It was decided that as a group we would take a stand against the immoral stance that the Salvation Army have taken regarding workfare. Since writing the last blog I have heard many first hand accounts of claimants experiences there, and none of their stories were nice. These claimants deserve representation, many are too scared to speak out about it but we don’t mind. This is a situation that needs to be highlighted.

As mentioned in my previous blog The Salvation Army have been working with the Jobcentre to recruit “volunteers”. These claimants are told that they have no choice, that they have to sign up to “volunteer” with The Salvation Army otherwise they will get sanctioned. Refusal to comply will ensure that your voluntary position becomes mandatory, therefore you will incur all the penalties that come with that. The Salvation Army are only too happy to oblige.

We arrived at our location and decided to stand in front of the shop. As soon as we were spotted by the manager we were told that we had to move because we were stood in front of the shop window. We made it clear, that it was our intention to do so, and we had every right to hold a peaceful protest in a public area. We also stated that we wernt moving. This did nothing to lighten her mood, so she went back inside the shop and called for security.

Security arrived. Having been a resident of Ashton Under Lyne for most of my life I know a lot of people, and I happened to know this chap. He was very pleasant, asked what we were doing, we explained and he didn’t take issue. However his employer did. He seemed to be of the mindset that you can’t protest about a moral issue, but you can only protest about a legal issue. We corrected him and informed him that we wernt moving. We were causing no harm, indeed we had a lot of support from the public. Some members of the public had actually been forced to “volunteer” there and not one had a good word to say about the place. The Salvation Army tried to send a member of staff outside to attempt to intimidate us by taking our photo and telling us to “move”. We stood our ground and had a good morning chatting to members of the public about workfare and why it is wrong. One person disagreed, as is their right, but they also stated that they were an ex DWP worker so what else could we expect?

As one member of the public stated “if you are forced to volunteer the organisation isn’t going to get the right sort of volunteer. They won’t want to be there, they won’t want to do the work. Volunteering should be voluntary because when it is people are happy and enthusiastic.”

Forcing someone to “volunteer” for up to 30 hours a week is enforced labour, no matter what name you decide to call it.

The definition of slavery as quoted in Collins Dictionary is;

1″ The state or condition of being a slave; a civil relationship whereby one person has absolute power over another and controls his life, liberty and fortune.

2. The subjection of a person to another person esp in being forced to work

3. The condition of being subject to some influence or habit

4. Work done in harsh conditions for low pay”

Being faced with loosing all your income if you don’t “comply” falls exactly into that category.

We will be returning.

Jeremiah 22:13King James Version (KJV)

¹³ Woe unto him that buildeth his house by unrighteousness, and his chambers by wrong; that useth his neighbour’s service without wages, and giveth him not for his work;

  
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