Some of the truths about unemployment

I would like to dispel some of the myths that surround the current unemployment situation. After working in a Jobcentre for seven years before retiring and dealing mainly with the long term unemployed of all ages it's about time that people heard the other side of the story, the unreported one.
It's true that unemployment is rising, but not as fast as we are being led to believe because for several years now, women with children are gradually being moved from Income Support to Jobseeker's Allowance as soon as the youngest child reaches a certain age and this age has been coming down. It used to be sixteen but when I retired a couple of years ago it was down to seven and I think it will continue to go down to five. A high proportion of these women are 'single' mothers, many have never worked and most also left school without any educational qualifications whatsoever. In fact a lot of them could barely write properly or complete a simple 'basic skills' questionnaire and many actually didn't possess any social skills either.
In fact there are so many young people who lack any of the necessary skills required to assist them in life it's frightening. I believe that much of this is because they 'bunk off' school whenever they feel like it yet no-one seems to challenge this and the parent is usually oblivious and probably not very well educated themselves anyway. Perhaps we need more inspirational teachers and a change of teaching methods to engage these young people in the important matter of preparing them for a successful and productive life in the outside world once they have left school. They also need better careers guidance as many of them have completely unrealstic ideas about what they want to do (if anything) once they leave school for the world of work and the words 'graft' and 'dedication' don't appear in their vocabulary.
Many of the older generation of long term unemployed also lack many of the basic skills but they have also become conditioned to a life without work and a lot are just downright lazy. There were ocassions when we had three generations of the same family who had never done a day's work between them, all attending the Jobcentre at the same time. They will all grumble that they don't get enough money to live on but their housing and council tax is all paid for them and many of them smoke heavily and drink too so they always have sufficient funds to accommodate those vices! You'd be surprised at how many of them also pull out the most up-to-date, all singing, all dancing mobile phones equipped with the latest ringtones, camera, video and internet as it is possible to cram into one gadget and they probably have the biggest flat screen televisions at home too! Yes, there are some on the fiddle, working on the side and not declaring their earnings but if staff have their suspicions it gets passed onto the fraud department for further investigation but sadly, not all are caught.
Despite every effort being made to prepare these people for work I used to feel that I was flogging a dead horse and I think many Jobcentre staff feel the same even now. The rewards came helping those who were desperate to get back into the workplace after being made redundant, sometimes after many years with the same firm or those with the right work ethic who would do anything and any job just to get off benefits.
Sadly, we don't have the numerous production industries that we once had because it's been cheaper for many British firms to move production overseas. That together with the use of robots in production has meant that there are just not the number of skilled and unskilled manual jobs that there once were and I wonder how long it will be before the country wakes up to the fact that service industries and hospitality just aren't enough.

Fed Up!

For the last couple of days I've had a lot on my mind and I have been extremely frustrated too. On top of everything I decided to write a blog today only to find that they are updating the interface. Well, I liked it the way it was even if I have been rather busy lately and not had the chance to blog as often as I would have liked.
Don't get me wrong, I'm not averse to change but I just can't see the point of change for change sake. I found it quite hard to get my head round the new interface and there wasn't anything there to help much either. At least with this current set up I know what I'm doing and where to find things or change them to how I want them, but in all probablility I won't bother to do a blog in the future if they decide to bring in the updated interface.
This has completely put me off of the subject I was going to write about today so I'll have to go away, recoup my thoughts and do it another day!

A flock of my own!

For several years now there have been reports that some of our most popular garden birds are under threat due to loss of habitat and food sources. This includes our chirpy friend, the house sparrow whose numbers have taken a dive and nobody is sure why this is. Some of it may be due to loss of suitable places to nest, some is down to the loss of natural food sources and some is probably due to increasing numbers of predators such as sparrow hawks.
Well, I'm one of the lucky ones! I've been feeding birds in my garden for the past twenty six years or so and I think that successive generations of the house sparrow now have a built in 'instinct' to find their way to the bird table in my garden. I have always had a small flock of house sparrows as well as assorted other garden birds but this year the numbers have swelled tremendously. I think they have reared at least three lots of chicks so the numbers are now in the region of fifty or maybe more.
It's so relaxing and entertaining to watch them when they come to feed and as a flock they are extremely clever. There have been sparrow hawks in the area for several years and in fact I have even had them sitting on the top of the bird table in the past waiting for tea. The sparrows (I call them the 'Chip Chip' gang because of their chirpy call) always know when there is danger because they come over to the garden about a dozen at a time and conceal themselves in the honeysuckle then the next lot join them. They feed quickly and silently then all congregate in the honeysuckle before leaving in small gangs as they had arrived. I think they know where the sparrow hawk patrols and when he's about they all stay very quiet and hide themselves.
It's lovely on warm, sunny afternoons when there isn't any danger because they are far more relaxed as they come over to the garden to feed. Then they take it in turns to have a communal bath in the water lily tub and sit on the fence in the sun to preen themselves while drying off.
I feel honoured to have a flock of my own even if they do cost quite a bit in feed. Their favourites include some of Bill Oddie's mealworm crumble, mealworm suet treats and sunflower kernels as well as mixed seed in the feeders and their own peanut feeder.

My solution to the riots

I have made a list of suggestions that I think Parliament should seriously consider in response to the recent riots in our cities. We are currently far too soft and our police force have to pussyfoot around instead of getting in there and sorting out those who are hell bent on causing trouble. Some of the following could also be used as a deterrent for the drunken weekend revellers who puke, pee, brawl and fill our city centres with rubbish as well as for any future protest and demonstration that gets out of hand.

1. Anyone who has been arrested in connection with the aforesaid troubles should not expect the upstanding British public to cough up for them to have legal representation. Legal aid is a luxury they have waived their entitlement to because of their actions. Instead, the money should got towards the police wage bill.
2. If the perpetrators are under 16 they must stay at school until they can pass a minimum of 5 GCSE subjects at grade 'C' (even if it takes them the next twenty years). In order to finance this their parents will have to give up the fags and booze and get a job.
3. If they are under 16 and are able to read, write and speak properly, when they have passed the mandatory 5 GCSE's and leave school they will forfeit half their wages for the first twenty years to help re-finance the businesses and rebuild the homes they have destroyed by their actions.
4. Those above the age of 16 found guilty of any of the above crimes will automatically forego the right to any State benefits for life and will not receive a pension unless they have contributed to the pot in the way of taxes and National Insurance contributions for a minimum of forty years regardless of their current age. Those currently working will contribute half their wages for the next twenty years to the compensation kitty for the lives they have destroyed.
5. Anyone found guilty of the above crimes will automatically forfiet the right to social or council housing for life.
6. Those found guilty and given a prison sentence will be sent to 'no frills' prisons where they will be found hard, smelly work to do and not the current 5 star 'hotel' type prisons we have at the moment (these will all be changed to very basic prisons over the next 5 years).
7. Police will be given the powers to use as much force as is needed to arrest those involved in any civil disturbances in the future and any participants waive the right to to sue if they get a little bruise or bump in the process.
8. In the future, any rioter, protestor or demonstrator that injures an officer carrying out his duty to protect the public and their property, or in any way injures either a police dog or police horse will be detailed to scrub out the stables and kennels with a small nailbrush every weekend for the rest of their working lives.
9. Anyone arrested for drunk and disorderly behaviour will have to spend every weekend for the next five years cleaning out public loos with a toothbrush.
10. Those caught discarding their fast food containers or cans in public places will spend every weekend litter picking in city centres for a minimum of ten years.

Summer frustration!

This year the weather has been somewhat upside down to say the least. We had a very warm spring which brought all the plants on in leaps and bounds so that they flowered well before the time they should have done but recently it has been rather cool, wet and windy so that other things such as the annual bedding plants and tomatoes have slowed right down.
One of the other problems that I've had with some of the annuals that I bought back in May is the compost. Being conscientious, I bought a bag of organic peat free compost but it is absolutely useless. There were great big lumps of unidentifiable stuff in it and all the plants grown in it have failed to thrive despite being given liquid feed regularly. The tomatoes do have fruits on them but they are very small compared to previous years so next year I will be going back to my usual compost.
So with the weather and the compost, it has been a rather disappointing summer so far. I had visions of being able to potter about and do dead heading then sit outside and relax in the shade on warm, sunny afternoons just watching the bees in the flowers, but that has only been possible on a few occasions. I'm hoping that September and October will be better where the weather is concerned because this year I have a lot of plants that need either digging out completely or dividing because they have got far too big. I'm keeping my fingers crossed.

The fun of experimentation

I've been having problems with weight gain for a couple of years and no matter how hard I have tried to diet, nothing has shifted the extra pounds. Some of the gain is down to some of the medication that I have to take and having a metabolic disorder hasn't helped either.
Anyway, a couple of years ago my daughter Sarah gave me a book the she got when she attended Slimming World and she did lose a stone when she followed it so I had a read and thought I'd give it a go. I'm certainly not off to any weekly meetings because I don't want to be weighed in front of everyone and I can't afford it either so I'm going it alone at home.
I have found that this way of eating does actually work and I haven't felt hungry at all. It is called 'food optimising' and you have either 'red' or 'green' days. On a red day you can eat as much lean meat, chicken or fish as you want and you have to have what are called 'healthy extras'. On green days, you can eat as much pasta or rice as you want and as much fruit and vegetables or vegetarian dishes as you need to fill yourself up.
Eating this way, I have found that I eat less bread and fats but I can still have a varied and satisfying diet without the need to weigh or measure or count calories. As I love fruit and vegetables and enjoy vegetarian dishes anyway it really suits me. There are odd days when I mix things around but I have found that sticking to the main principles the diet is really working and I have already lost a stone. There's still a long way to go but browsing through cookery books I have come up with lots of inexpensive and tasty new dishes to try and I'm also experimenting with 'quorn' and TVP (textured vegetable protein made from de-fatted soya).
Of course summer is easy with a plentiful supply of vegetables and fruits but I will have to come up with some good alternatives for the winter. I'll let you know how it goes.

A good threat works wonders!

I'm usually a quiet, easy going person but there are a few things that really get me going and then I take the appropriate action.
However, there are some things that I can't really do much about apart from issuing a few stern warnings followed by a threat which is always seen through and it nearly always works.
I'm not talking about the actions of people here, nor animals or birds but plants. Yes, that's right, plants. There have been occasions when a plant hasn't done very well in the spot where I've put it so I move it to a more suitable part of the garden and nine times out of ten, the plant does very well.
But there's always one that does it's utmost to defy me. I have had plants that have flourished for a couple of years and then stopped flowering for no reason. I give them bucket loads of TLC coupled with some stern warnings and wait for the next flowering season, but still nothing happens. Then they get the threat. I tell them that if they don't flower next year then I will dig them up and plant something else and this has always worked for me. Last year Nellie Moser (a clematis plant that has large flowers with a dark pink stripe in the middle of the petals) only put out one flower that looked rather pathetic. I never had time to do much with it but as I was tidying it up in the autumn I did tell it that if it didn't flower this spring I would dig it up and put another one in it's place. This spring it was completely covered in flowers and was the most spectacular display it had ever given.
A few years ago Sarah and the grand-children gave me an orchid for Mother's Day and sadly, the last one they had given me did not survive despite me being very careful with it so I knew I would have to be extra careful with this one in order not to upset them. After the first lot of flowers finished I did what it said in the book and it did flower again but not very well. Since those flowers finished it has done nothing! I have fed it and cared for it as the book says and it has grown a couple of leaves in the last eighteen months but no flowers.
It was time for me to issue the threat and so I did. I told it that if I didn't see a flower very soon it would be banished to the coldest window sill this winter or even worse, I would put it outside. The threat of that has shocked it into producing three flower stems that are just beginning to poke out from the leaf base.
So next time you've got a plant not doing very well, threaten it with something horrible because it works for me!