What happened at the job centre

[avevale_intelligencer]

Nothing. They're understaffed and two people are off sick, so I saw a (very nice) young lady who rebooked the appointment for two weeks' time but could do no more.

Another gentleman who was there at the same time seemed exercised about something, apparently (I gathered from his mumblings) related to the recent termination of his relationship with a lady who had assumed responsibility for his dogs. He appeared desirous of occasioning a sense of remorse in her for this action. I wondered what the dogs would think. As I left, he was opining in a loud voice to one of the staff that whatever he wanted the Jobcentre to do for him would be more speedily accomplished had he been of Polish extraction. Shortly thereafter I believe he was summarily ejected from the building. I was just very glad, for my sake and the staff's, that he didn't have a gun.

Comments

[lexin.livejournal.com]

Jobcentre staff do have to put up with some shit. I bet they didn't even report him as PV.

[mrs-tribble.livejournal.com]

I could never work in a Job Centre, purely because of people like this asshole :(

[akicif.livejournal.com]

Sorry - I can't help but be amused at the notion of the Jobcentre being understaffed.... Sort of fits in with the rest of this delightful Government's actions...

[zanda-myrande.livejournal.com]

It was the same when we worked in the Benefits Agency years ago. This govt, the last one, the one before and so on back, all following Maggie's plan...

[akicif.livejournal.com]

Hideously stressful work, and never enough budget to pay the people they'd need to make a decent job of it. I don't envy you that one tiny little bit - I was very lucky to get DH and not DSS when I was semi-conscripted.

[janewilliams20.livejournal.com]

Good (serious) point. Why not offer to work there as a volunteer? It's a step back towards work, and fits previous experience.

[zanda-myrande.livejournal.com]

Um. There's no way I could do that for pay, let alone for nothing. It's harder and more stressful than the job that made us both ill in the first place, with the opportunity to meet interesting people like the gentleman who wasn't Polish and get assaulted by them, and the knowledge that I am there purely and simply to put an acceptable face on the gradual abolition of the benefit system.

Sorry if I sound a little negative. I am willing to work, and aware that all jobs have downsides, but dear gods, not that.

[janewilliams20.livejournal.com]

OK - then that sensitivity to stress, to the point of making you ill, needs making clear to the job centre, when you get your "real" meeting. The normal assumption for anyone who's been out of work as long as you have is that you're willing to do anything that you're *physically* capable of, and that disliking your job is just the way life is, and something that everyone has to cope with.

[eintx.livejournal.com]

Well, the point is money. If I understand things correctly, he is not looking for something to do to fight boredom.

[janewilliams20.livejournal.com]

Of course the point is money, and that's why it needs to be made clear that if there was a job of that nature going, the sort of thing that he'd be expected to apply for, his refusal to do so is for a real genuine health-related reason, not just "whinging idle bugger who doesn't really want a job", which would otherwise be the default assumption. This is not a good climate to give people excuses to take benefit away.
As a volunteer position, where the whole point is to prove that, yes, you can still hold down a regular job, and still remember how to wash, put a suit on, and turn up on time, then doing so in a position where in fact you couldn't cope would be a terribly bad idea, so we drop the proactive application concept on this occasion. As a general concept, though, it's a good one - at minimum, you get something on the CV and a recommendation, and it may even lead to paid work. Saying I'd do three days work on the cheap (not free, but about half the rate I was worth) got me a permanent job, eventually.

[eintx.livejournal.com]

Of course. I haven't said anything against the general concept. My comment was not too long to be read, I think.

[janewilliams20.livejournal.com]

Not long, no, but I don't see in what way it was relevant to anything I said.

[eintx.livejournal.com]

Your loss, not mine.

[weebleflip.livejournal.com]

In your first comment, you did seem to have missed the point that she was suggesting volunteer work as a stepping stone to paid work, not as an end in itself. Her reply made that clear - no need to get snippy!

But yes, unfortunately even a very short stint volunteering in a job centre would push stress levels a lot.

[eintx.livejournal.com]

I did not miss any points, and I'm angry, not snippy.

[michael cule (from livejournal.com)]

I worked 'backstage' at our Jobcentre, not normally in direct contact with the public and that was stressful enough.

Given the current lunaic cuts in the Civil Service I doubt if there are any nice restful jobs in it any more, if there ever were.

(All right, lighthousekeeper. But they automated that one out of existence years ago.)

[akicif.livejournal.com]

Indeed. I'm surprised they don't take on the staff they need from the nearest source to them. Except, of course, it's not really people they're short of, it's the cash to pay them with.

I was luckier, in a similar situation: the reason my CV has a chunk of Department of Health / NHS Executive work on it was that if you were signing on in Leeds in the early nineties and looked vaguely literate/numerate you'd get more or less drafted to Quarry House - I ended up as a casual EO on the research funding side.

It was actually both interesting and useful work, with some interesting stories (the nearest we got to public-facing was the occasional mildly tee'd-off academic), and had a job in Edinburgh not appeared later that year, I'd maybe have stayed.

(One funny-ish story from those days. One morning we received a fax, chock full of confidential information that should have gone to a different part of the forest. i recognised the sender as a London-based fan who I hadn't realised was a civil servant, but who I had had previous exchanges with by email or letter. So, I positively grovelled to be allowed to be the one to ring up and say what had happened. I phoned them, and after a bare minute got put through to the right phone, and after the initial greetings and the "what are you doing phoning me at work" bit, I managed to mention that I'd received this fax they'd just sent. It took a good couple of minutes before they'd calmed down enough to realise that a) I'd phoned in on a GTN line and b) I was trying to tell them that it hadn't been mistakenly sent to my home number, but simply to the wrong bit of Quarry House. Okay, maybe not as funny as all that)