Workfare For All…Sleepwalking to disaster!

Workfare for all…everyone on benefits has to work for them…The latest idea being trialled for public response by the Tories via their ever helpful media!

Remind me again what National Insurance is??

And why is it removed from the paypackets of the workers in this country??

The salivating masses of the workers will love the idea think the Tories, as they continue their divide and rule policy to turn workers against non-workers, employing the language of the ‘shirker’ and the ‘scrounger’ as they go.

The people in employment, especially lower paid jobs, need to be very careful before they fall into the Tories trap on this one…whilst reading the Sun and getting worked up about ‘foreigners coming over here taking our jobs’ seems to be the target audience of the Conservative Party it is those very people who, whilst struggling to make ends meet, could find themselves at the sharp end of this policy.

Out there are many employers who are loving this governments assault on the very people they employ to make them rich. Workfare has been a tremendous boost for employers who can’t be bothered to actually pay a living wage to someone to do a job they need doing, why pay a full wage when you can get someone on benefits (and under threat of losing the benefit) to do your dirty work.

And that is the problem with workfare for all.

It means that there will be a massive market of jobseekers, under threat of losing all they have, being forced into jobs that should be permanent positions paying proper wages, and those in the positions may well find themselves looking very unattractive to those employers who suddenly think they can save a fortune on their bottom line by engineering a switch from permanent to desperate.

And remember…unless you have some cash in the bank now, such employers can dispense of your talents without fear as this government have already removed the right to an industrial tribunal from all but those who can now afford to pay for it.

There are by many estimates about 5 million people not working who are of working age.

The Government don’t care about the young, they don’t even seem to register on their radar anymore, parents can deal with that problem!

They want the people to work longer so that they don’t need to pay pensions, and therefore encourage people to work years longer than they should have to so they can save on pensions whilst denying the turnover of jobs that would naturally offer work to the younger generations.

The number of vacancies advertised (and we will ignore the made up one’s that most certainly do exist to massage figures) is a very small percentage of the number of people seeking work, and most advertised jobs go to employed people anyway, the circle of employment is very hard to break into once you are out the loop.

The quality of jobs and wages offered has never been lower, there are jobs aimed at young people advertised in my local paper for £2.68 an hour…I earned almost twice that when I started my first full time job aged 18 some 25 years ago! And that was in Thatcher’s Britain.

How are people under minimum wage age meant to find somewhere to stay and live off £2.68 an hour? Not everyone has parents who can assist them. And before anyone cries ‘Housing Benefits etc’…without contributions (which the young don’t obviously have) they can hee haw for any kind of assistance that will prove meaningful. They may get some help but a life they most certainly won’t get!

I ask again for the rest of the workforce…what are National Insurance contributions for…exactly?

They are supposed to help give you something in return if you fall on times that require assistance, you pay them as your safety net so that if you lose your job through no fault of your own as thousands have done in the past few years the state will give you help by giving money back to you by way of benefits. So why do the Tories think that everyone should have to work for their benefits, are they planning to scrap National Insurance?? I doubt it!!

I know from personal experience that paying in NI means nothing, I paid money into that system for years and when I asked for help I got nothing back, you are made to feel guilty even for asking! And yet the money continues to be taken!

I accept that it is also a means of funding the Health Service etc but the point is that it is also meant to be there for everyone who needs it, the vast majority of those seeking work are doing so through no fault of their own…the ‘scroungers’ may exist, but they are such a tiny minority compared to the genuine people who apply for job after job and get nowhere…those genuine people should not be forced to work for nothing, or for benefits that the majority have paid into a system to cover…and those genuine people form a group that EVERYONE in a low paid jobs today is just a  decision away from…a decision that employers can take without legal fear in many cases and which can then lead them to replace people with others for considerably lower wages if indeed they have to contribute to their wages at all.

Workfare is a great idea in the minds of many who swallow the Tories divide and rule attempts, it is not a great idea for the thousands who struggle daily to survive…and the line between the two points of view is an employer who is able to do as they want unchecked by legislation or government scrutiny. It is very easy to be in the first group and then suddenly find yourself in the second…people should remember that when they fall for the divide and rule scenario.

If there is a job to be done, no matter who many hours, it should be done by someone being paid a living wage!

It must never be done by someone under threat of poverty and hardship!

People in proper jobs pay taxes…they swell the coffers of the nation…they contribute…it isn’t rocket science!

Making it easier for employers to do as they want and forcing low wages on people will never lead to a recovery that matters, because the people working will always be in poverty and fear of what lies ahead, as a nation that is how this government wants us all…living in fear, compliant, docile, scared…what a great nation the Tories lead, they have us all just where they want us!

 

 

 

 

Scottish Independence…The Nasty Campaign

Its taken a lot to get me back onto the blog, but some of the things that are happening now in Scotland regarding the Independence debate leading to the Referendum in a years time are starting to grate on me, and the blog is always here to let that vent take a form.

Quite frankly I always doubted the ability of either side to offer up a debate that would rise above the gutter, simply because the tendancy of many is to fight optimism with a level of debate that the gutter would look down on and subsequently each side would react more and more in a downward, spiral such is the Scottish way that we seem to deal with things and critisicm etc

The Better Together campaign haven’t disappointed me in this regard, never has such a negative, inward looking rabble offered up a campaign of utter nothing and called it a reason to vote No…No by its very definition is negative, their campaign hasn’t offered anything other than that. Scare stories are one thing, and they seem to be daily, and despite each one being pretty much more ludicrous than the last they keep coming and coming…there must be a room somewhere with people employed to think up these things, and nothing is off limits to them either, any situation as it exist today can be twisted into a negative scare of the future, it is for want of a better word ( and I struggle to think of one) pathetic.

Now I don’t let the Yes campaign off here too, because they are just as capable of sinking to the level of the other side, but one thing that does seem to be a part of their strategy is to use a degree of humour when dealing with the ridiculous, and whilst it doesn’t always work it can be effective!

I come at this campaign having seen both sides, I was a member of the Labour Party for many years, I was subjected to the vile side of the SNP that does exist in some quarters and for which their party seems almost oblivious…1992 saw myself and other members of the Labour Party spat on by SNP members outside the City Halls in Perth after the Tories had done the unthinkable and held their seats in the General Election, a defeat that led one SNP candidate to stamp her feet like a petulant child onstage and led to the disgusting behaviour of those outside. I have also seen the venom with which Labour folk have approached the SNP, none of it pretty and none of it doing anything but a dis-service to the history and tradition of those who went before.

I have never voted SNP, and can never imagine a circumstance where I would, and similarly my time supporting Labour is now a very distant thing in my past, they will never speak for me in their current form and quite frankly their ability to accept Tory ideas without any form of resistance is a disgrace to the many who fought to build the Labour movement in the past. Things like the Bedroom Tax should have been opposed at conception, not months later!! Workfare and its acceptance by Labour is a disgrace plain and simple.

But this referendum is about the future, and the future I want is a Scotland that embraces its roots, its core politics and forges itself in the world as a Socialist nation, offering hope and opportunity to all in a compassionate and understanding manner, yes its a dream, but all dreams lead to ideas and ideas to action…Its why I decided at the very outset of this campaign to vote Yes.

In all the time I voted and supported Labour I was opposed to Independence, the SNP haven’t converted me, I don’t want to live in an Independent Scotland run by Alex Salmond…I want to live in an Independent Scotland run by people for whom Socialism is not a dirty word, and for whom the ideas of justice and vision are just the starting point on a journey that a new, young Independent nation can take.

I know quite a few people for whom the whole debate focuses on Salmond, without him they would vote Yes but they cannot separate the person from the campaign and because of it they cannot be convinced to try and look beyond him…it may be the downfall of the Yes campaign if their views are amplified, the debate and vote isn’t about him or the SNP for that matter, there is a very high chance that the SNP would play no major part in a post Independence government in Scotland simply given that by its nature it is a collection of groupings brought together under the want for separation from the UK and that once that aim is achieved there is a very good chance that splits would happen as people resorted back to their natural positions. What form the SNP has in a new Scotland is there for the SNP to decide on, but any chance that can be taken to seperate the Yes campaign from the SNP should always be taken and should be actively encouraged by those SNP members serious in their aims. There are other groupings fighting alongside the SNP.. the Greens and Scottish Socialist Party to name just two of many…a bigger role for them in the media would do no harm to the appeal of the Yes campaign.

The SNP won the last Scottish election, and they won it convincingly despite the Labour Party’s attempts in the formation of the Scottish Parliament to try and ensure such a result was impossible…and in winning the SNP and Salmond earned the right to have the referendum and shape the debate…but if the Yes campaign is to be succesful then they need to look at the toxic views many have of them and their leader and try and address that to widen the appeal. Without Salmond I know from personal conversations that more votes could be achieved, but unless he plans the ultimate sacrifice I doubt he is going to resign so more use of the non-SNP political forces needs to be addressed and quickly.

The Labour Party is not disappointing me now with their attitude, I expected no less than the absolute vileness of their so called Scottish Leader who seems to think that if she just makes everything personal it will stick, between her comments on the ‘virus’ of nationalism and those around her now pointing towards reduced rather than enhanced powers for the Holyrood parliament in the event of a No vote the Labour Party is sinking further and further into the mire. The Scottish people may reject Independence next September, but I see no way they would then allow the Parliament to be devalued from its current state…its cheap talk from a cheap party with no ideas, struggling to sit alongside the Tories while claiming to fight them in Westminster…it was always a tightrope they couldn’t stay on, it will only get worse for them as people really start to focus on the debate in  the months ahead.

There is no positive case being made for staying in the union, if the choice was continuing to be an Independent country or joining the UK it would be a walkover, and that is maybe the best way for the Yes campaign to approach this. As a nation we wouldn’t feel a clamour to give up powers to be run from Westminster, its just convincing people to take that leap of faith and leave the past behind that somehow a vision needs to be formed from.

The Yes campaign has to try and keep positive, humour to deflect from the ludicrous nature of some of the attacks can work and lets face it, no-one is going to find a joke told by Alastair Darling particularly funny…Maybe another I.M.Jolly moment from Salmond is needed to change perception, or better still just less Salmond and more of some of the others!!

I worry for my country in the wake of all this…I worry that attitudes and feelings are hardening to the point where whoever wins and whoever loses the country may struggle to pull together. There is an undercurrent here that is toxic, on both sides, and it will need careful managing no matter which side wins the vote…triumphant attitudes could bring out the worst in unionism should it be a Yes result, you only need to look across the water to Ireland to see the dangers that may present…and a No vote could equally lead to unrest, especially if it is perceived that the ‘victors’ are then punishing those who brought about the vote and debate in the first place. I dread to imagine the reaction of the hardest core of Nationalist should a No vote be followed by moves to remove the powers of the Scottish Parliament or even to remove the whole institution itself…it is a very hard path that will follow this vote whoever wins and the managing of it needs to be addressed on both sides sooner rather than later and with very calm heads.

The nasty language should have no place in this debate, facts should be all that matters, resorting to the language of hate always suggests a desperation at an argument that has been lost and then the loser lashes out with words. I know that the Labour Party in Scotland is struggling with the concept that some who would be its natural support are going to vote Yes, they cannot see beyond their links to London, which is sad because no party or movement really stands to gain more from Independence than the Labour movement, Scotland would be its natural partner, it has an opportunity to shake off the workfare loving tendancies of its southern base and actually lead a nation in the very direction it was invented for…such a shame that those career politicians who lead it cannot see beyond their vileness and petty squables… they could be the key to the future, I won’t hold my breath on them leading us there.

Lets hope the next 12 months sees a debate worthy of the nation we live in and love, there is no need to be afraid of change or the future, there is a very real need to debate its merits and ideas in a calm way that does not inflame the worst aspects of both sides of the argument. There is a lot for the people of Scotland to gain, and equally a lot could be lost if this bile is allowed to go unchallenged…the media have proven they cannot be trusted to offer an objective face in all this, everyone involved must therefore use whatever means they can to remain calm and rational in the face of provocation by whichever side does it…Scotland must come first, the future of our country is at stake and the generations that follow us will never forgive us if we fail them.