JSA Claimant: At The Jobcentre, We’re Not Considered People

An extract from Kate Belgrave’s latest article, on Jobcentres.

“They [jobcentre advisers] are working by their own system to push themselves up the ladder at our expense. Because we come in to sign on, we’re not [considered] people. That’s what it is. That’s what it has become like. I’ve worked [in administration] and I’ve paid my taxes like everyone else. Coming to a place like this – it’s so degrading.”

“I have to do daily signon. They didn’t say why. One day I come in and the next minute they told me I have to do daily signon. So you who is genuinely looking for work, you haven’t got nowhere to turn. I’ve decided that if I can’t find work in what I’ve worked in, I will go back to doing some sort of carework to fill the gap. But now they [the jobcentre] have told me that they can’t do anything to help to get my CRB check. How am I going to find that money? It’s £65 and we get £140 a fortnight [in JSA]. So that means I have to either go without – and I’m already going without for gas, electric and all these things. How are we supposed to get out there to work when they’re not helping us in any way at all? My definition of a jobcentre is that when you go in there, there is somebody to assist you. But there is nobody there to assist you.

“I have to come in every single day. I don’t know from one to another what time it is. Today, I came in at ten o’clock. Tomorrow, I’m in at 11.05am. The day after, I might go back to 9am or 3.30pm. I don’t know. They’ve messed me about so much I haven’t been able to go to my drop-in centre. My drop-in centre is so helpful. I pay my own fares and everything as well to go there. I have got use of the computer and advisers there. They are a world of good to me, but coming here [for daily signon], I cannot get there, because my drop in centre is from 9 to 12.”

“The government has to really check and see what they’re [jobcentres] are doing. There’s no help for the unemployed. They think that people love to be unemployed. I do not love to be unemployed. If somebody walked up the road now and offered me a job, I would take it. [I was made redundant] – the company that I was working for, they closed down so many branches. These sorts of places, they don’t give you no confidence to go out to work. If I wasn’t a person who keeps on going, they would break me down. I would end up being on the tablets and being at the doctors. That’s how they deal with you.”