"Training Camps" for unemployed & disabled ?

The idea of packing the unemployed and disabled off to special "residental Workfare", though applauded by readers of the Daily Mail (and certain American posters on Hip Forums) is probably more likely to bring comparisons with concentration camps - Arbeit Macht Frei, as the Nazis used to say.

It hasn't quite come to that yet, but the Department of Work & Pensions (which essentially means the government) have been discussing the idea...

From: The Void http://johnnyvoid.wordpress.com/201...-workfare-for-unemployed-and-disabled-people/

An independent report, commissioned by the DWP, has called for greater use of Residential Training for disabled people and an extension of the scheme to include long term unemployed non-disabled people.

The report also accepts that this kind of training, which can involve periods of workfare away from home, should be opened up to the market. This process may begin with a open tender exercise next year.

:bobby: "opened up to the market" - there's a phrase to turn the blood to ice... as the article goes on to add -

If the private sector is involved in this process, then the implications are even more concerning. It is chilling to imagine what an A4e or G4S run Residential Training facility would look like in practice.

And once the welfare-to-work companies get a taste of the pie, mandation – which means benefits being stopped for people who refuse to attend – is unlikely to be far away.

This of course is wild speculation. This report contains only recommendations which may well be ignored. Any attempt to introduce mandation into a residential scheme would almost certainly require new legislation, which isn’t happening this side of the next election. It would also be far too expensive to roll this out to all claimants, and however it evolves is likely to remain aimed at the so called ‘hardest to help’.

But this report shows a worrying direction being considered at the DWP. The potential for a charity run residential training facility to eventually become an A4e run workhouse is difficult to ignore.

:bobby: But the fact that they're even considering the idea is worrying.

 

Forget the Nazis - Britain has been here before...

Labour camps were introduced to Britain, by a labour government, back at the time of the Great Depression, and continued until 1939 (by which time we had another war, always a good way of diminishing surplus population.)

All the bits of British history they dont teach you at school...

The next bit refers to labour camps in Scotland, but is probably a fair description of them countrywide.

"It may seem incredible to us now, but it was Ramsay MacDonald's Labour government which introduced work camps - officially called "Instructional Centres."


A network was established throughout the UK with a number in Scotland. They were at Carstairs in Lanarkshire, Glenbranter near Strachur in Argyll and Glentress near Peebles.


Ministers were concerned that many men who had been unemployed for long periods were no longer fit for work.

An official at the Ministry of Labour wrote of "the younger men who, through prolonged unemployment, have become so soft and temporarily demoralised" that they required to be "hardened" or "reconditioned."

Those attending the camps came from the depressed industrial areas of Lanarkshire, Ayrshire and Glasgow. They stayed away from home for up to 12 weeks - and if they refused to go, their dole money was stopped.

But many were in such poor physical shape when they arrived, they needed decent food before they could carry out the work.

They were doing very hard heavy manual labour in the hills and in the forests.

Typically the men worked for 10 to 12 hours from 6am, living in dormitories in wooden nissen huts, and they were supervised in military-style discipline by former police officers or sergeant majors.

They received part of their unemployment benefit, with the remaining nine shillings being sent to their families.

And they were provided with suitable clothing for their work, including corduroy trousers and waterproof boots.

In total about 200,000 men were sent to the camps, which continued in operation until 1939.

But it is estimated that fewer than 10% of those who had been trained there were able to get work when they went back home.

The camps were reviled by the Left. The Daily Herald called them "concentration camps."

:devil: Given the lack of original thought amongst politicians (of all parties) its probably inevitable that they're going to re-hash the past. How long till Workhouses for the poor reappear ?

 

Would such camps be compulsory and were those in the past compulsory?

 

Sounds like a holiday.I'm up for it.People are so weak and flabby these days.

 

Hear in the USA , the politicians that cut off the well fair money dont get voted back into office . They dont have the balls do do this .

 

They're only being talked about at present, so that's unknown. But do you think anyone would volunteer for them ?

In the past, I think in theory you could decline but unless you went your family got no money. So, at the height of the Great Depression, that was a choice that was no choice at all.