78 Job Centres to Close

missapril75

Who needs benefit offices if there's no benefits?

Mersey_2

nannytone wrote: »

a lot of JB staff are on fixed term contracts and don't have permanent roles.

they just shed them at the end of the contract.
means they don't have to pay redundancy

Yes, that's true of those 20 - 35-year-olds I mentioned. Although they tend to just move them to the contact centres, which makes sense as they are more IT savvy on the whole.


But some of the 50 somethings are on very good deals indeed, which is why it saves a lot - in future years - when they go.


As Missapril75 suggests - although jokingly - the DWP has never been very good at eg 'reducing the estate' in times when the claimant count halves. Plus eg in one city they had a dozen JCPs even though the population had almost halved over the past 45 years and yet in areas of population growth in London there were no extra JCPs over a decade in 3 boroughs. Surely if a centralised Civil Service is for anything it is to manage such changing demographics? As an aside - a friend of mine who used to work in a JCP said she honestly didn't know what the manager there did, as 90% of the work was delegated.

missapril75

Mersey wrote: »

But some of the 50 somethings are on very good deals indeed, which is why it saves a lot - in future years - when they go....

It's really not many.

The deals where they offer the equivalent of what you'd get had you remained to get the maximum possible are few and far between and tend to be restricted to those in the higher grades.

A friend of mine was lucky enough to get one a couple of years ago and it was only the second such deal possible in the area since I left in 2004.

I had no such luck other than leaving before meeting the more benign targets - interviews done, job vacancies referred (to willing recipients) - stopped being enough to cover your back.

squiggles

_shel wrote: »

I feel more sorry for those who are now going to have to find money to travel further for appointments.

Or having to walk a longer distance in bad weather because they can't afford to pay for a bus ride. Some unemployed people have health issues or can be quite an age which adds to their misery.

Sncjw

I already knew South Shields was going to go as it was part of redevelopment plans. They are supposed to move into the old library and this was from the developers speaking to me about it as they rent the building from the council. The current building I believe is going to make way for a cinema.