay my bills in the meantime.
BUT i do believe that if someone is doing proper, useful work – whether it’s what they want to do long-term or not – their employer should be paying them. I’m actually not sure I’m prepared to argue this point anymore – we already have a NMW law which says just that. AND this is a law that it is difficult to find anyone to say they disagree with. Yet when it comes to young people trying to get their careers started, people’s principles about what’s fair and right suddenly start to waver, which I think is just blatant prejudice v the young. I find it astonishing that at a time when we are giving our young people such a raw deal, a lot of people are lining up to put the boot in. It just seems like bullying.
To the people who think Cait should work for Poundland (or anybody else for that matter) for free, do you disagree with the NMW law?
Poor her!!!
Whilst I was unemployed, I too had to attend one of these workplacements, I would have prefered to have been a banking director(bonuses included), sadly no such placement was not available to give me the experience, I too had to work for Poundland, I am now actually employed by Poundland, and also recently received mangement promotion), admitedly it is not what I wanted, but the self respect I get from working, is gratifying, and although the wages are not fantastic they do exceed the minimum wage, even on the lower ranks, many employers can not say the same, especially in retail but not solely in same.
@Plop Your sarcasm and wit is proficiently ignorant. The problem here is that these so-called ‘work placements’ are replacing real labour, are getting longer and longer and there is NO JOB at the end of it. Lucky you for your job while the rest of us are exploited. Besides, this affects you too. Middle managers get made redundant or are sacked, the juniors are promoted to managers for even lower wages (as the value of work as gone down due to free work placements) and then the juniors are replaced by work placement people. If it hasn’t happened on a full-scale at Poundland, it will do if this lady doesn’t win her case. I wish her all the best!
By the way, this FINALLY got featured on Daily Mail. Plenty of ignorant comments as usual. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2085142/Unemployed-graduate-sues-ministers-forced-stack-shelves-Poundland.html
I’ed love to know on what grounds she is suing them and it cant be iron clad if shes saying shes looking for change not coppers.
Whether the likes of chris grayling is aware of the misuse of placements has yet to be proved if ever. Their only provable guilt currently is envoking targets on its JCP staff.A little known fact is that when a jobseeker is placed on training of any kind including placements their taken off the total figure out of work even though their still only getting JSA and unemployed.
Some employers are abusing this latest scheme, as is the staff from both the public and private sector in charge of the scheme and others like the work programme as its as usual all about the money and figures.
The staff seeking the actual placements seem to make little effort securing more diverse placements, hence why your only offered tat(no disrespect to retailers). Also a study was done back in early 2000 under labour no less to find out apart from other things which sectors lack applicants, something that this government is still using as all the sectors used in this placement lark are exactly indentical, retail,hospitality,warehouse,etc. Look at the funding for courses and you will see likewise be it not indentical yet.
As for the money the private sector get to get you into work (work programme) is a ridiculus amount and as for this only payed on results is a lie as their all drawing funds from the likes of the european social fund day one so their being payed twice off the back of the tax payers when you think about it.
On the FND programme which was done before the work programme, providers payed placement finders 150 a head if the job seeker stayed in the placement full term. Basically your talking a few visits but mostly just phone calls for check ups. The likes of poundworld take on loads at a time so doing the math can easly see the earner in this. The FND programme was a monumental failure when you look at the figures released by the government and the work programme currently is a carbon copy.
Lastly what incentive is their for the employment sector to keep you employed permantly as they’ed all be out of a job if they actually did what their suppose to.
Those supporting her, don’t understand how the world works and are most likely theirselves, Students or Un-employed and have never been placed in the situation where something isn’t handed to them.
I work as an Apprentice, I get underhalf of National Minimum Wage, which is £70 more than Job Seekers earn every two weeks. However, I need to work 35 hours a week, pay my own travel which is £600 a year, but I stay with it because at the end of the day, I can write on my application a reference and experience.
No offense to those studying at Unis, but the chances of finding a job in your designated field is VERY low. What alot of students find is, as soon as soon as they get out of Uni they are faced with Un-employment, no funding and having to sign on.
The fact that people are saying “She should being get paid minimum Wage”. No she shouldn’t. She earns free money for months, possibly even over a year, she also has student funds that have been paid for her, and she should get paid a full time wage for 16 hours of work a week?
Look at this, she will have student loans to pay back, which will never get paid back, it’s unlikely that she will find a job that will earn over the amount to pay it back, after all, you need to earn well over minimum wage.
Moral of the story? If you want to go to Uni, have it paid for you, study hard and pass, then come out saying “Give me a job I studied for”, you’re in for a shock. I work for the Council, I’d prefer to work for a film or television company, but you take what you get, you build up who you know, and what you’ve done.
Grades mean nothing in non-specialised fields. Experience does.
I think what this girl was really upset about was how she was duped into the placement which i can say as fact is quite rife because these placements handed out by JCP in the first instance are optional, however if you agree to participate it instantly beomes mandatory.
This is why however wrong it my be is why JCP act as they do and lets not forget advisors have to do what their told to whether they like it or not.
I still think regardless working for benefit is a great idea and only disagree with how its currently being actioned.
This is however only part of the problem as even grads lack the necessary skills to look for and secure work. This preparation needs to start while all are in secondary education and right on through college/uni.
A major overall is needed before we can really have a system that benefits all as i agree that placements should be relative to ones path as people with careers are more often more dedicated than those with a job just for the sack of earning money.
I dont want to see anyone working in the likes of macdonalds unless they actually want to be there and i believe also education should be free for all and actively encouraged no matter the age but must be intergrated to aline with working life.
My food for thought is this:
If one mind can create one great thing, imagine what 7 billion minds on one thing could do.
@Cameron: There is no such thing as a “full-time wage”: wages are paid by the hour; *salaries* by the month or year. When people are arguing that Cait should be paid “National Minimum Wage”, they mean that amount poer hour for the hours she worked at Poundland. It is nothing to do with full-time or part-time. And what she was being forced to do wasn’t an apprenticeship: it was free work for Poundland, for which someone doing the same on a proper employment contract would be earning a lot more than JSA. There is a difference between useful work experience and doing an ordinary McJob for nothing, dressed up as such.
@Alex Macfie
You’re joking right? A full time wage, is a wage that is earned in a full time job, hence, full time Wage, the point that you even tried to correct me on something, that is Grammatical and not a fact choice mind boggles me.
No she shouldn’t be getting Paid National Minimum wage, because the work is Mandatory to recieve Job Seekers allowance. It’s her choice not to apply for a job in a super market, or clothes store and wait for something in her field to come along, that attitude means she shouldn’t get anything at all.
The Point of this scheme is to allow real work experience, if a Uni student applies for a Job, has the highest grades in the world, and it’s a choice between them and someone who got a few GSCE’s but has been working in retail for 4 years. They are going to pick the person with the experience.
She is getting free money, to wait for the job of her dreams, which most likely will have more than her competing for it, if it comes along. Why should she get paid more than what she is claiming, after all, she isn’t being taxed, her acomidation will be paid for her(Though she most likely lives with her parents) and ontop of this will be having her Fees paid for her.
Why should she deserve anymore money? The Job Centre are giving her a very good oppertunity, thousands of people would kill for a chance to get there foot in the door of a retail store, even unpaid work.
my son is on one of the schemes at the moment and it is very rare that he finishes on time he is always working over his 30 hours he isnt a long unemployed person and has looked for jobs in various places the job he is doing is very demanding and very seldom does he get a break i thought the days of slavery were over but obviously not this is the third time he has done this in less then a year but like he says if it helps him get a job or put on his cv then he will do it. Its not as easy to find jobs you want out there but they always manage to find jobs when they dont have to pay the people who are on jsa
@Cameron: No-one said anything about “full time” until you came along. The National Minimum Wage is an *hourly* rate, and is NOTHING to do with full-time or part-time. I am correcting you because you are WRONG in asserting that this has anything to do with wanting “full-time” pay: it is NOT, it’s about wanting the appropriate HOURLY rate for the HOURS worked. You may think I’m being pedantic, but the difference between “wage” and “salary” IS an important one; you used the wrong word demonstrating that you fundamentally misunderstand what the fuss is all about.
And stacking shelves for free is NOT a good opportunity, unless as someone suggested earlier, you’re still at school and have never had any kind of work experience at all. The only reason a graduate would ever do a dead-end shelf-stacking job would be for the money to tide them over until they get a job suited to their skills and chosen career path, and so they would expect to be paid the going hourly rate, whether they are doing it full-time or part-time. [Trouble is, the shop might reject such people as “over-qualified”] This is NOT “real work experience”, it is doing the SAME work for nothing that somone else is being paid the proper rate for. Her museum volunteering work, however, IS “real work experience”.
@Alex Macfie
Your first arguement makes no sense. No-one dispute hourly earning at all in this. There is a difference in money however in earning a Full time Wage or a Part time wage. Please read what I said before commenting, as you clearly do not understand that you earn more for full time work which is more hours, that part time work. Thanks 🙂
And honestly, I don’t think you or those saying it’s not a good oppertunity have ever had a job before. You meet new people, interact with people in a real work enviroment, regardless of what you’re doing.
You speak to the manager, you get a reference. A reference is one of the most important things looking for a job. Employers would rather have a reference from an employer, than from a teacher or lecturer. Vocational is always better than Academic. It’s about actually working.
When you get a job, come back and we can discuss this. Angry Students as usual though, they get so much handed to them on a plate, but that’s not enough.