I have always thought Iain Duncan Smith a thoroughly odious person, a failure at everything he touches, failed politician, failed party leader, never actually achieved anything except being kept in position by his wife’s money. He has probably never done a decent days work in his life. Today he showed himself to be not just odious and obnoxious, but evil.
Last week an unemployed student won an important victory in the Appeal Court. The Court ruled she could not be forced to work for nothing. The ruling was on the regulations rather than slave labour per se, but it was still nonetheless an important victory. Finding herself without a job, she was willing to put her skills to some use by working as a volunteer at a museum. She had been forced by her local Job Centre to go and work for Poundland for nothing. It was either that or lose her benefits.
An employment minister was quick to claim it would make no difference to the scheme, it would be businesses as usual and they had absolutely no intention of compensating those who had lost benefits by refusing to work as unpaid slaves for big corporations.
Today, Iain Duncan Smith launched a vicious attack on the young lady who won her case. He made the point the former boss of Tesco started stacking shelves. In making the point, he completely missed the point. Yes the former boss of Tesco started at the bottom stacking shelves, but he was paid to do so, as he was paid to be boss of Tesco, he did not work for nothing.
These companies are not employing people on no wages out of the goodness of their hearts because they wish to give unemployed people a helping hand. They are employing them because they are free. If they wanted to help people get out of poverty, they would be offering jobs at above minimum wage. Often the very same stores that have no vacancies when unemployed inquire about a job, are the same companies that are only too happy to employ them on a temporary basis unpaid with no job prospects at the end.
These are the same companies that obtain goods from sweatshop factories, screw their suppliers, pass horsemeat off as beef.
Iain Duncan Smith asked which would you rather have when out shopping, someone stacking the shelves or a geologist. Next time this cretin fills his car, or more like has someone to do it for him, let us ask who he would rather have, a shelf stacker or a geologist. Or does he think the oil finds and extracts itself?
In attacking the young lady for preferring to work in a museum, not waste her life working as a shelf stacker, Iain Duncan Smith showed himself not only to be a cretin, but also a Philistine.
The latest nonsense to pour forth from this jerk is that the bedroom tax is to help the poor. Since when has Iain Duncan Smith or anyone else in this evil ConDem government had any interest in helping the poor? They love the deficit, as it gives them an excuse to carry out slash and burn of public services, to kick the poor, to deprive them of money.
If it is to help the poor, then let’s have a bedroom tax on 5 or more bedrooms, on second homes.
Will members of the ConDem government be giving up their mansions as hostels for the homeless?
ConDem government says Mansion Tax a very bad idea as the rich can ill afford to pay it and it would need an army of bureaucrats to value the properties that would attract the Mansion Tax.
On the other hand the poor can easily afford a Bedroom Tax out of their shrinking incomes and it is ok to employ an army of bureaucrats to assess all the properties of the poor for too many bedrooms.
It is ok to kick disabled off invalidity benefits and cut the level of benefits to everyone as it makes them better off, gives them an incentive to work harder. On the other hand the rich need tax cuts as they are suffering, and by giving them a tax cut it acts as an incentive to work harder.
What we are seeing is Double Think, the ability to hold two contradictory arguments simultaneously.
Workfare is doing nothing to help those on benefits, it simply provides free labour to Big Business and helps drive down wages. If you want to help the unemployed you provide them with high quality training, so that when the economy improves, they have improved their employment prospects. You do not help them by turning them into slave labour. You do not punish them for being unemployed, you do not punish them for an economy destroyed by criminal bankers and failed politicians like Iain Duncan Smith.
We need safe and secure communities. We create by making people feel safe in their homes, a stake in their community. You do not achieve this by making people homeless, forcing them out of what is their home, where they thought they were secure.
