How Jobcentres bully the disabled and set up fake JSA sanctions

Originally published as ‘Revealed: Inhumane Treatment Of Disabled And Poor By UK’s Department For Work And Pension’ on Mint Press News on 9/10/14. The Department for Work and Pension’s unfair treatment of disabled claimants has been widely reported. There was the ex-RAF serviceman who was found fit to work even though he has to carry

The DWP Works For YOU- Jobcentres must be run in accordance with benefits claimants’ wishes

DWP shaming The DWP thrives on shame. Its tool for repressing benefit claimants is total humiliation and control, and its security for its controversial policies are lies and vilifying of the unemployed. If it operated otherwise, its punishments for poverty – six month workfares, daily sign-ins, mandatory meetings- wouldn’t be tolerated by either its victims

Job Centre Mole: The Second Interview

First published on Guerilla Policy on 20/3/14. In November 2013 I interviewed the DWP whistleblower known as the Jobcentre Mole, who used Twitter to expose corruption and advise DWP victims. In the interview the Mole revealed the existence of sanctions bonuses and competition between JobCentres to sanction the most people. Now another whistleblower who tweets

Meg of the Ingeus Diaries: “I work for £51 a week to escape Jobcentre”

Remember Meg who previously told Slutocracy her story of the Ingeus experience (here and here)? She’s now working for £20 a week less than her Jobseeker’s Allowance just so she can escape the Jobcentre. “I earn £51 a week working 2 days a week. My jobseekers was £71 but I can’t cope with the Jobcentre

Memoirs of a benefits scrounger: Jobcentre sanctions me for getting a job

My transition from good-for-nothing benefits scrounger to upstanding citizen is only a phone call away. Yes, for the last couple of months copywriting and content writing work was harder to find and I’ve been claiming Jobseeker’s Allowance. Now that I’ve got a regular job again I went down to my local Jobcentre to close my

The Ingeus Diaries (part 2): Jobcentre stalking & benefits cut due to Jobcentre incompetency

DAY 2 Before I wrote my last blog, Meg told me that some people hadn’t turned up because the Jobcentre failed to tell them it was mandatory that they go to Ingeus. As a result, their benefits will be cut. These people still weren’t there today. Meg also told me she would only have to

The Ingeus Diaries: a jobseeker’s report of an Ingeus programme

Meg is a middle-aged migrant woman with a degree and 9 years’ experience as a legal secretary. She’s also been self employed and worked briefly as a waitress. Meg was referred to the Ingeus 2-week Stairway To Work programme by her Jobcentre two months after completing her workfare at YMCA and three months after completeing

Myths about unemployment and why the unemployed deserve medals for workfare

As we all know, politicians and the media can’t shut up about how the unemployed are lazy scroungers or, recently, even child-killers (as alleged by George Osborne and the Daily Mail) just because Mick Philpott happened to be unemployed. But jobseekers are the ones who are working for free  doing workfares up and down the

How workfare and students working contribute to unemployment

While workfare is widely criticised as providing free labour for corporations such as Asda and Superdrug, workfare is only part of a wider trend of free labour being used. Firstly, there’s social media marketing. When you follow Burger King on Twitter or ‘like’ the new Cadbury product, you’re providing free marketing. Many apps and sites

Workfare: community service for the crime of being poor, or, How workfare encourages criminality

It’s already been pointed out by people like Johnny Void and the Boycott Workfare movement that workfare, as well as being immoral, is also dangerous because employers don’t know what they’re getting. What if an alcoholic is sent on a workfare in a bar, or someone with social phobia forced to work slave with the