Dear Iain Duncan-Smith, thanks for nothing
I've got BIG News! I've got a job! Amazing isn't it? Fifteen months after being made redundant, I've finally managed to secure one of the many jobs that you regularly claim in the media are out there for the taking. We were beginning to think it would never happen. So many interviews, so much hope, followed by disappointment after disappointment. I don't know where these jobs are that you speak of. Perhaps they're in London, because, be honest – you don't have much knowledge of towns and cities outside the capital, do you? Actually, you're right, there are jobs out there, but I'm not entirely sure you're aware of the stumbling blocks preventing folk from getting them.
Getting a job isn't quite as easy as just sending your CV to a prospective employer. Perhaps if you understood that, you might not continue to spout your patronising nonsense in the media, and further continue to get the backs up of those who genuinely want to work, and do not under any circumstances live off benefits as (you call it) a lifestyle choice. You make idle comments about how you could live off £53 a week if you had to, but that's the point, Iain, you will never have to, and furthermore it's likely you'll never want for anything for the rest of your life, whether that be a job, a home, or financial security. You are preaching about things you have absolutely no knowledge of whatsoever. You are using the teeny weeny minority of benefit claimants who do live a satisfactory standard of life to attempt to prove your point, and in doing so you are destroying those who are genuinely struggling.
It's been a difficult 15 months, Iain. I'm not sure whom you've spoken to in order to form your opinions of the benefit lifestyle, but this luxurious existence that you talk of on TV never made its way into our home. For most of the time, you expected us to live on £61 a week … that's £30.50 per person per week. Oh to have had the luxury of the £53 per person per week you speak of! And when we questioned this £30.50 each per week, and pointed out that it was ridiculous to imagine people could live on that amount, we were told by your "loyal, and highly experienced" (your words, not mine) advisers that this was a "wholly appropriate amount of money to live on" and that we should "stop complaining"....
....Iain, I am not sad to be leaving the benefit system behind, far from it. I am, however, worried about those who will continue to be persecuted while you're in power, who you will continue to take money from (money they don't have) because you refuse to turn the tables on your golf club buddies, and you refuse to open your eyes and speak to real people about real problems. This has been the worst 15 months of my life. I would love to say I hope that one day you too could experience just a portion of what I've gone through, but you never will. I am looking forward to a more positive future. Sadly, under the current government I don't think many more people will be able to say the same.
(Much more at link.)
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/apr/24/dear-iain-duncan-smith-thanks-nothing
