No new workfare!

Submitted by Matthew on 2 October, 2013 - 12:10

George Osborne used his speech at Tory Party conference to announce a “new” work-for-dole scheme. In fact the proposals are nothing new — “work for the dole” (or workfare) schemes have been in place since 2011 across the country.

This latest scheme (to be introduced in April 2014) will involve compulsory placements for the long-term unemployed like clearing up litter, daily visits to the job centre, or compulsory training.

The plan is not new, but an on welfare at his party conference was useful to Osborne — just another populist stance to please the Tory activist rank-and-file.

A piecemeal pattern of forced work will be hardened into an automatic, systematic pushing of people into workfare after they have been unemployed for a certain period of time.

This shift was always planned to take place. Ironically, Osborne’s promise that the tougher scheme will be implemented fully by April 2014 constitutes a considerable postponement.

Workfare is extremely ineffective in its stated goal of getting people into jobs. Over the last three years, the Government’s work programmes has been no more efficient at leading people into work than the New Labour programme it replaced.

The statistical likelihood of people finding work is barely improved by being placed on workfare. The state will spend £300 million per year on the scheme. That money would be far better spent giving people properly paid, socially useful jobs.

The reason the Tories persist with the idea has nothing to do with genuinely helping people out of joblessness. It’s a useful way of whipping up divisions between working-class people with jobs and those without them, winning the loyalty of the right-wing Tory grassroots, and providing platoons of free labour to their friends in big business.

Workfare is a controversial policy, and one that has become vulnerable to political criticism and activism. Large companies are increasingly wary of using workfare labour because of the reputation for exploitation that accompanies the practice.

Socialists and the labour movement should renew efforts to stop workfare. We call for increased non-means tested benefits for the jobless, job creation, paid on-the-job training with guaranteed jobs and a living wage.

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