Step Ahead
An effective enslavement of the unemployed. It provides cheap labour for employers. Given the option of actual hiring of part/full time positions or cheap labour/slaves the decision is a no-brainer for employers thus actually creating joblessness. How about something actually useful, such as learning a second language? For some reason this choice is not available, despite the vast cost of these schemes to the taxpayer.
GAP
A massaging of the unemployment figures to say the least. Graduates are rewarded for their hard work earning qualifications by working for no money. The idea that this is a good way to gain experience for future employment is ridiculous as why would employers hire anyone when they are ensured constant, qualified, free labour.
East Belfast Socialist Party spokesperson and education worker Tommy Black today attacked Minister Caitriona Ruane after revealing that promised new school buildings in East Belfast will now be scrapped.
There was an emphatic response to the savagery of the Con Dem spending cuts on Saturday in Edinburgh. Just 3 days after the government’s spending review that had proposed cuts of £81 billion in public spending, well over 20,000 people took to the streets for the Scottish TUC demonstration.
Considering that the so-called “green shots of recovery” have failed to appear in the economy and with major questions marks over the European and world economy, the decision of the Assembly to make £4billion cuts is economic madness. Even before the Assembly Executive begins to carry out these cuts, the scale of actual unemployment is truly shocking. The number of unemployed persons in December 2010 was 68,000 (8%), up 18,000 over the year. Nearly 50% have been unemployed for a year or more. The unemployment rate for 18-24 year olds is at 22.5% – up 10.5% over the past year.