Modell for full Employment in Australia
Pillar 2: Social Justice - Increase Employability
The four pillars are:
- Health and wellbeing at work
- Social justice, increase employability
- Strong support for innovative and committed employers, training and research
- A fair tax system and a supportive Social Security system, equal opportunity
Pillar 2: Social Justice - Increase Employability
Social Justice is about inclusion and achieving maximum participation and access to those institutions which advance job seekers career goals.
Social Justice is also about the right to participate fully in decision making processes, especially if the policies created affect a particular group of people. Democratic participation strategies and mechanisms need to replace the old system of representing the interests of someone else. it is not good enough to consult with the experts or academics. They need to be consulted, but so do the people having to live with the consequences.
Advocacy agencies run by disadvantaged groups, affected individuals, community members and citizens especially from low socio-economic backgrounds, people with disabilities and especially the unemployed are not asked for their advise. Advocacy bodies are overstretched and cannot adequately respond to all the calls for assistance.
For information on Social Inclusion policies in the EU go to http://europa.eu.int/comm/employment_social/soc-prot/index_en.htm
How can genuine participation and consultation be achieved?
Links to a new form of consultation: Open Space Technology
http://awakening.net/OpenSpace.htmlMonika Baker, BSSc/HS (ACE), Hon AdVocEd, is available to facilitate workshops and conferences in this kind of format, if the technology needs (laptops, computers, printers, etc) can be supplied on site.
Content
Essays about strategies on how to organise the poor from the Kensington Welfare Rights Union's University of the Poor. The US is currently experiencing a massive explosion of community learning, disadvantaged people are learning the skills needed to analyse their situation and bring about change in policy and public opinion. The discussion is about whether only those having experienced a particular disadvantage should lead a movement for liberation or whether other people can participate/lead a movement and conduct advocacy if they have not experienced such disadvantage themselves. And this article is also about how to bring about change and justice for the poor.
http://www.universityofthepoor.org/library/kwrumodl.html
To get an idea about the effects of unemployment on individuals in Tasmania take a look at the TASCOSS Report:"Dead Man's Shoes" on UPM's web site
The CofFEE web site at the University of Newcastle is full of info, go to http://e1.newcastle.edu.au/coffee/
Kevin Brennan from UNEMPA (Unemployed People's Advocacy in Brisbane) send us the following links to articles from the CofFEE site, two of which are stored on this site because they were really hard to read. Here are the links to articles of Prof. William Mitchell from the web site of CofFEE :
http://e1.newcastle.edu.au/coffee/docs/working_papers/1997/bse.html http://e1.newcastle.edu.au/coffee/docs/education/op_ed/unemployment_and_inequality.pdf http://e1.newcastle.edu.au/coffee/docs/education/op_ed/nh_11_07_02_clmi.pdf
So how can more social inclusion be achieved? Obviously by increasing the employability of everyone and supporting participation of ordinary people in decision making processes.
In regards to employment, the increase of employability is very important. The provision of employment services to assist job seekers and employers is crucial. The European countries have taken or are suggesting many interesting measures to improve their service delivery in regards to employment services..
Without focusing too much on sanctions and breaching, one thing has to be stated: the current punitive measures are absolutely unacceptable and increase the cycle of poverty for individuals but also for our communities. They are unnecessary and only serve one purpose: to increase the availability of cheap labor at appalling conditions. They are actually counterproductive.
So is the current Work for the Dole scheme. It prevents the creation of more employment and undermines self directed and truly voluntary contributions to the community. It keeps people busy and puts them at the same level as people who are serving their sentences for criminal offenses in the form of community services work. Only the people working off their sentences finish after a period of time, while Work for the Dole and Community workers have to repeat their sentence year after year. (see also letter under Volunteers)
See UPM's newsletters and Research and Information page for more on the topics and further links
We suggest the following to improve the existing Employment Services sector:
1. Incentives instead of punishments, no reduction of benefits! Security of financial resources, otherwise the job search efforts will be severely disrupted!
2. Individual psychological, vocational aptitude testing to provide meaningful advise and support, this means better trained Job Network consultants, who are aware of special needs customers such people with mental health problems or other disabilities, are aware of anti-discrimination legislation and skilled in coping with difficult and desperate customers. Thorough consultation and work on developing career ambitions and goals, referral to pathways which enhance the advancement of achievement of career goals, such as access to training, work experience, professional development and membership in professional associations or clubs.
3. More support in enabling job seekers full access to the infrastructure of job search, such as the internet, e-mail, computer literacy, industry meetings and networks, reliable phone service and cheap access to public transport and/or assistance in keeping the car on the road.
4. While we welcome the introduction of individual case managers, we are concerned about the case load of these case managers. Further, the introduction of individual case managers does not change the fact that there is a high turnover of personnel in the Job Network. (it must be frustrating to try to find jobs which don't exist) and a lack of training of staff in vocational guidance and working with people who are disadvantaged by disability. illness, addiction, or lack of language skills. Individual case management practices should be focused on the individual, the job seeker, and the quality of service delivered. Job consultants need more training in how to assist someone to identify their career goals (supported by tests used by companies when they employ people), how to communicate and interact with people who have been disadvantaged and disability awareness.
5. Either Mutual Obligation is eliminated as a concept or it must be expanded to become truly mutual. Employers can be asked to notify early of redundancies, they can even be asked to estimate their future need of employees for the coming year. (If parents can be asked to estimate their income a year ahead, we can expect the same from our employers!). If punitive measures for non-compliance for the unemployed continue, similar measures should be introduced for employers who squander the funds of their employees. Those, who do not notify of insolvency in such a way that early intervention can be implemented to find jobs for those to be retrenched, should be personally fined.
6. Employers ought to be supported in taking affirmative action towards disadvantaged jobseekers. This support could be offered in form of a mentoring scheme to assist long term unemployed or first time employed people and their employers to identify additional training needed, to coach in regards to conflicts at work or assist employees to identify and observe their rights and responsibilities. Legislation will need to underpin affirmative action (see pillar 4). Mutual Obligation should be introduced to all employers and industries: Every employer employing more than 20 employees should be obliged to employ a person with a severe disability (eligible for the DSP on the basis of medical assessment), a long term unemployed person or other disadvantaged people.
7. Stronger links with the training sector would enhance the Job Network Services significantly. Learning and accreditation opportunities offered free of charge are a necessity to improve employability. Learning opportunities during times of unemployment need to be extended beyond adult literacy, computer, IT, Workplace Cat II and numeracy courses. Every community worker and work for the Dole participant should be given the opportunity to gain recognition of current competency in those areas they worked in. All volunteers, especially the long term volunteers ought to have the opportunity to be assessed in relation to their work and be accredited for having gained competency in the skills developed on the 'job'. Recognition of Current Competency (RCC) procedures need to be simplified and streamlined to enable assessors to assess a volunteer at his/her workplace. The volunteer may need some support previously to review his/her work and gage for themselves whether they are competent in all aspects required, and how to develop those skills not yet developed but required.
Everyone, unemployed and employed should have access to improve their career by accessing appropriate training, study and employment services. Learning fees should be affordable to unemployed people and be subsidized for employers training their staff.
For more information on the issues look at the European Union's employment strategy clearing house and the reports from the European countries about their successes and failures. Go to http://europa.eu.int/comm/employment_social/empl&esf/ees_en.htm
The lifelong learning sector and the vocational and higher education institutions need to work more closely and flexibly together with the business and industrial stakeholders, who in turn should be obliged to project employment trends, so that all demands in certain sectors can be identified early and appropriate training measures implemented.
It is time that we get a decent vocational consultation service, and improve these superficial job matching attempts! Germany conducts psychological tests and vocational guidance tests. This is what the Centrelink Occupational Psychologists ought to do with every long term unemployed person. In Europe people gain jobs purely on the basis of their test results, such is the quality of the assessments.
For ideas about a better working Recognition of Prior Learning System see the following page found at http://www2.trainingvillage.gr/download/nonformal/en1278_00orExecSummary.doc
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
This contribution treats the question of how to make learning, which takes place outside formal education and training institutions, more visible. While learning in the formal education and training system is a distinct feature of modern societies, non-formal learning is far more difficult to detect and appreciate( ). This invisibility is increasingly perceived as a problem affecting competence development at all levels from the individual to the society as a whole.
During the past few years, most Member States of the EU have emphasised the crucial role of learning that takes place outside of and in addition to, formal education and training. This emphasis has led to an increasing number of political and practical initiatives, gradually shifting the issue from the stage of pure experimentation to that of early implementation.
Identification, assessment and recognition of non-formal learning has to be based on simple and inexpensive methodologies and a clear notion of how institutional and political responsibilities are to be shared. But first and foremost, these methodologies have to be able to deliver what they promise, with the quality of 'measurement' being a crucial aspect. This report makes an effort to clarify, through an initial theoretical discussion, the requirements for reaching successful practical solutions.
For the full report click here
For more information about this issue look at the European Union's employment strategy clearing house and the reports from the European countries about their successes and failures. Go to http://europa.eu.int/comm/employment_social/empl&esf/ees_en.htm
Contribution from ACOSS (Australian Council of Social Science):
Hi, my name is Peter Davidson and I work at ACOSS. I'll read with interest your website on full employment. Attached for you info is some work acoss has recently done on the subject, a paper called generating jobs.
You might also be
interested in a publication of the ILO on four european countries that
have succeeeded in reducing unemployment to below US levels without trashing
minimum wages or their social security systems. Its called Employment
revival in Europe by Peter Auer (an economist with the ILO) and it can
be bought off their website
Regards Peter Davidson
Here is a link to the ACOSS Paper Generating Jobs in pdf file format
ACOSS has several other interesting papers on their web site and very relevant media releases to a number of topics discussed here.
Those who care for children or elderly relatives need to be supported by enough income and with respite provisions, as well as assistance to increase their employability during their time of caring. They should also receive superannuation contributions from the government in recognition of their loss of income and the valuable contribution they make to our society. After all institutionalised care would be so much more expensive!
Further, their experience as carers should be accredited through Recognition of Current Competency procedures, which will need to become more accessible to the general population as part of the restructuring of the new vocational training system
We suggest, as many others have done before us, (see the links) to introduce a social wage. Anyone caring for people with a disability, who is not waged, should receive a social wage in recognition of the foregone income. This should be higher than the current pension level in recognition of the lost opportunities and combined with concessions when carers want to study or train and the availability of acceptable respite services.
Part time employment should be obtainable for every carer if adequate respite and carer services are provided.
Employment Services should accommodate the need for part time employment and assist long term carers who want to get back into the work force in the same way as long term unemployed people are assisted.
Read the tribulations of a single mum, submitted to the Australian Senate Inquiry into the appropriateness of extending breaching to other social security recipients, such as single parents and people with a disability.
Social Wage proposals can be found on pillar 4.
Would you like to add your idea about how to address the problems carers face in regards to employment and social inclusion? Send it to us we will publish it here!
People with disabilities need extra income support and programs to ease the cost and decrease the access barriers of disability. Further rehabilitation, training, mentoring programs, work experience opportunities should be actively pursued if the person feels able to do so.
While UPM supports the rhetoric of looking at what someone can do instead of what they cannot, we believe that this slogan needs to be hammered home to employers first. And naturally first and foremost to the public sector where just recently 260 postal workers were threatened with dismissal because they were too 'big'. This clearly is discrimination on the grounds of a disability, if obesity can be viewed as such. If not, how was the state of someone's body relevant to the job they are doing and did get done so far without any hindrance?
Affirmative action and government subsidy programs will be needed to convince employers about the abilities of people with disabilities. So will special employment services which help people with a disability to settle into employment with all adequate modifications and support in place. Resources are needed to promote, not only employment creation, but especially the employment of people with a disability.
If the government wants to put people with disability into work, they need to legislate affirmative action and introduce subsidies for employers to be geared towards training for the workforce or other projects which increase the employability of the employer's workforce. In this way everyone benefits from integrating people with disabilities and the enterprise profits from a loyal workforce.
Those who work in sheltered employment have the right to decent wages and superannuation contributions. Some of the costs through the wage rises could be met by government, which will save the expense of the Disability Support Pension for many. As much as possible should sheltered or supported employment be integrated in mainstream workplaces to avoid the exploitation of people based on their disability. The current state is a disgrace with many capable people working for the same hourly rate as ordinary people worked maybe 60 years ago, or those poor workers in the US getting by with US $2.15 per hour. The hourly rate in employment services (large employers) range between $1.50 and $4.- No wonder that people are getting frustrated and feel cheated! And the stigma of a sheltered workshop past sticks.
There are many links to advocacy organisations concerned with the topic. Please submit links you think bring a new perspective to the debate or contribute your ideas about how to integrate people with disabilities into our work world and pay them!
Compulsory volunteering is a contradiction in itself it should be abandoned as it divides the volunteer community. Most unemployed want to contribute and enjoy volunteering in organisations of their choice. All volunteers who are seeking employment (registered or not) ought to be guaranteed a process of Recognition of Current Competency which may be linked to a training voucher to take up further professional development, which would enhance their employability.
Organisations using employment seeking volunteers in positions which could be advertised if the funding would be available, should oblige themselves to lobby and look for funding for these positions. Unions should support the demand for more funding and increased employment in the community services sector.
One question raised by someone in a letter to UPM against Poverty highlights other issues to be discussed, and we invite a vigorous discussion on this issue!:
Dear UPM Board
What are your plans of action against the blatant exploitation of my working capacity as a volunteer in community and church-based organisations?
From what I have heard during the International Year of Volunteers, 80% of the workload in welfare organisations and community service organisations is undertaken by volunteers.
While I believe that volunteers are essential to all societies, never before have I witnessed such an explosion of volunteer positions, and of 'volunteers' in organisations who are hoping for the next job coming up.
Mutual Obligation further degrades the concept of volunteering. Over six years of unemployment I have continuously offered my services to a variety of community organisations in the hope to gain work experience and a larger network. At times I have volunteered for up to five different organisations, on request, presumably for my ability to carry out the work they needed done.
Rarely did I receive training to complement my work and never was I given the opportunity to accredit my skills. On the contrary, I was subjected to bullying, reprimanded, and isolated at times, 'pushed out the door', especially by staff who felt threatened. There were organisations which valued my contributions and sought my participation, yet when it came to the filling of open positions I was overlooked. At one time someone confessed to me that the reason was, that they could not afford to train another volunteer to take my place. I left soon after.
However, I am still working 20 hours per week as a volunteer and have now been asked to join a Work for the Dole project or Community Work Placement. Suddenly I am obliged to volunteer and I am losing the power to be master over my time. If I am lucky, part of my current volunteer work may be counting as Community Work, however, it will radically change my relationship with the organisation and my 'supervisors'.
As a community worker I have to submit a medical certificate if I am late or miss a day due to illness. If I want to leave the organisation I may get difficulties and lose part of my benefits. I cannot take a break during the six months and my supervisor has to report on my attendance and working hours. Worst of all is the threat of having my New Start Allowance cut if I walk out of the job, as I was able to do before.
My status as a volunteer will significantly change, I have become vulnerable as I have no return. I have no rights, at least I have not seen any, and I have lost my ability to pressure organisations to employ people and fight for more funding instead of relying on volunteers for essential service provision and core business activities.
These measures undermine not only the spirit of volunteering and create two classes of volunteers, the 'true' and the 'have to' volunteers, in addition they undermine the working conditions of the workers. With every volunteer hour paid employment could be cut in the long run, efficiency measures are built into all community services budgets.
So I am wondering whether we as a society can afford to continue to foster and force volunteering. Do we want to pass on to our children a world where they are expected to work for nothing for half of their life due to unemployment? Do we want our children to work for hourly rates of $2.-, because there are so many volunteers waiting who can take the job anytime and have to work for nothing?
In order to counteract this trend of onesided obligation of the poor to work for nothing and undermine their comrade's working conditions I have decided to withdraw my services from any Community Work Coordinator sponsored agencies (besides the one I have to do to keep my inadequate income support going).
I think you should publish a list of agencies who cooperate with Centrelink in breaching the poor. All volunteers with some conscience should withdraw their support or let them know of their concerns regarding the sinister nature of this cooperation.
And a awareness raising campaign is needed against the explosive trend to volunteering. Volunteers may want to focus on how to get the funding together to employ more people instead of sitting silent on Boards of Managements. Organisations need to realise that they are in no way contributing to the increase in job creation when they cooperate with Centrelink in turning their previously esteemed volunteers into financially and welfare dependent slaves.
Being able to breach a former volunteer may increase someone's feeling of being in control over that person, but it does nothing to increase the chances of the volunteer to find employment. It is counterproductive as it is disempowering, demeaning and undermining the existing, carefully established, balance of power between volunteer and organisation. It seeds resentment and mistrust.
I further ask you to consider to form a kind of union for the Community and Work for the Dole Workers.
My suggestion for a name is EVU: Enslaved Volunteers Union. What do you think?.
Eronima Thetikis (not my real name, for obvious reasons!)
Should volunteers should be given the opportunity to apply for upcoming jobs in some preferred way.
Should compulsive volunteering and Work for the Dole be eradicated as it undermines working conditions of other employees?
Should we publish a list of sinners, organisations who breach their 'volunteers'?
Should we boycott volunteer work, denounce it publicly, or start an education campaign?
Do you want to add ideas about the role volunteering can play in enhancing employability?
If you have any ideas or contributions to this page or want to respond to any of the questions posed, please send your comments now!
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