Today the Court of Appeal ruled that a scheme by the British government's scheme which forced individuals into unpaid work was illegal. For a bit of background, this scheme was devised to help the long-term unemployed gain some work experience. It therefore organised unpaid placements for those that had been out of work for defined periods (9 months for those aged between 18 and 24 or 12 months for those aged over 25). So far so noble. The problems start in the fact that the placements were not optional. Moreover, individuals faced having their benefits docked if they did not take up the placements. The final straw is the fact that placements were assigned on an arbitrary basis and took no account of an individual's skills or interests.
The cases resulting in the Appeal Court ruling illustrate this nicely. One of the parties was a recent geology graduate who was forced to work in Poundland. The other was an unemployed HGV driver who was forced to work in a similarly unrelated position. Reports for the media suggest that, in both cases, the cost to the employer of having these individuals working for them was nil. Naturally the process was compared to slavery and indeed the court decided that the fact that the individuals were not getting paid for their efforts made the process illegal.
The idea of the a government forcing individuals into slave labour is a pretty terrifying one. However that does not mean they should not be proactive in getting the long-term unemployed back to work. Part of this is of course trying to facilitate them gaining workplace experience and providing incentive to do so. However a particularly troubling aspect of the above cases is the fact that both seemed to totally ignore the specialist skills of the individuals involved. In the case of the graduate, she was working for free at a local museum and had ambitions to work in museums as a career. In the case of the lorry driver, well he's a lorry driver.
The case of the graduate student in particular touched a nerve with me because I am in a not too dissimilar position. A major barrier to employment these days can be summed up in one word, "experience". Everybody wants it yet nobody seems prepared to offer it. I have filled out countless application forms knowing I stand only the slimmest chance of even getting an interview. Despite the fact I more than fulfil the academic requirements and have great examples of the transferable competencies, I lack experience. Such feedback that I do get often cites this as the reason my application did not proceed further.
So how is one supposed to get it. The obvious answer is to work for free. That way, the risk to the employer is minimised and the employee gets to put it on their CV. Of course the most obvious problem with this is the financial one. We all need to eat, put a roof over our heads and clothe ourselves. How are we supposed to do this if we don't have any money coming in? This dichotomy has forced me at least (and probably many others) to take a job that isn't really brilliantly suited to me. The most obvious example of this is the fact that I am vastly overqualified for it; my colleagues were startled when I let slip my academic qualifications. However I will be the first to admit that academic ability isn't everything. Slightly less obviously, the job just isn't suited to my skills, nor particularly to my personality. I can do it and I can do it well but there's more to building a career than that. At the moment I am just relieved to be working however I am very aware that it is not a recipe for long-term happiness.
It frustrates me that, in order to gain experience in a field they are passionate about, an individual is forced on to benefits. The benefit system is there to support those in dire necessity, not provide a springboard into industry-relevant experience. I don't particularly blame the young lady for doing it but it is awful that she has been forced into that position in the first place.
What really angers me is the blinkered ignorance displayed by those who administer the system. Why was her voluntary work not recognised for what it was? Similarly, why was she shoehorned into a job stacking shelves for a large company. Surely a better solution would be to further encourage the voluntary experience. I do however admit that this could be hard to administer nation wide but that still doesn't explain why a large, profitable business what given the benefit of the free labour (and this labour was free). Why not use the pool of available workers to support charities and small businesses. I'm not an economist but I'm willing to bet that there are many businesses that could gain real strength and momentum by having a few more pairs of hands at a lower price. Similarly charities could benefit from an influx of able people who were needing to work. In both these cases it is likely to gain the individuals more skills than if they simply performed menial tasks and offer the opportunity to allow pre-existing skills to be utilised.
In a previous post I attacked government and the civil service for generating and implementing policies that do little other than generate paperwork. I'm going to backtrack a little bit here. I agree that jobseekers allowance should be reduced for those that do not appear to be actively job seeking (or perhaps increased in line with the amount of effort being put into finding a job) however the system cannot be as blind as it is at the moment. Yes, I agree there should be a certain period where individuals are allowed to focus full time on searching for a job however after that constructive effort should be rewarded. This does not mean presenting an individual with a metaphorical gauntlet in the form of an arbitrarily generated role; it means supporting them if they are actually doing something that will assist in their search for a job be that voluntary work, further training or assisting in finding an unpaid placement that will be of some constructive benefit. Of course this will be individually specific and will require a lot of project support however I believe that if this system, or one like it, was introduced it would lead to a happier workforce who would in turn work harder and be more productive giving a net benefit to everybody.
Before I round this off, let's have a quick look at the companies. Assuming my scheme does come into fruition (although what I'm about to say is doubly applicable if is doesn't and bit high street chains still get the benefit of jobseekers), should the "employers" get the benefit of this service for free? I don't think so. Giving the service for free still seems exploitative to me. Instead, their obligation to pay national minimum wage should be waived in favour of them paying reasonable expenses incurred during the course of service (essentially travel costs and lunch which is an allowance given to volunteers in organisations such as St. John Ambulance). In an ideal world, remuneration could be graduated to reflect the skill level of the position thus providing motivation to undergo skills training. Of course the obvious pitfall of the latter idea would be that small companies would forgo employing skilled staff knowing they could get jobseekers at significantly below the market rate... Hey, I didn't say my idea was perfect, there are kinks that need ironed out but we must be able to do better than we are at the moment.
In conclusion, the jobseekers system should be there to help those who are genuinely looking for a job. The government should be supporting their efforts rather than hindering them and demoralising the individuals involved.
JR
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