HearFromYourMP

Comments

• Posted by LAThomas, 13:36, Thu 24 July 2008: (Is this post abusive?) #

  I have no quibbles at all with people who are long-term unemployed doing community work - if it is suitable.

  BUT

  I am an Open University student and disabled. I am over retirement age (thank goodness) so the new regime will not affect me personally. However, I am incandescent with anger at the fear and stress that have been caused to my fellow members of the Disability Forum at the OU.

  They already have to jump through all sorts of administrative hoops to qualify for their benefits. With the new rules that are being introduced, many of them are genuinely terrified at what the future holds for them.

  This, in some cases, is exacerbating their condition! Well done!

  The thought of people's physical and psychological well-being resting in the hands of private agencies who are paid a bonus for getting people back to work is abhorrent!

  I was overjoyed when the Labour party was elected to power but I am completely and utterly disillusioned by how the disabled in our society have been treated since then. Whether they receive money to help them to exist should never be decided by anyone but qualified medical personnel who have no financial interest in their recommendations.

  I would welcome your views on my comments and hope that you can give me something which will reassure my fellow-students that they have not been sold down the river by the very party which is supposed to protect the vulnerable amongst us.

• Posted by Tim Mitchell, 14:52, Thu 24 July 2008: (Is this post abusive?) #

  James

  This proposal really is appalling. If society has a need for people to work for the benefit of the local community then advertise the job and employ somebody to do it. Pay them the minimum wage, which should guarantee a lifestyle above the one available through the benefits system, by all means use the benefit system to make people look for work but if we need work completing in the community then employ people to do it. But this will just further entrench the underclass.

• Posted by Matthew Heywood, 17:27, Thu 24 July 2008: (Is this post abusive?) #

  I think this proposal is needed, if people wish to take money from hard working tax payers by claiming benefits something should be shown for it. Many people learn to play the benefits system and forcing them to work may show that there are alternatives to living off the state.

  However, I think that many people falsify disabilities to claim allowances, i think these people who have no wish to work will merely move to this and a further, wider crackdown on such unscrupulous people should be made especially as it is costing the tax payer £2-3Billion pounds a year!

  I think the only people who will disagree with such measures will be those who are scamming the system!

• Posted by Andrew Clure, 20:30, Thu 24 July 2008: (Is this post abusive?) #

  This is long overdue. If someone is genuinely unable to work then fine, but there are far too many people sat around claiming money for doing nothing. Anyone who is claiming benefits because of bad luck will be glad of the extra focus to get them back to work and doing something positive. If this also has the effect of reducing our (far too high)welfare expenditure, then all the better. Only people with no interest in making a positive contribution will complain about these proposals.

• Posted by David Tilbrook, 23:40, Thu 24 July 2008: (Is this post abusive?) #

  I agree with this proposal to some extent. I think that people who just live off benefits because they cant be bothered getting a job would finally realise that this is unacceptable. Those who are unfortunate to be on benefits through no choice of their own would be able to use the work in a positive way to get a better and paid job.

  However, I also agree with a comment from Tim Mitchell. If there is work required in the community, then why isnt someone just employed? Could these types of jobs be offered to rhose on benefits first? This would then sort out those people who bleed the welfare state for as much as they can.

• Posted by Liam Billington, 11:45, Fri 25 July 2008: (Is this post abusive?) #

  Hardly revolutionary James. You copied it from the Tories.

• Posted by julie elms, 17:32, Fri 25 July 2008: (Is this post abusive?) #

  It is well over due, tax payers are the ones suffering every time. Its the ones ripping the system off who should be sorted out, as long as everything is done fairly for them, ie the ones that really need benifits then I say go a head.

• Posted by jacintha Manchester, 20:56, Sat 26 July 2008: (Is this post abusive?) #

  Why not simply deny those long term unemployed benefits if they decline, or feign unsuitability for, jobs and ease prison overcrowding by making more petty criminals put something useful into the community. Or even better, make them work together.

• Posted by Peter Jones, 14:00, Thu 31 July 2008: (Is this post abusive?) #

  I don't think this is a good idea - not only does it lend a kind of criminality to the idea of being unemployed, but as someone has already said if the jobs are there then perhaps actually employing people to do them at a decent rate of pay would make more of a difference to society and the economy. Time and time again the unemployed are attacked over their supposed fraudulent behaviour, when the evidence for said fraud is based on guess work, and has been since the eighties. This is not the right way to go. Re-training and forcing employers to pay decent wages for jobs is, but that's more difficult isn't it?

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