The problem with employment

If you had been on the same journey I was on around Austerity UK during 2012 and 2013, one thing would have been abundantly clear: work – or the lack of it – was a major problem. You would have encountered a country in the throes of a jobs crisis where citizens were expected to grapple with a dramatically changing employment landscape typified by high and entrenched unemployment in many parts of the country and an increasingly low-wage economy – all against a backdrop of the drastic roll-out of punitive ‘back-to-work’ reforms. If you asked someone about their experience of being unemployed and looking for work, they would more than likely have told you that it was painstakingly hard, frequently fruitless and fraught with barriers.

People everywhere I went spoke of the vast array of hurdles to finding suitable employment, including the invidious spread of the skiver narrative that appeared to have seeped into the entire jobseeking system, from ministers down to the staff at jobcentres.

And people also told me that following the election in May 2010, initiatives aimed at forcing those without work into jobs (however illusory the prospective work might be) had taken previous endeavours under New Labour to address ‘worklessness’ to a whole new, merciless level. If those who bought wholesale into the skiver narrative were tempted to dismiss claims about how harsh conditions were, the evidence proved they were wrong. The reality in fact was that many people were being pushed to the edge because jobs weren’t available or the pay and/ or hours were so low they would still leave them in poverty.