Originally posted by xanthanotus
im not saying that some people dont deserve the dole, but maybe the money that is put into the dole would be better spent re-training these people to work in hospitals etc.....it would be nice to have a government that could for once use its brain!
This statement is uninformed - once you've been on the dole for a certain amount of time the government forces you to go to training seminars on interview techniques, how to get a job ect. and forces you to do unpaid work experience, or else they cut you off. This system does work, for the majority of people who would rather be working. It doesn't work (and no system ever will) for people who want to laze around on the dole for the rest of thier lives.
A testament to this: My b/f was on the dole for 6 months after dropping out in year 11, but, despite applying for everything and sending out heaps of canvasing letters he couldn't get a job. Centrelink made him do a weeks unpaid work experience at a business of his choice, and the great reference he got from this got him the next traineeship he applied for. Now hes finished that traineeship and hes been put on as a fulltime, fully paid worker (its very rare for a business to hire a trainee at full wage after they finish thier traineeship!) - hes paying enough taxes to pay back what he got on the dole in 6 months - a year
I think the dole system works fine, although I do agree more should be done about dole cheats and the lazy buggers that just WONT get a job (like, you have to report that you applied to a certain amount of businesses for a job each fortnight, and everyone just makes them up out of the phonebook, centrelink never checks). As for the people that think we should kick everyone off the dole - look at america, one of the richest countries in the world but because of the lack of a social security and public healthcare there are people straving in thier streets and dying of curable medical conditions.
=> Unrelated comment about america - They should look after thier own citizens before they go barging into the affairs of other countries.... state soverignity? pfft!