Unemployment: lack of jobs, not laziness, prevents people working

Politicians trying to look tough are ignoring the reality. There is no life worth living on benefits

Employment: "Our sons and daughters do almost anything rather than sign on and my guess is that this as much as immigration is what’s driving wages down." Photograph: Christopher Thomond for the Guardian

Like many older parents, I see my children and stepchildren having harder lives than mine at their age. Unemployed, overworked and/or in debt, it hurts us all and Labour's threat to be tougher than the Tories risks rubbing salt in the wounds ("Labour will be tougher than the Tories on benefits, pledges party's new welfare chief", News).

Most of my generation had a choice of jobs and felt no great shame on being on benefits between them. Some of us used that time to do what we wanted or thought was needed in the world.

Our sons and daughters do almost anything rather than sign on and my guess is that this, as much as immigration, is what is driving wages down.

I know from experience on and running job-creation schemes that Labour's latest promise and threat must offer useful work with pay at rate for the job, plus a real prospect of progress, not let-down at the end.
Now, as ever, it makes no sense to push people into work for peanuts to make some rich men richer.

Greg Wilkinson
Swansea

Rachel Reeves, the new shadow minister for work and pensions, endorses the myths that flow from the lips of Iain Duncan Smith by claiming that nobody should be under any illusion that they are going to live a life on benefits under Labour. There is no life worth living on benefits: £71.70 a week single adult unemployment benefit is now paying rent and council tax and becomes valueless because annual increases are pegged at 1% while prices of food, utilities, clothes and transport escalate.

Tins of beans collected at a food bank cannot be cooked at home when the gas bill cannot be paid. Unless there is a policy to provide affordable housing, then a higher and higher proportion of the £500-a-week cap on benefits will be needed to pay rising rents in a housing market in short supply, forcing more individuals, parents and children into penury and out of their homes into temporary and overcrowded accommodation.

The Rev Paul Nicolson
Taxpayers Against Poverty
London N17


Many people will have been disappointed to read Rachel Reeves's comments in the Observer. It is a worrying trend that at a time of high unemployment, we see those unable to find work treated like criminals for not finding work that doesn't exist.

Unemployed people are perfectly capable of assessing what is in their best interests, without threats. They don't need to be compelled into demoralising and futile exercises so that politicians can look tough. No one would willingly choose life on unemployment benefit that pays just £10 a day (£8 if you're under 25). Trade union members expect better from the Labour opposition, which should be taking a constructive approach of supporting people into work through training and re-skilling. Work experience also has a role to play, but it should be voluntary and paid, as per TUC policy.

It is pathetic that politicians compensate for their failure to build an economy that provides adequate jobs by bashing the victims of this failure. Many of us had hoped the reshuffle would open the door to a serious debate about the role of social security and the labour market. We hope it still can.

Mark Serwotka
General secretary, PCS

Michelle Stanistreet
General secretary, NUJ

Bob Crow
General secretary, RMT

Steve Gillan
General secretary, POA

Bob Monks
General secretary, URTU

Ronnie Draper
General secretary, BFAWU

Ian Lawrence
General secretary, Napo

Matt Wrack
General secretary, FBU

John McDonnell MP 

The Observer