I SUSPECT THAT WE ALL HAVE A LITTLE LIST

We've heard a lot recently about how much fiddling goes on in the benefits system. 


Since the days of Peter Lilley and his song and dance routine about having a little list, like Gilbert and Sullivan's KoKo, and how he was going to get all these people off said list, we have been demonizing people who claim benefits, without stopping to think about why some of them are claiming.


Politicians from the Tory camp to the Labour camp and now the Liberals have taken pleasure in carping about scroungers. And that's fair enough, because there are scroungers out there. Some of us will know someone who should be working but isn't trying, but that doesn't mean that all or even most of the people who are claiming unemployment benefits of some sort are scrounging.


And it's surprising how many people immediately assume that if you're on the dole you must be swinging the lead, until they, or their son, or niece or grandson is thrown out of work. Then of course, it's a different story and there are, suddenly and mysteriously, no jobs.

Horribly now there is evidence that disabled people, some even in wheelchairs and on sticks are being taunted with the "scrounger" label as they struggle to get on buses or do their shopping. And yes, once again there are people who are fiddling the country, but they are damned few.


A report by the Department of Work and Pensions which looks at overpayments and fraud in the benefits system shows that a very small amount of the benefit that is claimed is actually fraudulent.


The report is for 2010-11 and shows the following:

• 0.8% of benefit spending is overpaid due to fraud, amounting to £1.2 billion;
• This proportion is the same as in 2009/10.

Estimates for different benefits are:

• Retirement Pension 0.0%;
• Incapacity Benefit 0.3%;
• Disability Living Allowance 0.5%;
• Council Tax Benefit 1.3%;
• Housing Benefit 1.4%;
• Pension Credit 1.6%;
• Income Support 2.8%;
• Jobseeker’s Allowance 3.4%;
• Carer’s Allowance 3.9%.

Of all the benefits, retirement pension has virtually no fraud, simply because you have to be over 65 to get it if you are a man, and over 61 if you are a woman. (Incidentally, so much for equality. Can you just imagine the hoo haa if it were the other way round?)

After that you have tiny amounts of Incapacity and DLA which are misclaimed. I'll lay money that the Incapacity Benefit fraud is almost always someone who HAS been ill but is now better, not volunteering that information immediately to DWP, and that the DLA fraud is almost all in the free cars given to the most disabled people on the highest level of help, and which are frequently used by other members of the family for their own use.

I'm happy that the government is looking into that fraud, but these figures (remember they are DWP, or government figures) show that 99.7% of Incapacity Benefit claims are genuine, and 99.5% of DLA are genuine. It seems a pity to be encouraging the nurses at ATOS to take genuinely ill people off these benefits, does it not, and it also seems rather unreasonable to tar everyone with a disability as a scrounger when such a great proportion of them are clearly not...(and all to save money because the bankers and the politicians made, and continue to make, a cock up of running the country).

Would that the same proportion of MPs and Lords could be said to be straight down the middle with their claims. As far as I could make out from the Telegraph's investigation over 50% of their claims were dodgy...

It might be worth remembering too that most of the people in receipt of benefits have paid into National Insurance all their working lives in order to get benefits when something goes wrong in their lives...unlike MPs and Lords who simply fiddled their expenses because they thought they were worth more, and they were sure they would never be found out.

WILL MR GRAYLING SHOW AN EXAMPLE AND WORK FOR DOLE MONEY?

Chris Grayling, a minister with the London coalition, is going to “rescue” the “lost generation” by taking them off the dole figures and putting them into work, so says the Telegraph.

I am delighted, of course, that the government is to focus on the 16-25 year olds in the jobs market. I have advocated that several times on this blog. Years of experience in the employment business has reinforced in my reckoning that there is little point in perusing the Thatcher lost generation for work. They have been unemployed too long, settled into their world of poverty, mostly with an acceptance that that is how it will be till they die, probably long before their time. On the other hand, unless we want to ruin the lives of yet another generation of Scots we have to do something to provide work for the under 25s. Even if this costs money, it will be an investment worth making.

The numbers of this age group who are without employment, further or higher education has risen dramatically. It is not just in Scotland where this is a problem. All over the world the issue is the burning one for governments and for young people alike. It is disingenuous therefore of the coalition to try to blame this all on the Labour Party (although their input was substantial).

The figures in Spain are far worse than in Scotland, and even in Germany, there is a 10% youth unemployment rate. In Tunisia youth unemployment was one of the causes of the riots which overthrew the government. This is now spreading to other countries. Although Scottish Youth is unlikely to be so vociferous in expressing its displeasure at idleness being thrust upon it, London is right to be afraid of this possibility.

Mr Grayling’s solution is to offer work in private companies to young people most likely to end up joining the ranks of the long term unemployed (LTUs). Unfortunately Mr Grayling’s plans come unstuck at the first obstacle because neither he, nor the private companies can actually afford to pay for this work, so this new workforce will rely on benefits.

The laudable aim is, of course, to give young people the experience of work, the absence of which is so often a barrier to their being employed. Unfortunately some rather hapless coalition spokesman said that they would be focussing on the needs of employers...which would appear to be for free labour!

I’d be the first to agree that the needs of business must be one of the primary concerns in the rebuilding of the economy, wrecked by bankers and the incompetence of the bank of England, the regulatory bodies, the last government and the last opposition. But free labour is taking this a bit too far.
For employment to work, it must be a partnership between employers and employees. And whilst job experience can have a role to play, it is usual in this relationship for money to change hands.

The full plans are to be announced in the next few days. I look forward with interest to reading them. I hope that the issues of payment will be dealt with, and that the massive problem of drink and drugs addiction will which is one of the barriers to work and the treatment of which is so sadly underfunded will not be neglected.

The problem of unemployment is one which has dogged the London governments for a long time. It has always been handled ineptly. Perhaps London would consider devolving the issue to Edinburgh where it might be dealt with effectively.

Pics: (1) Chris Grayling, a controversial Tory who was destined to be Home Secretary until he made a series of embarrassing statements about youth, Liverpool and gays, whereupon he was demoted to minister of state under the safer IDS and his job given to Kinky Boots May (or ''Matron', as she is known in certain parts!!) (2) Tunisian youth demonstrating that a mixture of unemployment and rising prices don’t make the best cake. Take note David Cameron. (3) Still, look on the bright side, there’s a job for a plasterer there. (4) Chris looks at a wall of achievement and wonders where he went wrong. Want a wee hint, Chris? Two extremities, “feet” and “mouth”.

UNEMPLOYED WILL PAY FOR BANKERS' RECESSION

It appears that, in an effort to get Mr Coulson off the front pages of the newspapers, Mr Osborne has come up with a diversionary tactic. Hit the dole scroungers. No one ever objects, Rupert loves it, and he’s the boss. Can’t go wrong.

So George announced that there will be swinging cuts on benefits.

OK long story as short as I can make it (and I apologize; it is a long post). There are cheats. Yes, loads of them. But there are far more decent honest people on the dole than there are cheats. I promise you. It’s my job.

The truth of the matter is that most people do not actively choose to live on benefits. Despite what the Sun and the Mail tell you, they are rubbish. Even worse than the kind of wages so many people get by on.

No, most people would prefer to have a decent job and a disposable income. Those who are long term unemployed are so because they:

a) do not have the kind of skills, or intelligence, necessary for the kind of work that today’s employers are offering;

b) were put on the scrap heap in the last great clear out of jobs, taken off unemployment benefit and put on to invalidity benefit, in order to massage the figures, and forgotten about. As a result of which they are now elderly and utterly unemployable;

c) have criminal records which, for most employers, immediately disqualifies them for consideration;

d) have appalling employment records which mean that they discarded by employers;

e) have drink or drugs habits which will exclude them from any kind of work;

f) are recovered drug users or alcoholics;

g) are female, and pregnant or single and have children under 10;

h) are HIV positive and their treatments make them sick

or

i) they are over 45, and most employers are dubious about employing them

or (and these are things that should be actionable by government because they are the individuals fault, although that doesn’t increase their employability)

j) they have debts (that are held in abeyance while they are unemployed);

k) they are dealing drugs on the side and need the cover of unemployment;

The people who made this recession are sitting in the House of Lords or selling books, or raking in massive bonuses again like nothing happened. But savings have to be made and the idle poor are to be made examples of.

Maybe George would like some of them in the Treasury. Maybe he would like to explain to his colleagues why there is a paedophile and a rapist starting in their office on Monday, along with a guy who has a drink problem, and someone who is HIV positive and whose treatments make her vomit regularly.

If you are going to get the 5 million people that the government now estimates are idle (I seem to remember that the estimated it at 7 million when Labour was in power) back to work, iron lungs and all, there is a golden ingredient that is missing, and that is JOBS.

Unemployment is going up. Employers are paying off. The government is about to add to that. Vast numbers in the poorest parts of the UK (the BBC survey was all about England for some strange reason) are going to be paid off making the most depressed parts of the country more depressed.

I hope this is a ploy. It certainly was not planned and some members of the Liberal party are furious and predict resistance as they were not consulted. As for the public? Cutting benefits to the lazy is usually much welcomed, but there are a lot of hard working folk that the bankers’ recession has thrown onto the dole, while they take ever bigger bonuses like nothing has happened. I’m not sure that it will work so well this time.

Don’t take the prols for granted George. You’ve probably met very few of us, but we can be quite assertive when we are not tugging our forelocks.