Skip to content or view mobile version

Home | Mobile | Editorial | Mission | Privacy | About | Contact | Help | Security | Support

A network of individuals, independent and alternative media activists and organisations, offering grassroots, non-corporate, non-commercial coverage of important social and political issues.

Jobcentre anger and bans. What a mess.

Kate Belgrave (repost) | 26.09.2013 18:50 | Workfare | Policing | Public sector cuts | Birmingham

It’s hardly surprising to hear that the tension is bad at jobcentres. Lengthy and ridiculous benefit sanctions, pointless courses and workfare placements that go nowhere – it’s no wonder that people are getting really, really angry.

Birmingham Against Cuts had a story recently about a man who smashed windows at the Sparkhill jobcentre after being sanctioned.

Broken Window at Sparkhill JCP
Broken Window at Sparkhill JCP


The Manchester Evening News has a story today about a man who set fire to phones in a jobcentre in the hope that he’d be arrested and given something to eat when in police custody..

And last week, I visited a few people in Bracknell who told me they and people they knew had been banned from their jobcentre for complaining about the centre and their workfare provider.

The jobcentre ban notices (which are not signed by a named officer) said they were banned for verbal and written abuse and behaviour “which was totally unacceptable” (no further details on that appear in the correspondence). The people in question denied the charges in the letters. More to the point – and this is the key point, whether we’re talking Bracknell, or wherever – they felt that they had little recourse. They said that they had nowhere to go to appeal those bans. They’d been issued with ban notices by London lawyers (I have copies of these) and then the jobcentre (I have those as well) and told to appear at another job centre for their fortnightly JSA interviews. That was the end of that.

Except that it’s not. Iain Duncan Smith has clearly decided to leave claimants and jobcentre staff to their hell together, to fight it out themselves. This can surely only get worse. As Birmingham Against The Cuts observes, people are dealing with increasingly lengthy sanctions and ridiculous reasons for them – absurd sanctions handed out by stressed staff who are under pressure to meet cruel targets. No wonder things kick off. What do people expect?

As for bans – heavy. And one-sided. I’ve got papers here which threaten Asbos and injunctions and costs if bans are broken. Wonder what happens if you disagree. Which you might. Of course jobcentre workers shouldn’t be abused – but what if there are two sides to a story? These are tense times, as I’ve said. Isn’t it possible for frustration and persistence to be interpreted as abuse? Can’t perspectives on a heated incident differ? Couldn’t jobcentres ban people who simply persist with a complaint and refuse to give up the fight for their money? (The DWP said, simply, that it banned people “who posed a threat” and that “we do not issue bans lightly.” I’d be interested to know if people think that’s the case. Certainly, the various people I’ve spoken to about this have issues with it).

And if someone disagrees with a ban, shouldn’t they at least be able to appeal that decision? Because if they can’t, or don’t know that they can, then the equation is not equal. So I asked the DWP about this as well. I tried to ask Bracknell jobcentre first, but kept getting bounced back to the DWP. Their advice seemed to be that anyone who disagreed with a ban would need to fork out for a lawyer – “they can seek legal advice – and additionally they could follow our complaints process if they disagree with the methods we adopt – but as a legal request the ban would stand, unless contested legally.” So – you’re sanctioned, you’re banned and you must find money for a lawyer. You’re hardly in a position to do that.

What a bloody mess. I can only imagine that IDS enjoys it – this power to throw people into a tinderbox and chuck in a match. Only a truly evil prick would foster that.

Kate Belgrave (repost)
- Homepage: http://www.katebelgrave.com/2013/09/jobcentre-anger-and-bans-what-a-mess/

Comments

Hide the following 4 comments

A great scam.

28.09.2013 15:38

The Conservatives have everything pretty much sown up.

They have an economy locked down into austerity and are quite literally forcing the UK's most vulnerable into grabbing at high indebtedness by taking payday loans from companies that have been set up with funding from the Israeli's. So the British government gets to maximise that austerity to funnel money to Syrian rebels while indirectly funnelling large amounts into the Israeli economy. The Conservatives do this because many of them are paid and bought for by foreign governments. William Hague is a long term member of the Conservative "Friends of Israel" and the Conservative Party has many more Hague's among its ranks.

So austerity in the UK is a political strategy which has been bought about to aid a Conservative Party that is waging its own personal war against Muslims on behalf of Israeli fanatics.

Those people struggling against benefit sanctions in the UK are subject to a double edged scam. On the one hand they are being forced to pay the price for being vulnerable and on the other hand they are also being used by Labour Party activists who simply cannot see how things are, but see instead only the Tories.

Britain is a dumb place. Even its most ardent activists have very little grasp over the wider environment.

anonymous


You don't need to pay for a lawyer

30.09.2013 00:52

It is still possible to get legal aid from a firm with a public law legal aid contract to challenge a sanction, especially when it's blatantly obvious that you haven't broken your jobseekers agreement: you can apply for judicial review on grounds of irrationality, or that the decision was "ultra vires", that is, outside what the jobcentre is empowered to do under the Jobseekers regulations. The problem is, the job centre staff probably pick first, to meet their sanctions targets, on people who they are fairly sure won't complain or fight back, or won't know how, or won't know where to look for advice. Judicial review may operate faster than putting in an appeal (though you can do that at the same time). Check for local law firms that have legal aid contracts through the law society website, though when you phone them, don't be surprised if some of the entries are out of date. Firms don't update their entries regularly.
I am itching to see some one take the bastard DWP to court over illegal sanctions. Given the way sanctions have increased, I don't know why nobody has done it already. Use judicial review now while you can, the government is planning to change the way it is funded so that law firms don't get paid any costs on account, and only get paid anything if they win the case; they hope most will not be able to take the risk of running such cases, thus preventing ordinary people from getting justice.

pinkolady


Victorian age of wealthy patronage.

30.09.2013 14:10

"I am itching to see some one take the bastard DWP to court over illegal sanctions."

Nobody in their right mind would ever represent a client that daft. Look, the lawyers don't have any morality. If you phone them up and have a conversation about some injustice or other and you tell them you want to take legal action, they will just wait on the phone till they get the other guys name, then they'll put the phone down and then phone the other guy and offer to represent them in court. The system is far too corrupt to reform and endlessly demanding people snivel here and snivel there does nothing to help...at all.

You don't have any money, that makes you a third class citizen and third class citizens get nothing. That is the way this system has been setup to work.

The courts are as bent as the morons that insist we waste our lives away trying to get justice inside them.

The whole system is corrupt, concentrating on just one part of it is pointless.

You will never get justice in a court against the tools of the state.

NEVER.

anonymous


Jobcentre

21.01.2014 15:58

The jobcentre makes you wait 6 months for a response to any tricky complaint and respond with a standard letter slightly edited. Any querys/conerns you have take another 6 months. There lawyers respond to enquirys by saying contact the jobcentre who says theres nothing i can do. The Midlands has been hit hardest and will continue to be the flagship area. No Midland MP's have tried to help in the last few years apart from praising foodbanks who are one of the core of the problems. People have to stand up not just for themselves, for each other, togeather as one we are stronger than anyone in Britain.

I cant say
mail e-mail: Icantsay@yahoo.co.uk
- Homepage: No website


Upcoming Coverage
View and post events
Upcoming Events UK
24th October, London: 2015 London Anarchist Bookfair
2nd - 8th November: Wrexham, Wales, UK & Everywhere: Week of Action Against the North Wales Prison & the Prison Industrial Complex. Cymraeg: Wythnos o Weithredu yn Erbyn Carchar Gogledd Cymru

Ongoing UK
Every Tuesday 6pm-8pm, Yorkshire: Demo/vigil at NSA/NRO Menwith Hill US Spy Base More info: CAAB.

Every Tuesday, UK & worldwide: Counter Terror Tuesdays. Call the US Embassy nearest to you to protest Obama's Terror Tuesdays. More info here

Every day, London: Vigil for Julian Assange outside Ecuadorian Embassy

Parliament Sq Protest: see topic page
Ongoing Global
Rossport, Ireland: see topic page
Israel-Palestine: Israel Indymedia | Palestine Indymedia
Oaxaca: Chiapas Indymedia
Regions
All Regions
Birmingham
Cambridge
Liverpool
London
Oxford
Sheffield
South Coast
Wales
World
Other Local IMCs
Bristol/South West
Nottingham
Scotland
Social Media
You can follow @ukindymedia on indy.im and Twitter. We are working on a Twitter policy. We do not use Facebook, and advise you not to either.
Support Us
We need help paying the bills for hosting this site, please consider supporting us financially.
Other Media Projects
Schnews
Dissident Island Radio
Corporate Watch
Media Lens
VisionOnTV
Earth First! Action Update
Earth First! Action Reports
Topics
All Topics
Afghanistan
Analysis
Animal Liberation
Anti-Nuclear
Anti-militarism
Anti-racism
Bio-technology
Climate Chaos
Culture
Ecology
Education
Energy Crisis
Fracking
Free Spaces
Gender
Globalisation
Health
History
Indymedia
Iraq
Migration
Ocean Defence
Other Press
Palestine
Policing
Public sector cuts
Repression
Social Struggles
Technology
Terror War
Workers' Movements
Zapatista
Major Reports
NATO 2014
G8 2013
Workfare
2011 Census Resistance
Occupy Everywhere
August Riots
Dale Farm
J30 Strike
Flotilla to Gaza
Mayday 2010
Tar Sands
G20 London Summit
University Occupations for Gaza
Guantanamo
Indymedia Server Seizure
COP15 Climate Summit 2009
Carmel Agrexco
G8 Japan 2008
SHAC
Stop Sequani
Stop RWB
Climate Camp 2008
Oaxaca Uprising
Rossport Solidarity
Smash EDO
SOCPA
Past Major Reports
Encrypted Page
You are viewing this page using an encrypted connection. If you bookmark this page or send its address in an email you might want to use the un-encrypted address of this page.
If you recieved a warning about an untrusted root certificate please install the CAcert root certificate, for more information see the security page.

Global IMC Network


www.indymedia.org

Projects
print
radio
satellite tv
video

Africa

Europe
antwerpen
armenia
athens
austria
barcelona
belarus
belgium
belgrade
brussels
bulgaria
calabria
croatia
cyprus
emilia-romagna
estrecho / madiaq
galiza
germany
grenoble
hungary
ireland
istanbul
italy
la plana
liege
liguria
lille
linksunten
lombardia
madrid
malta
marseille
nantes
napoli
netherlands
northern england
nottingham imc
paris/île-de-france
patras
piemonte
poland
portugal
roma
romania
russia
sardegna
scotland
sverige
switzerland
torun
toscana
ukraine
united kingdom
valencia

Latin America
argentina
bolivia
chiapas
chile
chile sur
cmi brasil
cmi sucre
colombia
ecuador
mexico
peru
puerto rico
qollasuyu
rosario
santiago
tijuana
uruguay
valparaiso
venezuela

Oceania
aotearoa
brisbane
burma
darwin
jakarta
manila
melbourne
perth
qc
sydney

South Asia
india


United States
arizona
arkansas
asheville
atlanta
Austin
binghamton
boston
buffalo
chicago
cleveland
colorado
columbus
dc
hawaii
houston
hudson mohawk
kansas city
la
madison
maine
miami
michigan
milwaukee
minneapolis/st. paul
new hampshire
new jersey
new mexico
new orleans
north carolina
north texas
nyc
oklahoma
philadelphia
pittsburgh
portland
richmond
rochester
rogue valley
saint louis
san diego
san francisco
san francisco bay area
santa barbara
santa cruz, ca
sarasota
seattle
tampa bay
united states
urbana-champaign
vermont
western mass
worcester

West Asia
Armenia
Beirut
Israel
Palestine

Topics
biotech

Process
fbi/legal updates
mailing lists
process & imc docs
tech