Free school meal parcels containing barely any food

[olliebean]

It's tactical cruelty from their ideology. They don't believe the poor deserve anything so they get the bare minimum. Even less than they budget for so the cronies get a taste. And they need the poor to be really suffering so the working poor, working class and middle class will look at the food bank people and the homeless and be scared shitless about ending up like them. So they'll keep clocking in for their masters. The fear motive. It's about pushing people down rather than pulling them up.

Not related to the meal parcels, but related to this, I realised the other day that the the requirement of job seekers to apply for so many jobs isn't designed to increase their chances of getting a job - that would involve putting more time into finding, applying and interviewing for a smaller number of jobs that the applicant is really well suited for - but rather, by ensuring they have to apply for many jobs that they have no chance of getting in order to fulfil the requirement, and eating away at the time they have to prepare for the ones they are suited for, it's designed to get them lots of rejections and crush their spirits. Also to increase the chance of them ending up in a crappy job that they hate.

[JaDanketies]

I mentioned this to my mum, who immediately suggested it was faked. I asked her why would someone fake something as ludicrously cruel as that?

Yeah the picture with the cut-up onion and the tuna in the moneybag has not been verified as far as I know; it's just something someone posted on Twitter. Last I saw, the company that packed the parcel had not been identified. So it could just be someone's attempt to go viral.

Not to defend the government at all. Just this single picture itself still has the potential to be disinfo AFAIK. We gotta be skeptical of the things that fit neatly into our ideologies, as this is the bullshit we're particularly likely to fall for.

I know Angela Rayner and the London Economic have both reported on this picture as if it was true but I don't believe it's been verified. Would love to know if anyone has any more info.

[MojoJojo]

Yeah the picture with the cut-up onion and the tuna in the moneybag has not been verified as far as I know; it's just something someone posted on Twitter. Last I saw, the company that packed the parcel had not been identified. So it could just be someone's attempt to go viral.

Googling there is a mirror story where a 17 year old got 1/3 of an onion. However the headmaster went out to apologise and said they'd be getting vouchers from then on. It sounded like the catering company hadn't sent out enough packages and some junior member of staff had decided that the best thing to do would be to split one of the packages 3 ways.

I think with some of the pictures it is a case of being presented in the worst possible way. So with a two week pack they'll cut all the veg in half, open the tins and put half in a paper bag. In much the same way it's always described as "this much food to last them 10 days" as if it's supposed to be all they eat, rather than just lunches.

Which isn't to say that the food parcels have been acceptable. A lot of them have been shit - but it does look like cock-up rather than conspiracy, with the catering companies not being able to react to the lockdown quickly enough.

[JamesTC]

The fact that the government feel £30 per meal package for just ten lunches is ridiculous in and of itself.

£30 for each package should easily be enough for all meals for a child across 10 days particularly when they can pay wholesale prices. The picture of the packages in Wales show this.

[JaDanketies]

Googling there is a mirror story where a 17 year old got 1/3 of an onion.

https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/free-school-meal-measly-included-23305830

Yeah it definitely looks very similar to the other viral picture and is secondary evidence for it's veracity.

[Blue Jam]

Not related to the meal parcels, but related to this, I realised the other day that the the requirement of job seekers to apply for so many jobs isn't designed to increase their chances of getting a job - that would involve putting more time into finding, applying and interviewing for a smaller number of jobs that the applicant is really well suited for - but rather, by ensuring they have to apply for many jobs that they have no chance of getting in order to fulfil the requirement, and eating away at the time they have to prepare for the ones they are suited for, it's designed to get them lots of rejections and crush their spirits. Also to increase the chance of them ending up in a crappy job that they hate.

The last time I signed on was near the end of 2010, and after a few weeks I told the guy I'd found a job and it would begin in January. He then asked me why I hadn't filled in my job application diary for that week and I told him again: "Because I've found a job". I got a telling off: "You still have to keep applying for jobs and keeping a record though". Obviously this would have been a waste of my time and the time of any would-be employers, it seemed I really was just being punished.

Also after twelve weeks I was summoned to a meeting at the Job Centre, at around 7am on a Sunday, which seemed a really odd time for it. I wondered if there had been some mistake, but I arrived to find the Job Centre open- again, I was being punished by being denied a lie-in, presumably because all jobseekers are lazy and need to snap out of it. The door was being guarded by a huge bouncer who leered into my face with "...and where do you think you're going?" It was obvious that I had an appointment, again, he just wanted to belittle and humiliate me. At the appointment a member of staff angrily demanded to know why I still didn't have a job... and again, I told him I did, and would be starting it in January.

Just before this the job centre also sent me on a day-long course on how to find a job, with the focus on sales jobs, which isn't my line of work at all. Again, they were just wasting my time, and no doubt the owners of the firms providing this training were Tory cronies getting a chunk of wedge passed to them by their friends in high places.

There's that old joke about how Job Centres only exist to keep Job Centre staff in employment, but there does seem to be some truth in it. The whole system is a hopelessly inefficient waste of time, money and resources, and seems to be more about punishing people than getting them back to work and paying taxes, which would make more sense but again, a lot of Brits just seem to love the false economy of punishing people for being poor.

[bgmnts]

Agree with everything said by Jam. The idea of bouncers at a jobcentre is obscene to be honest. I hate using the word fascist but fucking hell it isn't half fascist.

[checkoutgirl]

Not related to the meal parcels, but related to this, I realised the other day that the the requirement of job seekers to apply for so many jobs isn't designed to increase their chances of getting a job - that would involve putting more time into finding, applying and interviewing for a smaller number of jobs that the applicant is really well suited for - but rather, by ensuring they have to apply for many jobs that they have no chance of getting in order to fulfil the requirement, and eating away at the time they have to prepare for the ones they are suited for, it's designed to get them lots of rejections and crush their spirits. Also to increase the chance of them ending up in a crappy job that they hate.

Or it could be that they want you working as close to 8 hours a day as they can get you to just for your dole money so you start to think fuck it I might as well get a job for better money.

[Blue Jam]

Agree with everything said by Jam. The idea of bouncers at a jobcentre is obscene to be honest. I hate using the word fascist but fucking hell it isn't half fascist.

Bit weird that Job Centres have security guards isn't it? I never saw any jobseekers kicking off, and those places have nothing to steal.

The place where I usually signed on had this weird guy who would harass people in the queue, demanding to see their paperwork and threatening to throw them out if they didn't show it, even though he didn't have the authority to check people's documents. One time I went in there to use one of those job database computers and he physically blocked my way and made me join the queue at the front desk. Of course when the woman there asked for my paperwork I told her I didn't have an appointment and was just there to use the computer and she said "But you don't need to queue for that" and the penny dropped as she realised the bouncer had been getting heavy-handed again.

Yes, I think they just put big aggressive blokes in black clothing on the door to intimidate and humiliate people.

Also this was the Job Centre in Deptford which closed down while I was signing on, which meant I then had to go to the Lewisham branch instead, and I never saw the weirdo again. I really hoped he was now signing on and having to deal with big threatening blokes himself. There was a petition to keep the Deptford branch open and I was pressured into signing it, but secretly I didn't give a shit about all these sadistic peeps losing their jobs and all the lovely power and suddenly finding themselves on the receiving end of our wonderful welfare state.

[JaDanketies]

I'm sure the bouncers are there so they can kick out all the poverty-stricken people who realise they are going to go without their pittance for the foreseeable future because they made a misstep in the kafkaesque nightmare of claiming benefits, and who are making a scene by pleading for mercy.

Last time I had to use them was for a few short periods back in the 2009-2011 credit crunch global financial horrorshow, and it was pretty awful back then. I believe it's substantially worse nowadays, which is unimaginable.

[Blue Jam]

Or it could be that they want you working as close to 8 hours a day as they can get you to just for your dole money so you start to think fuck it I might as well get a job for better money.

That was probably one of the ideas behind Workfare too. For all the people applauding it, enjoying seeing people punished by being forced to do tedious unpaid labour like criminals doing community service, there was a minority who realised the real scroungers were the likes of Poundland getting state-subsidised free labour.

It's not unlike the situation we have with free school meal parcels except more people are out of work now, we all know what a £30 food shop looks like, and more people are realising that the cronies providing £4 of food and pocketing the £26 for themselves are the real scroungers.

[earl_sleek]

When I was signing on the bouncers used to like to tell you to sit down, as if you were at school. What difference does it make if people are standing or sitting? On more than one occasion I got a scowl for politely pointing out there weren't any unoccupied chairs.

[confettiinmyhair]

I've witnessed a big kick off in a job centre back when I was signing  on, which would have been 2009 time. Three security guards restraining some guy on the ground. Goodness knows what had happened. I've seen a few people get warned for swearing at job centre staff also during that era. Wouldn't want to be going through unemployment these days. With sanctions and what not. Seems absolutely horrid. Can totally understand people getting pissed off.

[Blue Jam]

Wouldn't want to be going through unemployment these days. With sanctions and what not.

How are Jobcentres operating under quarantine? Have the staff had to invent new ways of punishing and humiliating claimants now they can't make them turn up for an appointment at 7am on a Sunday?

[Sebastian Cobb]

My pal works at one and although he reckon he's trying to help people, he's let out a few contemptuous slips. I guess the work is designed to groom even the nicest staff into that or ensuring that only the bastards rise.

On the topic of Covid he said there's been an up-tick in 'pisstakers' claiming and advertising odd jobs on Facebook who they have to report for fraud. I'd like to think I'd do an intentionally shit job of 'finding' these people, it's not like it's coming out of my pocket is it.

[Poirots BigGarlickyCorpse]

Here's the thing about the hardcore group of scroungers (and they do exist, I work for a local authority and know for a fact they're real) - the only way you'll ever get rid of them is if you abolish social welfare altogether. They know down to the last red cent exactly how much money they're entitled to, they know all the little scams and schemes, they know everybody in the town who pays under the table, and they all have an aunt or a cousin-in-law who'll give them a few yoyos for power-washing driveways. The guy who's managed to swindle himself a council house will be just fine no matter how unpleasant the dole office is, how difficult it is to get benefits, or how much social welfare is cut. The people who are hurt are the 99% of unemployed people who would rather be working. You can't run the social welfare system with the scroungers in mind, you have to run it on the presumption that 99% of the people using it have fallen on hard times.

[The Culture Bunker]

Here's the thing about the hardcore group of scroungers (and they do exist, I work for a local authority and know for a fact they're real) - the only way you'll ever get rid of them is if you abolish social welfare altogether. They know down to the last red cent exactly how much money they're entitled to, they know all the little scams and schemes, they know everybody in the town who pays under the table, and they all have an aunt or a cousin-in-law who'll give them a few yoyos for power-washing driveways. The guy who's managed to swindle himself a council house will be just fine no matter how unpleasant the dole office is, how difficult it is to get benefits, or how much social welfare is cut. The people who are hurt are the 99% of unemployed people who would rather be working. You can't run the social welfare system with the scroungers in mind, you have to run it on the presumption that 99% of the people using it have fallen on hard times.

I doubt the DWP have any real interest in them, as they're too much hard work to deal with. It's much easier to sanction/punish people who don't know how to work the system: catch them out on technicalities and meet your quotas.

That's the added factor that a healthy slice of such bods being in society is handy for governments to give big talk about 'sorting out' without ever actually doing much, bit like immigration figures.

[chveik]

it's pretty hard to be a successful scrounger these days. I genuinely admire these people.

[Dr Rock]

I'm with the scroungers. Work is for mugs.

[Dr Rock]

Not my words, the words of Aristotle.

[Blue Jam]

I'm with the scroungers. Work is for mugs.

We are often told that the poor are grateful for charity. Some of them are, no doubt, but the best amongst the poor are never grateful. They are ungrateful, discontented, disobedient, and rebellious. They are quite right to be so. Charity they feel to be a ridiculously inadequate mode of partial restitution, or a sentimental dole, usually accompanied by some impertinent attempt on the part of the sentimentalist to tyrannise over their private lives. Why should they be grateful for the crumbs that fall from the rich man's table?

That's what you meant, yeah? Close enough.