It is hard to imagine a more toxic influence on wages and working conditions than an army of un-unionised and unpaid workers forced to be there under threat of benefit sanctions.
Yet whilst the so-called fighting PCS Union has dithered over benefit sanctions and workfare that is exactly what has happened under their very noses at the DWP.
As spotted by @boycottworkfare, Employment Minister Esther McVey recently boasted that 4,300 unpaid workers on the Government’s Work Experience scheme have been press-ganged into working for the DWP over the last three years. This could represent up to one million hours of forced labour – potentially replacing nearly a two hundred full time jobs over the same period.
Whilst the Work Experience scheme is officially ‘voluntary’ claimants who refuse to work for free at the DWP can face being sent on a mandatory workfare scheme instead. George Osborne even recently announced
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