Ideas 4...Employment, Getting A Job

Ideas 4...Employment, Getting A Job -
52 Reasons why you can't get a worthwhile job.

Lets take a look at the present system:

There are numerous reasons why I and most people in the UK cannot get a worthwhile job. Some of those reasons are as follows:

1 The 1974 Rehabilitation of Offenders Act (ROOA). This denies ex-cons the opportunity to work in the transport sector, emergency services, civil service such as Highways Agency, education, health, lorry driver, Royal Mail, etc. As a draughtsman and building services engineer I am not allowed to work on defence, law court and prison contracts. I am also not allowed to work in many countries outside the European Union. Without CRB (Criminal Records Bureau) clearance, employment in this part of the country is almost impossible. According to the media, one can get around this problem by changing ones identity by deed poll on the internet, something which I refuse to do. The number of national insurance numbers wildly exceeds the number of people working in the UK, suggesting that a huge number are working here illegally, many of whom probably work in the NHS (National Health Service) where foreigners abound. The ROOA encourages people to steal the identity of someone alive or dead if they do not want to spend the rest of their lives on welfare. It is too easy to steal someone's details from computer databases, particularly as HMG does not police the Internet effectively. They could then become a security risk when working in HMG departments or on HMG projects. This is probably the reason why HMG abandoned the smart national identity card system. It cannot be secure if you cannot determine who someone really is in the first place. As the human race becomes more mobile, this problem will become more apparent.

2 In a world of AI, where much of the management of the economy is transferred from capitalist organisations to government, because to leave AI in the hands of commerce would create an IT based disaster, how will governments be able to manage people directly if they do not know who they really are, nor even that they exist? It's thought that there are one million illegal immigrants in the UK, living with false identities. This is particularly important when the National CV Centre and SPEVs (Specific Person Electronic Vouchers) are created.

3 Under this Act of Parliament (ROOA) I am not permitted to work with vulnerable people, which could include just about anyone, including a nervous PM at an OPEC meeting in Jeddah. This Act of Parliament has inflicted billions of pounds worth of damage to the British economy. There is no rehabilitation in this legislation.

4 The quality of our education system is suspect, with one in seven children using English as a second language. There are no training courses to supplement educational courses. Government Training Centres and Skillcentres, which provided full time practical courses of 37 hours per week for 5 to 11 months, were shut down in 1988. The government does promote Learndirect, which I regard as nothing more than a means of getting ethnic minorities to learn English, and to get the long term unemployed back onto JSA (Job Seekers Allowance). Learndirect provides short courses in basic read / write, IT, business & management and languages. As for me doing a one year Masters of Business Administration....forget it, no chance. The technology taught on higher education courses tends to be decades out of date, whilst the courses are too short. They do not satisfy employers demands to be employment specific and multi-skilled. Many lecturers only teach a quarter of the syllabus, the part that their students will be examined on. The lecturer sets the exam, not the examining body. Its a system open to corruption, at the expense of the student. It's designed to ensure the job security of the lecturer, not the lasting career of the student.

5 There is a distinct lack of government vision and investment in science, technology, engineering and manufacturing (STEM). The Bank of England's call, in January 2008, to export more and import less, appears to have fallen on deaf ears. HMG has failed to create a science based society (despite my letters of insistence), and neither does it invest enough in major construction projects abroad designed to employ UK citizens. The global economy appears to be all one way, with our sea ports not being large enough to accommodate container ships. Upon leaving university most young people find themselves in the 'graduates grave', a soul destroying office environment that does anything but tax their brains. Many of the jobs I have done have been financed by regional aid. They are anything but demanding. The money would have been better spent employing the likes of me in research. In a world of AI where will we be? In the cages? Human mentality has to improve, and in the very short space of time now available.

6 It is a well known fact that your success or failure in life is greatly influenced by the advice and help that one gets from your parents. My parents spent so much time arguing amongst themselves that I could not find the courage to ask them, never mind seek financial support from them in order to go into higher education. They were both machine operators in the long since deceased, boot and shoe industry, and knew nothing about higher education anyway. For a career, I went into the merchant navy, whilst my brother went into the army, for some peace and quiet. Any entrepreneurial spirit one may have had, is simply beaten out of you at school. For most people, success in life is merely a matter of luck or class, not effort.

7 The apprenticeship appears to be a thing of the past, with companies now tightening their belt even further, with middle management becoming a distant memory. With the commercialization of higher education, courses will not take place without at least seven students. Since apprentices formed the core of these courses, most subjects in engineering and construction are no longer covered.

8 I was a navigating apprentice for four years with Shell Tankers. I took the job very seriously. It consisted of one year at college and two years at sea. There are two incidents I remember, apart from the inevitable trips with the officers to the local brothel that is. During my engine room watch experience, my personally owned new boiler suit was stencilled across the back with the words DUREX FITTER, presumably by the forth engineer, who had recently spent his shore leave in Manila having sex with eight year old girls in a Manila brothel. When we were not covered in steam from spraying the condensers with a hose to remove salt encrustation, I was assisting the fifth engineer to pack grease boxes on top of the boiler in 140°F temperatures, which we could only stand for five minutes at a time. I was the victim of hostility on three of the five ships I sailed on. Unfortunately it is not much better ashore.

9 At the end of my apprenticeship I had to take my Board of Trade exam. The third part consisted of an orals exam. I had been told at college that I would not be asked about sailing ships, so I looked at them suspiciously when they did precisely that. I answered all the questions correctly but the two examiners would repeatedly move the goal posts until I ran out of answers. Since you had to wait two months before sitting it again, I assume it was their way of ensuring their job security, not mine. I failed it three times then gave up in disgust. Until then I thought my apprenticeship had been good, but I later realised that all that time spent running the obligatory cross-country course across the moors and sailing cutters in Plymouth Sound should have been better spent. Such as how to deploy and sail a lifeboat, together with survival techniques. We should also have spent time doing Board of Trade mock exams. We never did one. Neither did we learn how to use ship's equipment, except radar.

About twenty years later I asked a solicitor whether I could sue Shell over the quality of my apprenticeship, but was told that I should have done it within six years of leaving my employer. At that stage of my life, I had no comprehension of the financial damage that had been inflicted, and of course I knew nothing about employment law, and know very little now. Employment law should be taught to every new company recruit, plus at least a mandatory fifteen minute private chat with the boss each month. That would solve an awful lot of problems in a nation where management does not like talking to its employees, preferring instead to hand out dismissal notices. In the case of Shell, its management were too remote from their workers, in a company where, if you did not have a degree you were simply not worth knowing. At the end of my apprenticeship I was called in for interview at Shell Centre. They wanted to know whether I would continue employment with them. I said,"No." The interviewer made some remark about me not looking as smart as my passport photograph. He also referred to pay and conditions without giving me any details. Never once had the company contacted me on the subject, nor had they asked me how I was getting on. The interview was then terminated. It lasted no more than five minutes. I thought they would show some interest in me and ask my why I would not continue with them, but they never did, and I was too young to be assertive.

10 During my apprenticeship I knew of two third officers given official warnings, one for falling asleep whilst on watch, and the other for doing his homework on the bridge, instead of keeping a look-out. I also recall an incident in Europort whilst on my last ship, the Naticina. I was working on deck, cargo handling at the time. It was daylight, and I noticed a slick of oil growing from the side of a Dutch M boat, 220,000 ton deadweight, berthed opposite us. I shouted and gesticulated to the officer on deck, who after running to the side to see the crude oil, dashed down into the pump room in his number one uniform to shut the sea valve. If the incident had happened at night, I shudder to think of the consequences. I recall another incident on my second ship, the Hemifusus, where on sailing from Manila to the Panama Canal, we had to divert to Honolulu, because half way across the Pacific Ocean, the chief engineer suddenly realised that we had insufficient fuel to reach our destination. In another incident, I was standing by the telegraph as the ship approached Stanlow or Tranmere oil terminal, when the pilot said, "full ahead." One of the two jetties was badly damaged. I froze. The order was given again. "Did he say full ahead," I asked the helmsman. He said nothing. I repeated the order and put the telegraph to full ahead. The captain then came in from the bridge wing and shouted,"slow ahead!" So if you employ personnel in your telephone support centre who have broad local accents, don't be surprised if your customers transfer their accounts.

Since it's so easy to get fired, is it really worth spending years studying for a profession. Generally speaking, employers do not provide a contract of employment, plus written instructions on how to do the job, including a list of misdemeanors for which you can be fired. It's all hire, fire and forget. Years of training down the drain, as other companies refuse to take you on without a job reference. My cousin, who was an accountant, fell into this trap when he was caught having an affair with the director's wife. For most people it does not pay to become a professional in this country.

11 At the time, I thought my apprenticeship was great. When it came to looking for another job however, it became a handicap. Interviewers thought I had a girl in every port, when in reality it was more likely to be a buoy, with no shore leave, and a months voyage to the next buoy. limey he's not likely to stay here long, was the expression on their faces. In the end I left my apprenticeship off my cv.

12 Ageism. I know of no companies that have been prosecuted for contravening the EU law on ageism. If you are over forty you are regarded as senile sedentary, resistant to new ideas, are constantly tired and you simply do not fit in with the corporate image. Companies are not charities, they recruit the best of the best, assuming they have someone in management capable of doing it. HMG has failed to allow elderly workers to have a reduced working week, to compensate for the stress in the workplace, etc. Despite a preference for youth, there are an estimated half a million young people (16 to 24) not in employment in the UK. HMG has kept the youth unemployment figures down in recent years by raising the school leaving age for 16 to 18. And they don't get trained for a job in that time.

13 Race. If you are an immigrant, you are probably more likely to get a low paid insecure job, particularly in agriculture or construction, with common deductions consuming most of your earnings. Till discrepancies, being late, and training costs also get deleted by some employers. 52% of new job vacancies have gone to foreigners since 1997. 713,000 foreigners registered for work in 2006. 90,000 of the 210,000 doctors in the NHS are foreign. In August 2007 the Office of National Statistics reported that in one year 574,000 people migrated to UK, whilst 385,000 migrated from UK including 187,000 immigrants. 80% of UK citizens who leave the UK usually return when they realise that the economic situation is even worse abroad, with no welfare state to rely on, UK qualifications not recognised abroad, negative equity, the prickly heat, racial abuse, etc. are all deciding factors.

14 There is no professional system for getting a job. No one stop shop enshrined by law. Jobcentre officials are more concerned with gathering statistics. Where do you get the addresses of the top fifty employers in your area? I do not know. The only advice I received from them was, "If you turn up early again to sign on, we'll stop your benefit." Job seekers can use computer terminals to search a database of national vacancies, and then use free telephone facilities to call up prospective employers. I could not find any construction vacancies abroad on this database, the only job I stood any chance of getting.

15 Many employers have nothing to do with Jobcentres, as they do not fit in with the corporate image or do not know how to contact them, whilst employment agencies are considered untrustworthy. Agencies modify Cc's, often passing them to another distant office where the staff do not realise the CV has been doctored. That counters the use of stress analysis techniques over the phone, employed by the employer. It can however put the applicant in a tight spot if it is realised by both parties at an interview that the CV has been altered, as has happened to me. A snooty mentality by employers can extend to only employing people whose postal code (property value) looks right, or you drive the right make of car. I once turned up at an interview by bus......I stood no chance. Few civil servant vacancies are advertised.

16 Many advertised vacancies require you to have a car even though the job only pays subsistence wages. Needless to say, many apply, since the stigma of being classed unemployed is simply too great. This is a nation with a history of not rewarding effort adequately. Some job descriptions are in-house and have no meaning to most job seekers. HMG has failed to provide recognised job descriptions for each profession, compiled by British Standards with assistance from professional bodies such as CIBSE in the construction industry.

17 Agencies prefer a brief CV, whilst employers prefer the opposite, often for security reasons. One never knows what to provide, until the day of rejection. Many interviewers cannot read a CV, especially of someone who has done a lot of contracting, as it is too complicated. Mine is a classic example. "You've worked at a lot of places," is a common remark from interviewers who have no understanding of contracting, usually thinking to themselves 'well he's not going to stay here long'. The older you are the more complicated your CV becomes, owing to the increasing number of companies you have worked for. Hence the HR Manager doesn't understand it, so the less likely it is that the applicant will get an interview, never mind a job.

18 Education and training content is usually a reflection of the availability and affordability of courses and the quality of the lecturer / instructor. Low attainment levels on education courses can be a reflection of the quality of teaching, as in my case, not simply the capabilities of the candidate. Belonging to a profession that uses costly software can be a distinct disadvantage when searching for employment. "What software have you used?" is a frequent question. If you have not used that companies software, then they will not take you on. HMG has failed to rationalize the use of software in the UK, perhaps the EC can. e.g. Office, CAD, CAM, CFD, FEA, DNC, Accounts, Project, PLC. I did a training course in Computer Aided Design at Birmingham Skillcentre for three months full time. The course was very good, but the software, mld2, was not used in industry. A few years later I got a colleague to get me a copy of Autocad from a friend of his in the US, where it is not protected by a dongle. I bought a PC for about 1200 pounds in 1991 and installed the software. Unfortunately engineering was already in decline, and so it was of little use. I have only worked one year since.

19 Since many agencies cannot be trusted, it does make one wonder what happens to all those personal CVs. Are they, along with details of the clients criminal record, sold off to companies, including insurance companies. Since I have a criminal record, I am not allowed home contents insurance. You can see the list of rejecting insurance companies on a price comparison website. With councils selling off electoral register details to companies, and people able to change their name at the drop of a hat, it does make one wonder how it is possible to guard against identity theft.

20 Application forms can be a minefield to fill in. Many employers want to know the reason why you left a company. Put on an application form or CV, ill health, fired or wanted a better paid job, and you are unlikely to get another. One person I knew left because he wanted a change of scene. A pretty neutral answer. Some application forms want to know the earnings at each place you worked at. An impossibility in my case. Others don't want details more that ten years old, in which case I would stand no chance. In the UK there is no standard layout for a CV / job application form. In the end it's easier to fill in the Jobcentre Plus application form for incapacity benefit, all forty pages of it.

21 After your CV has been accepted, the next step is the interview. Wrong! The next step is getting to the interview. Just finding the place can be a daunting challenge, with the vast majority of companies seemingly incapable of providing the candidate with a map showing the final 200m, usually the distance from a major road to the companies main gate, or car park, if it has one. On one occasion, the company had simply photocopied a page from a road atlas, without marking on it exactly where they were. I turned off the main road at the wrong junction, slowed down when I realised I was on a slip road, and was hit in the rear. That was the last job interview I went to.

22 Some job interviews can be a total waste of time, since they are based upon ulterior motives. I have been to interviews where I felt that I was being probed in order for the interviewer to find a solution to a technical problem. In one case I left the interview feeling certain that there was no vacancy, and that I had been interviewed simply to keep the interviewer occupied, on an otherwise boring day. There are of course recruitment bonuses to be considered. At one automotive manufacturer I was asked if I wanted to buy one of the company's cars. 'Rover...you must be joking', I thought.

23 Today there are six pages of recruitment consultancies listed in the Birmingham central Yellow Pages business telephone directory. About fifteen years ago there were sixteen pages of them. Then of course there is the Internet and newspaper advertisements, many of which are by agencies advertising the same job vacancy. Many are fly by night operations. Where does one start? Also, many of these web based agencies mean nothing to me. I do not know who they are, so it seems crazy to give them my personal details. The stress of hunting for a job can easily be increased when one's personal data is violated by such an agency.

24 Many unemployed cannot provide a job reference because the companies they have worked for no longer exist, whilst there is no law to compel existing companies to provide references or keep detailed employment records. Agencies, as a rule do not provide references, preferring to get one of their candidates in the job instead, preferably on a contract basis which can be more lucrative. As a draughtsman I often showed examples of my work and a folder full of qualifications, but apparently it all meant little compared to a reference. The interviewer needs a reference, so that if you get fired from your new job, the interviewer can say, "well the references appeared to be OK, you can't blame me."

25 Generally speaking it is not advisable to relocate for employment, as jobs are no longer secure and well paid, since the power of the trade union movement was undermined in the 1980s. One gets the impression that HMG hates manufacturing, since it is synonymous with politically damaging industrial actions of the past (seaman's strike 1966, three day week 1974, miner's strike 1984). If HMG thinks that the shop steward 'Red Robo' at British Leyland was too much to handle, I shudder to imagine how they will get on with 'Robo Asimo' from Honda, since it could already run rings around them, literally. Lack of trade union power in the UK means that two million people, including directors and managers do not take their full holiday entitlement for fear of loosing their job. The increasing spectre of zero hours contracting now dominates recruitment thinking.

26 For those with a gift for the gab and a degree in psychology, a job interview can be a doddle. Unfortunately I have neither. On one occasion I had two job interviews in one day. I waited for the second one in a pub. I didn't get the second job because I spoke so fast, it was obvious I was inebriated. On one occasion I was asked by an employer whether I had been there before. I replied honestly, "Yes." He went away for a few minutes. When he came back he said," Well I can't find your file, but you've got the job anyway." I thought he meant, 'have you been here for an interview before.' Once I was interviewed for the job of aircrew in the RAF at Biggin Hill. I did not get accepted, presumably because they thought I could never harm a soul. How wrong they were. My HND took two years, during which time I only went out in the evening no more than three times per year. That is the sort of commitment that does not come out at a job interview.

27 Some job interviews can turn out to be far more involved than anticipated. I was told it would take a couple of days, but I didn't find out why until I got there. "Tomorrow you'll do the assault course", the officer said. Assault course? I hadn't done anything physical for years. All the others in the group were from other army units. This was the parachute regiment at Aldershot. The obstacles towered over me, especially on the second and final lap, each one ending with a pool of muddy water. I didn't join up because I could not understand the language...Geordie.

28 There are few well paid jobs, as the wage's councils, which dictated what a profession should be paid, were scrapped in the 1980s. Companies now have no salary structure, which often results in asking for too much or too little financial reward. "So how much are you looking for", says the manager. "12,000 pounds per annum", says I in desperation. His expression is one of disgust. He thinks, 'Christ if all those under me work for so little, I'll soon be on the dole with my 30,000 pound salary. As a result, one in four Britons have no savings. Some people work for nothing, paid expenses from the petty cash, just to get away from the nagging misses. Others, unable to admit unemployment, spend their days surfing the internet in their local library, whilst some women are night nurses, standing on street corners.

29 With the rising cost of commuting, many people are now working there way into poverty, often financed by home equity withdrawal, or living with their parents, supported by the bank of mum and dad. I had no such advantage.

30 Money is of course, not the only incentive. Most men want to play their traditional role in society, through work in order to bring up a family. In a society dominated by women's lib, females do not want to get married and have a family, with many preferring instead to be wannabe whores in their spare time. In this fortieth anniversary year of the Homosexual Reform Act the number of lesbians openly active in society is also oppressive. It is now more common to see women wearing tattoos. The number of marriages performed is now at its lowest level since records began. Women now have direct access to welfare benefits and social housing, almost automatic access to a divorce where they can have automatic custody of their children, whilst men are bombarded with programmes on TV telling them of how brutal men are to women. In truth all the money that that man has invested in that marriage has now gone to waste. The overpowering feeling of rejection can result in a knee jerk act of violence. Much of the stress has been created at work, which HMG does nothing to eliminate. And any man who makes an advance towards a woman now runs the risk of being vilified, accused of sexual harassment. Men are now forced to live alone. Making friends in a world of state sponsored homosexuality is easier to reject. With no family, then upon their death their estate either goes to a distant relative or the tax man. UK society is a total disaster created by dumb dumb politically correct politicians. This disaster will never be corrected because no parliament will ever have the guts to admit its mistake and rectify it.

Twenty million people in the UK now live with the effects of personal divorce or separation, whilst the rented housing waiting list is four million applicants long, as the number of homes built reaches a new low, as mortgage approvals fall 64% as house values fall eight months in a row by 6.3%, due to the credit crunch and the near collapse of Northern Rock Bank. House prices are from 200% to 300% over valued, leaping ahead of earnings to create another disincentive. In addition, the UK laws on rape, with no statute of limitations, and financially punitive maintenance payments for offspring, does not exactly encourage a man to go out and seek a mate of the opposite sex. Immigration laws prevent you from obtaining a wife from abroad. I got mine from Wales. Although written some years ago, all of these problems are still proving to be a major disincentive for men to work.

31 During an interview, you have about fifteen minutes to prove yourself, whilst the potential hoity-toity employer uses those fifteen minutes to prove to you that he is part of the elite. 'If you haven't done it before, then you can't do it' is the motto of most of British management. As a draughtsman, I was often told that if I had no prior experience of drawing the companies components, then I would not be taken on. Most companies in the UK are too small to provide even one day's training. As for what you did during all those years in higher education, in preparation for this interview, 'well that was one long drug induced psychedelic holiday, wasn't it?'

32 Many well paid jobs require the applicant to have had ten years in higher education, such as that of a chartered engineer, even though the unofficial retirement age is forty. This gives too little time for a graduate to recoup the cost and effort involved in becoming a professional. Slowly the nation is loosing its skilled workforce, alternatively providing jobs in telephone support centres, warehouses, civil servants and of course the delivery driver or self employed white van man.

33 Many interviewers will not accept qualifications done outside of an apprenticeship. This makes changing one's career virtually impossible.

34 Wages in this country are so low, that in next to no time one can no longer afford a car, in order to commute to a new job. Some employers, enraged by our poor public transport system, and never ending excuses from their workers, will not recruit people who do not have a car. The cost of living in this country is too high, and if HMG's vision of an all electric society powered by wind turbines, photo-voltaics, fuel cells, nuclear fission and fusion becomes a reality, the cost of living may well sky rocket, leading to even greater personal debt, if the government doesn't get it right. To put it simply, people will be put off applying for jobs.

35 (Section 35 was written in 2008 approx, as was most of this subject of getting a job. Little has changed since.) As a result of my experiences in life, I hate capitalism and democracy, and as far as I'm concerned employers can get stuffed. And I speak for many people, who are sick of menial wages and benefits, whilst having to stomach the announcement of numerous fat cat company director's remuneration details exposed in the newspapers. Director's pay has doubled in five years to an average of 3 million pounds, presumably for FTSE 100 companies. BBC executives have recently been awarded salary rises of up to 107,000 pounds, after the BBC (not executives) were fined 400,000 pounds for five radio and TV scams involving rigged contests, plus an inexhaustible supply of repeat programmes, whilst three National Rail executives are now to get bonuses of 200,000 pounds each, despite rail maintenance personnel not turning up for work last Christmas. In a society where most people are earning 12,000 pounds per annum, this is blatant corruption sanctioned by the highest levels of government, in a society where political parties are financed by wealthy executives. Because it is all out in the open, psychology dictates that it is legal. Never in my book! Politicians never talk about imposing a national maximum wage, and it is easy to see why. One gets the impression that they are all worshipping that pagan idol capitalism, instead of promoting Christian values. The abolition of the ten pence tax rate, announced this year, is a clear indicator of the contempt HMG has for the grass roots of society. Genocide of the working class in the face of AI? Don't think it could never happen. I think the EC should compel all executives and politicians in the EU to use the TATA G-Wiz electric car and nothing else, when travelling within five miles of their office. Maybe then they will get the message about director's pay and global warming. For the average worker there are no exorbitant salaries, no huge bonuses and certainly no golden handshake.

36 Many job advertisements do not contain sufficient contact details, supplying an e-mail address only. Most agency advertisements do not even list the name of the employer. Most personnel departments do not send an applicant a map of the local area, radius 200 metres say. They are unable to provide you with an accurate description of the job, using in-house terms only. As far as I know there is nothing to stop someone putting a job advertisement into a newspaper with the intention of stealing your identity, or sexually assaulting you at an interview.

37 Some job interviews include technical questions, or worse. Some of these questions I find so mediocre that it puts me off wanting to be taken on. Some statements like, "we never advertise our services because we're so good we don't have to," I find off putting. Others employ psychology to get you to accept a salary much lower than you had in mind. They would ask you what your qualification is and then suggest that you go for something higher. At another place I was asked to spy on my colleagues and inform management if they were on drugs. I have no wish to work with such unprofessional people. They are pathetic. The assessor is in effect being assessed.

38 Many employers want to know the details of your criminal record, not simply whether you have CRB clearance. I cannot work in that kind of environment, as it is too stressful. It is obvious to me that HMG and employers are using CRBs as a means to divide and rule society through the work place.

39 Most work places are a source of intense stress, caused mainly by stressful commuting in overcrowded trains or stuck in traffic jams, poor working environment: outdated, noisy, cold; bad management often providing no written instructions, or no management at all; unrealistic deadlines and aggression.

40 Fear pervades many companies, and are not safe to work at as a result, including those that refuse to provide you with an employment contract stating hours to work, expecting you to work all hours of the day and night in unpaid overtime. In such an environment few superiors make decisions for fear of being sacked over it.

41 Whilst the National Health Service can provide prompt treatment for employment associated ills, it does not have the power to rectify the fundamental causes, i.e. depression and stress in the workplace caused by bad management, or poor diet, lack of exercise and poor hygiene resulting in absenteeism through poor physical health. Currently there are seven million people in the UK suffering from depression and other mental illnesses.

42 I cannot get a job because of stress. Whilst the brain wants to work, my heart says no. Every time I look at the job advertisements in the local newspaper my heart starts pounding. I only realised why when I watched a television programme which revealed that the heart, like the brain, also has neurones. It will accept just so much abuse. Politicians are right when they say that many people on incapacity benefit want to work, but the fact is that they cannot, until HMG dramatically improves working conditions.

Obtaining a job can be a financially dangerous act. Often companies, including employment agencies have no idea what is going on in the nation's economy, because the government is not telling the masses through the TV, TUC, CBI and Jobcentres. They therefore have little appreciation of what the client companies long term employment needs will be. When I did my BTEC NC Electrical Building Services course, one student changed employers and was made redundant when the company closed down just one month later. Because of that he left the course.

44 Searching for a job can be more pointless than you think. There is a growing tendency for companies to black list companies and individuals. I was once informed by an agency that I was banned from a company even though I had never worked there. Apparently another agency had arranged a contract for me, which I could not attend until the next day, because I had to buy a car in order to commute there. For being a day late I was banned. The agency could have sent me by taxi, but did not. I was left totally unaware of the urgency of the situation. On another occasion, upon arriving at an interview, I was told that the job was a contract, even though it had been advertised as permanent. I later wrote to the company, telling them exactly what I thought of them, knowing full well that they would ban me.

45 Contracting is little better than slavery, with 75% of the time spent looking for a new contract. When the telephone rings, you dread the thought that it might be from the agency. "But it could lead to something permanent" is often the 'catch' phrase. At one time the rate was substantially higher than for someone permanently employed in the same job, but that all disappeared in about 1982 when the 15% base rate of interest took its toll on businesses. Generally speaking you worked from clocking in to clocking off, with no time to chat with anyone. You were usually segregated from the women, and expected to prove yourself on every contract. If you failed those tests you were out and barred. On one occasion, at the end of the day, I found my car boxed in by a lorry on an industrial estate. Whilst attempting to move my car, some newly applied body work paint scrapped onto the battered wing of an adjacent vehicle. Needless to say someone saw it happen and the next day the owner was waiting for compensation. I paid him forty pounds, as hush money, but the management knew and booted me out, never to return. A few weeks later a colleague of mine went there and was booted out for spending too much time talking to other draughtsmen. Contracting becomes a curse because the longer you are in it, the more time you spend only doing rudimentary work, whilst your IT skills quickly become out of date due to no access to on-the-job training. It's no better for many scientists.

46 Do not believe for one moment that these companies will not ditch their work force the moment AI and androids arrive on the scene. The present sub-prime induced recession is nothing compared to what it will be like if governments do not manage economies and individuals directly. It appears that only technocracies will do that.

47 Birmingham is the most run down city in the UK as far as employment is concerned. Prior to the credit crunch the West Midlands was loosing jobs at the rate of 1000 net per week, mainly from engineering and manufacturing, the only part of the UK that had a net loss. It never ceases to amaze me, the sight of young couples coming to the city in search of employment, whilst being prepared to offer their bodies in return for shelter. They obviously have not done their homework.

48 Being long term unemployed, eventually means unemployable as your skills become out of date. With nothing to do, your brain deteriorates, constantly thinking of the same trivial thoughts, based upon early memory. Dreams about your apprenticeship, whilst being unable to recall words, as you watch news stories about medical advances in dementia. Every month I think about going back into prison just to get away from this lunatic society, as 7,900 pensioners are declared bankrupt in the past year compare to only 900 in 2002 (figures released 21-9-2007). Which nation will I select? HMPs are too overcrowded.

49 Assuming you can find employment that is legal, it does beggar the question, why work just to destroy the planet through global warming? We are constantly reminded of it by the media each day, and yet where are the jobs intended to defeat this trend?

50 I am now retired. Some people regard forced retirement as an act of ageism, whilst HMG wants to make people work till they drop, by raising the retirement age to 75. And yet the police can retire at fifty, strange? HMG ignores the fact that over the last fifty years jobs have been destroyed through automation. A process that is continuing. Clearly a new approach is needed. Thus far there has been no announcement from HMG, nor the EC, regarding what policy will be pursued when artificial intelligence performs the coup de grace on the working class.

51 With an imminent global banking collapse likely to result in the pound sterling becoming worthless, and properties unsaleable, what is the point of working? With global economics being far more complicated to manage than global warming, it is pretty obvious that governments are incapable of finding an acceptable solution to this problem. In 2016 Barclays and RBS banks were both facing difficulties.

52 And finally I wish to make it clear that I will in no way sell my body or pay bribes in order to obtain employment. The first mentality exists in the entertainment industry. As politicians turn a blind eye to the subject, it is only a matter of time before this mentality creates a third world nation morality, here in the UK.

When you reach this high a number of reasons, it becomes plainly obvious that HMG is not only clueless, it is a liability in its present form. This political system must go.

Ideas 4...Employment, Getting A Job -
National CV Centre, SPEVs, CV

Now let's take a look at my proposed alternative:

The UK has no National CV Centre. Because of this it is a nation of square pegs in round holes. It is grossly irresponsible to spend up to ten years educating and training someone for employment, only to fail to provide a professional job recruitment system. This system would operate at every level of society, economy and within every organisation including government. The NCVC would operate as follows:

When an organisation has a job vacancy the requirement details would be sent to the nearest Jobcentre. Every profession would have a reference number linked to a professional guild, so there would be no ambiguity as to what was required. The Jobcentre would interrogate the NCVC database. The database would contain records of everyone, even children. Education, training and annual employee reports from the organisations people actually worked at, would be interrogated by staff after initial review by AI's criteria. It would provide three suitable candidates who would be interviewed, one from the relevant professional guild, another from the employer and a staff member working for the Jobcentre. The candidate would be required to undergo an interactive examination, on a computer, compiled by the employer and marked by the relevant professional guild. This is to find out whether the candidate has the necessary up to date knowledge, and if not, what HMG financed training is required, should that person turn out to be the best applicant.

The NCVC would also serve as a dating agency and calculate SPEV (Specific Person Electronic Voucher) payments, paid into your account and accessed from your mobile phone's electronic wallet.

So you still want a secure well paid job in the big bad world of capitalism. The following is my cv (curriculum vitae) and is a glowing example of what not to send to an employer, since it's too complicated:

***BUSINESS ADDRESS***

Dear sir or madam,

In answer to your advertisement, please note that I am presently seeking permanent employment.

Due to company closures in engineering and manufacturing, I can no longer provide a job reference.

I am available for interview at any time. I will bring along examples of my work, certificates, etc.

I enclose my CV, and look forward to hearing from you.

Yours faithfully,

Mr. Nigel S. Allen

name: ***YOUR FULL NAME & NICKNAME***

address: ***FULL POSTAL ADDRESS***

phone numbers: ***FIXED LINE & MOBILE NUMBER***

web site: ***LIST YOUR WEB SITE & EMAIL ADDRESS

driving licence: ***TYPES OF VEHICLE, EXPIRY DATE***

personality: ***INTROVERT OR EXTROVERT***

health: ***SMOKER OR VEGETARIAN***

hobbies: ***LIST ALL RELEVANT HOBBIES***

Dept. of Maritime Studies, Plymouth College (now University)

Sandwich course in nautical studies: 9/65 to 4/66 and 9/67 to 4/68 52 weeks

Studied maths, ship construction, ship propulsion, cargo handling, chartwork, navigation, meteorology, oceanography, first aid, fire fighting, seamanship. Awarded two prizes for dissertations on the subjects of rocket research, and oceanography. Bridge and engine room watches. Deck maintenance.

Correspondence course in Industrial Engineering (Work Study)

Government Training Centre, Handsworth, Birmingham

Full time course in engineering draughting from 9/72 to 8/73 44 weeks

Multi skilled engineering & draughtsmanship course, including workshop experience on lathes and milling machines, welding, sheet metal, instrumentation repair, machine repair, precision grinding, capstans. Drawings to (British Standards) BS308 Pt. 3 involving geometric tolerancing, weld symbols (BS499), limits & fits (BS4500) and surface texture symbols. Design and detail drawings of automotive components, structural steelwork, jigs & fixtures, machine parts. Calculations on springs, levers, bearings, centroids, volumes, weights, beams, cantilevers, hydraulics & pneumatics, velocity and belt drives, electrical.

Sandwell College, West Bromwich Campus

Full time non-destructive testing course from 9/82 to 1/83 14 weeks. Passed ASNT in X-ray, gamma ray, dye penetrant, magnetic particle and ultrasonic inspection of castings, plate and fabricated components.

Skillcentre, Handsworth, Birmingham

Full time Computer Aided Design course from 5/88 to 8/88 14 weeks

Trained on mld2 parameterization software. Also used Edlin and Wordstar.

Cadbury College, Kings Norton, Birmingham

Evening class in DeskTop Publishing (Pagemaker) from 9/92 to 2/93

Course in Business Information Technology 9/93 to 12/93 12 weeks. Trained in accountancy, RDBMS and presentations on Microsoft Office Pro.

Sandwell College, Smethwick Campus, CAE Dept., Smethwick

BTEC HND Engineering course:1/94 to 6/95 60 weeks

Course included the following modules:

Computer Numerical Control of machine tools M (City & Guilds 9403 - double module)

Engineering Instrumentation and Control M (strain gauges, thermistors)

Computer Aided Design 5 P (dogs, duct, Autocad)

Computer Aided Manufacture 5 P (DNC, PEPS, GNC plus)

Computer Aided Engineering 4 D (college computer network plan)

Engineering Design 4 (A) D (limits & fits, geometric tolerancing)

Engineering Design 4 (B) M (man. costs, production control)

Computer Aided Drawing 3 M (2D, 3D, solid and surface models)

Engineering Design 4 (B) M (parameterised drawings)

Project (CAD) D (material handling, attributes & BOM)

Computer Applications in Control D (SAIA program. logic controllers)

Animation & Graphics (not BTEC approved) (3D Studio and Animator Pro)

Multimedia D (Creative Labs. Soundblaster HSC)

Metrology 4 M (Mitutoyo CMM, optical comparison)

Industrial Studies M (shares, patents, company structure)

Software Design Methods M (Microsoft Qbasic and VisualBasic)

Quality Assurance A M (SPC, Taguchi, BS 5750)

Mathematics for Engineering 4 M (diff., integrals, Fast Fourier Transform)

Mechanical Science A M (stress/strain, beams, dynamics& vibration)

Computer Aided Manufacturing Systems 5 M (automation methodology)

Manufacturing Technology A M (production cost estimating)

This is a total of twenty-two modules.

I have worked on the following software at education establishments and in industry:

Autodesk Autosketch, Autocad for DOS and Windows. Bentley Systems / Intergraph Microstation 5. Delcam International's DUCT, Pafec's DOGS, SDRC I-DEAS, Applicon Bravo 3. Computervision's DesignView, calculation & kinematics design software & Computervision's CADDS 5. Camtek's PEPS for Windows and GNC Plus, Camtek Director 3000 DNC software linked to 2 axis lathes and 2.5 axis millers, including Berox machining centre. Mathsoft's Mathcad. Microsoft Windows, Works, Qbasic and Visual Basic. PLC software SAIA and Toshiba (Windows and LCD based) and Plant Management System MMI. Toshiba PLC programming via Cleveland Open Learning Unit in 1998. e.g. latching circuits, cascade timers and counters, multiple motor timed interval starts, etc.

Matthew Boulton College, Division of Engineering, Highgate, Birmingham.

BTEC NC Electrical Installation Building Services Engineering course from 9/95 to 6/96 36 weeks

Course included the following modules:

Mathematics 2 P

Computer Applications / Common Skills M Microsoft Office, Autocad

Applied Services Science 2 D heat loss, illumination and pump power calculations.

Electrical Installation (A) 2 M single phase cable calculations, safety, conduit, fuses.

The Built Environment 2 D company structure, visual communication

Electrical Services Detailing 2 D luminaire arrangements, cable/trunking routes

Electrical Electronic Principles 3 M Transients, Thevenins, Norton's, PID, AC PF

Administration 3 D contracts, estimating, accounts, tariffs

Electrical Installation (B) 3 M three phase cable calculations, tests, special sites, IP.

Electronics/Microprocessor Control 2 M PLCs, Electro Magnetic Compatibility

Design Principles 2 D Projects: garden centre, village hall, bungalow

Printed Circuitry Systems 2 M PCB circuit principles, build, fault diagnosis

This is a total of twelve units (10 points).

I am familiar with the following:

IEE On Site Guide and BS 7671 (16th ed. of IEE wiring regulations for Electrical Installations 1992)

Health & Safety at Work Act 1974 and Electricity at Work Regulations 1989.

BS 5839 Fire Alarm Systems, Security Alarms, Building Management Systems, Electrical Man. Systems

Autocad 12 for Windows, Luckin's Tracer estimator, Cablemaster, BS7671 in Microsoft Excel

Matthew Boulton College, Division of Engineering, Highgate, Birmingham.

Internet course from 9/99 to 11/99 8 weeks

Learned to create web sites using HTML computer language. Course included European driving licence for information technology.

EEF Training Centre, Reddings Lane, Tyseley, Birmingham

NVQ 2 Electrical Engineering Installation & Maintenance from June 2001 to August 2001

Course included, Continuity testing, Insulation testing, Wiring plugs, House wiring circuits and Three phase electric motor start control circuits

EMPLOYMENT HISTORY

most recent first

Mavitta Ltd., 8 Furnace Lane, Moira, Swadlincote, Derbyshire DE12 6AT

formerly at 1 St. Michael's Court, Victoria Street, West Bromwich

I worked for this agency as an engineering CAD technician (Autocad) & design draughtsman at:

Ultraseal Ltd., Coleshill, nr. Birmingham, engaged in process plant design, in 1998.

It was a small company that made equipment that coated castings, thereby preventing creeping stress fractures. I was only there a couple of weeks, mainly doing clerical work. About two years later Mavitta asked me to work for a car sun roof manufacturer. I turned it down because of the difficulty in signing back on benefits. I never worked again. Instead I created my own work. This web site. Mentally it proved far more rewarding. One more word of advice. At the end of each employment session I went straight around to the Jobcentre to sign on as unemployed. If you don't do that, you not only don't get welfare benefits, but also you are not registering ultimately for your state pension. I worked for about forty companies over a twenty year period. My state pension comes to £172-21 per week, plus £200 winter fuel allowance. Looking back upon my life, I can't help thinking that it's all a con. Success in life is by pure chance, not simply effort.

Chinal Management Services Ltd., King Charles House, Castle Hill, Dudley DY1 4PS

I worked for this agency as an engineering computer aided design technician (CADDS 5 on Sun Microstation), at Rover Group Powertrain, Longbridge, Birmingham, West Midlands., in 1997.

I worked on just one drawing, a building services plan of east works, Longbridge. I was never told what it was for. A department meeting would be held on Friday mornings. I only attended the first one. I sat there for ages waiting for the manager to begin. I wondered why his second in command was grinning. I leaned forward, and to my amazement the manager's laptop screen showed an airliner making a death plunge. About ten people worked in the department, only two of which permanently. I got the feeling that someone was out to bankrupt the company. I was therefore glad when I had completed the six month contract.

DRB Engineering Ltd., (Holloway Tool Company), Birmingham

I worked as a CAD technician (Autocad), at Holloway Tool Company, engaged in progressive press tool design and detailing, in 1997.

I only worked there for one month, during which time two other draughtsmen were fired by a psycho-manager, who plainly enjoyed his power. I was the third victim. I complained to the directors about my treatment, but got nowhere. The factory was later demolished, the land becoming part of a luxury Sheepcote Street canalside housing development.

KNS Industrial Services Ltd., Edgbaston

I worked as a CAD technician (Autocad), at KNS engaged in building services design and detailing, in 1997.

I worked on building services drawings for a sport centre in north London. I took two days off work due to sickness, during which time the company found a replacement CAD technician. It was over one month before I received my final pay and P64 tax statement, by which time I had already left my next employer. Don't work for a small company.

Nova Design Ltd., Pensnett Industrial Estate, Kingswinford, Dudley

Worked at Simon Dudley on telescopic hydraulic platform design, in 1992.

I was only there for one week, as the manager got a student in to do the rest of the work for nothing.

Telford Management Services Technologies Ltd., Church Lane, Wolverhampton

Worked at GEC Alsthom on channel tunnel project, in 1992.

I worked there for three weeks. Went off sick due to allergy caused by ten holly trees in neighbour's garden. My contract was terminated by GEC and I never got paid for my final week there.

P-E International Ltd., (Mavitta Ltd.), 1 St. Michael's Court, Victoria Rd, West Bromwich

Worked at Tudor Webasto Ltd., on Sinclair Zike electric bicycle project, in 1992.

A modern factory. Good working environment. Worked on a drawing board producing drawings of bicycle components for quality assurance purposes. Worked there about two months, paid directly by Mavitta, who were represented to the contracts manager at Tudor Webasto by P-E International. Evidently my boss had forgotten to provide TW with draughtsmen for an earlier project, so Mavitta got banned. So a director at TW fixed it so that his mate would get the contract anyway. It's all hire, fire, forget and banned. There's no love in the capitalist world. It's not exactly an easy thing to explain on a cv, is it? You get all these HR managers looking at this, and they haven't got a clue what's going on, nor whom to write to for a reference.

Stuart Martin Ltd., Hagley , Hereford & Worcester

I worked for this agency as an engineering draughtsman, engaged in building services design and detailing, at DGI International Ltd., Stoneleigh Deer Park, Kenilworth in 1991. (DGI Head office is in Kenilworth)

This was a six month contract in a prefabricated WWII hut, that was originally used as a Venereal Disease hospital. Although it was some way from where I lived, it was a real pleasure to drive out into the countryside. When the contract ended, I felt very depressed. I never got that feeling on any other contract I worked on. I worked there self employed, paying very little tax. Soon after I moved into my apartment in Edgbaston. If it had not been for that contract, I would not have been able to furnish it.

J. Gater Designs Ltd., Tettenhall, Wolverhampton

I never visited the offices as it was only an agency, on the other end of a phone line. I worked for them, in 1990, as an engineering draughtsman, on numerous contracts at:

Electropaint Ltd., Lichfield, materials handling conveyors

I worked there a week or two. I got about four hours notice of end of contract.

Newton Collins Ltd., Acocks Green, Birmingham, building services

This was a contract on the extract system for the health physics laboratory at Atomic Weapons Establishment Aldermaston, Berkshire. Since I was not permitted to work on a defence contract, due to my criminal record, I terminated the contract after about two weeks, mainly because I was pissed off sitting around waiting for information from DSSR, located in Manchester I believe.

Birwelco Ltd., Halesowen, process plant

I detailed up an incinerator, and a shell and tube heat exchanger whilst I was there. Whilst leaving work one day I found my car boxed in by a lorry. Whilst extracting my car it grazed the rusty wheel arch of another car. A 50mm strip of bodywork paint had rubbed onto his car wing, because I had recently had my wing repaired after a car backed into it. I didn't find out about this mark until the next day, when I met the owner. Some people had seen the incident and reported it. I paid the owner twenty pounds compensation. My contract was terminated because of it. I worked there only two weeks. He could have rubbed the paint off with a scouring pad.

Meads Handling Ltd., Aldridge, materials handling

The materials handling at Meads was the only interesting work that I ever did. It was what I had been trained to do almost twenty years before. There were about six draughtsmen there working back to back in a room, more like a submarine than an office. The working conditions were deplorable, insulting. The permanent draughtsman rabbited on about how the director and salesman conspired to turn down contracts, to devalue the company, because they were afraid of losing their jobs in a take over. After that he went on and on and on about his sexual conquests. I couldn't get out of the contract fast enough.

All in the West Midlands in 1990.

Mavitta Ltd., 1 St. Michael's Court, Victoria Street, West Bromwich

There offices were immaculate, since the previous owners had specialised in office furniture. I worked for this agency as an engineering draughtsman, on numerous contracts in the West Midlands, from 1988 to 1990 at:

Flakt Environmental Ltd., Five Ways, building services

The company made large air handling units for office blocks, installing them with associated ductwork. I worked on a number of projects, including Thomas Moore Street, now HQ for News International, and Canada Tower, Canary Wharf. I probably worked for them for about four months.

Tudor Webasto Ltd., Minworth, car sun roof

The best technical illustration I did was that of an exploded perspective drawing of a car sun roof. The handle took most of the Friday to draw, only to be told by the manager that it was not needed. I had to go back on the Monday to add the parts list, in German. I worked there just six days.

Britax Weathershield Ltd., Birmingham, car sun roof in 1992.

I was only there about one week. I dimensioned one drawing.

Crane Heatex Ltd., Minworth, heat exchangers

Detailed heat exchangers on a drawing board. The contract lasted about one month.

Rolls Royce & Associates Ltd., control systems

This consisted of checking CAD drawings of control systems, which I assume were for nuclear submarines. This was a defence contract done at Mavitta's office on their Schlumberger bravo CAD system. The work lasted a day or two as my boss hunted around for another contract for me.

GEC Electromotors Ltd., Blackheath, factory layout

Most of the large factory was idle, and would eventually be closed down. Only there about one month.

Birwelco furnaces induction furnace detailing

I'm not sure if I've got the company name right, and like many of these contracts, I have no idea where it was located. The huge furnaces were impressive. The contract lasted about one week.

E.D.Hinchliffe & Son Ltd., West Bromwich

Employed as CAD technician (Norsk Data Technovision), on glazing contracts for the construction industry, in 1988.

It was a permanent job, but I sensed aggro from the chief draughtsman, so I left after one month. I had suffered enough

Mavitta Ltd., 1 St. Michael's Court, Victoria Street, West Bromwich

I worked for this agency as an engineering draughtsman, at TEK Group Ltd, King's Norton, Birmingham, engaged in aluminium louvre design (diffusers, louvre doors, penthouses and screens), in 1987.

The office was cramped, floor covered in aluminium filings, and the office furniture was second hand, battered. I remember the back of one office swivel chair hanging upside down. The temporary typist left within a week.

Rig Design Services Group Ltd., Sheldon, Birmingham

I worked for this agency as an engineering draughtsman, at Kwikform Ltd, engaged in formwork design and detailing in 1981, on a building contract in Saudi Arabia.

Allwood, Searle & Timney Ltd., Bath House, Bath Street, Walsall

I worked for this agency as an engineering draughtsman, on numerous contracts in the West Midlands, from 1978 to 1981 at:

Anglesey Aluminium Ltd., Holyhead was a huge aluminium smelter, employing hundreds of people. It was called Tinto by the locals, because it was owned by Rio Tinto Group & Kaiser Aluminium I was employed on contract as a draughtsman, mainly on materials handling, process plant projects.

I was there about two years. The work was nothing more than a job creation exercise. It was boring. As a result I lost interest, and my proficiency. My personal problems stopped me from thinking straight. An electrical draughtsman talked me into switching agencies, which due to legal reasons didn't work out. That and my in-laws turning up at the main gate, ensured that my termination was assured. Anglesey Aluminium was shut down in 2009, whilst Wylfa nuclear power station, which supplied the electricity to the pots (electrolytic furnaces), was also closed. The future of the power station site is uncertain.

Pipework Engineering Developments Ltd., Fuel system for airport

I was only there two days. I was asked to produce preliminary drawings of a bowser refueling station for Queen Alia International Airport, Jordan. The manager then walked off into the distance. I never saw him again, since the drawing office was huge. I had only a written description on an A4 sheet of paper. This was a job for a project engineer, who could carry out the necessary research. I had never seen a refueling station, so after a couple of days I gave up and went back to the office. I had been offered a contract in north Wales a week before, so I decided to take it.

GKN Birwelco Ltd., Water purification plant

I spent the first day doing nothing except listening to the section leader gabble on about one thing and another. On the second day I learned that the disgruntled manager had cancelled the contract, due to my low productivity. I worked on one pipework drawing for the rest of the day, returning to the office the next.

Harmo Industries Ltd., technical illustrating

I produced many drawings of exhaust pipes for a sales catalogue. Boring stuff.

Birmingham Mint Ltd., plant layout, tooling

I designed and detailed materials handling equipment, and produced a ground floor plant of the entire works. Birmingham Mint produced coinage for mainly third world countries. The factory was build on the site of a monastery, parts of which were still visible in the factory. Located on the Roman road Icknield Street, it consisted of four continuous casting lines, three of which were subsiding. They were built over a sandstone quarry which had been filled with ash. This appears to have spontaneously combusted, and therefore had to be dug out and then filled with inert material. The most nerve racking moment I had was when measuring the underground bomb shelters, since this section had been excavated into the local Pitsford Street cemetery and catacombs. I worked there about six months. Like most of the factories I worked at, this one was later converted into apartments.

Gibbons Bros. Ltd., Coke ovens for BSC Redcar

I detailed up the coke oven parts drawing, for British Steel Corporation in Redcar. Good office giving an excellent view of the foxes on the railway embankment. I was there about one month. Whilst there I noticed a warehouse complex development being constructed. I didn't realise it then, but it was to be a sign of the times. Today all we seem to manufacture is junk food and foreign cars, importing and warehousing almost everything else.

Serck Heat Transfer Ltd., Tubular Cooler Div., Warwick Road, Greet, Birmingham B11 2QY

I worked for this company as an engineering design draughtsman, detailing process plant associated with heat exchangers, from 1974 to 1977. There was no training and no standards to work to. The drawing office consisted of a single storey pitched roof with conducting plates attached to a hot water pipe in the roof for heating. The lino tiled floor ensured that your feet were always cold, whilst your head was heated by the radiated heat. The only modern furniture was the AO sized draughting machine. Rumours of a new office block never materialized whilst I worked there. The conditions made me ill, and after receiving an official warning for being absent, after which the chief draughtsman refused to give me any interesting work to do, I left the company a few months later. I was then on the dole for six months, looking for a job.

Keunen Bros. Ltd.,Station Road, Irthlingborough, Northants

Employed as an industrial engineer in a leather tannery, in 1971 to 1972.

Engaged in work study, time sheet calculations, batch production control, weekly and quarterly production cost reports.

Compiled the following reports:

Work study summary sheet, work study element description, work study time sheet, work measurement set-up sheet, rest allowance sheet, work study operation specification sheet, work study analysis sheet, cost centre sheet, cost centres summary sheet, labour cost budget form, labour cost comparison report, cost summary report, weekly labour expense control sheet, quarterly cost summary report, machine utilization sheet.

The factory included a wet shop housing huge tanning drums. The place stank. The smell permeated your clothes and destroyed your sense of smell. During one half hour session on the shop floor, I saw two workers repeatedly put two leather sides through a water proofing machine, at a time. In another process I saw a man deliberately sabotage a machine with a scaffolding pole he kept in open display on the floor. This is because you get just as much money, if the machine doesn't work. All this in full view of supervisors, who were doing anything but. Later in my office, I checked the work sheets of employees who had left the company in the past twelve months. It amounted to a one hundred per cent turn over of labour. I decided that it was now my turn, and walked out, never to return.

Nene Valley Caravans Ltd., Rushden, Northants

Employed as production worker in 1971. Company made mobile homes and American style factory made bungalows (Elizabethan Homes).

Worked there for two months. Got fired due to waiting to use a machine that someone else was using.

Taylor Woodrow Anglian Ltd., Rushden, Northants

Employed as production worker, making pre-cast concrete wall sections for London tower blocks of flats, in 1970.

Worked there for six months as a labourer and fitter assistant. Helped weld rebars to floor slabs following the Ronan Point disaster, where 4 people were killed when a gas explosion caused part of a 22 storey tower block to collapse. Left due to lack of promotion prospects and the dangerous nature of the work. A few months later I met an ex-colleague who had broken his arm whilst slipping on an oil covered mold he was filling.

Securicor Ltd., Northampton

Employed as static and mobile guard in 1970.

Left due to unsocial hours and low wages.

Shell Tankers (UK) Ltd., Shell Centre, Waterloo, London. SE1

Indentured Apprentice for four years. 9/65 to 9/69

Served two years at sea on five oil tankers, plus one year at the Department for Maritime Studies, Plymouth College of Technology (now university). Duties at sea included process control (load , unload cargo, tank cleaning, gas freeing), ship maintenance to deck machinery (Hydraulic, pneumatic, electric, steam) and pipework systems, safety equipment testing and repair, use of Siebe Gorman breathing apparatus, Explosimeter and Drager tubes, engine room watches and maintenance to steam turbine and reciprocating engine propulsion systems. Dry dock supervision. Bridge watches, navigation and look out.

Served on the following oil tankers as an apprentice for four years:

Asprella, Hemifusus, Drupa, Opalia and Naticina.

Upon completion of my apprenticeship, I decided not to remain at sea for the following reasons:

1...I failed my Board of Trade Foreign Going Certificate practical exams 3 times, and I realised that I would never pass. The training wasn't good enough.

2...I was sick of the aggression between ranks. Apprentices were at the bottom of the pecking order. There was no team work and no comradery, due to the wearing of uniforms. Whilst serving watches in the engine room the words DUREX FITTER were stenciled onto the back of the boiler suit my mum had bought me. The fifth engineer and I were then ordered to grease packing boxes above the boilers whilst at sea, in extremely high temperatures.

3...I was never asked directly by my employer what I thought of the apprenticeship. The only time they communicated with me, was to tell me what ship to join, when and where. I was never given any future earnings, pension and tax advice. I felt unwanted.

4...There was insufficient leave, as a result I lost contact with all my friends. Refineries were in the middle of nowhere, whilst loading points consisted of offshore platforms or buoyed moorings.

5...It was too easy to make a mistake, thereby receiving an official warning (logged), or be fired. During my apprenticeship my first ship collided with the quayside at Swansea, during high winds at night, which the pilot appeared to ignore. My second ship almost ran out of fuel whilst crossing the Pacific Ocean, due to a fuel miscalculation by the chief engineer. We had to divert from Panama to refuel in Hawaii. On my final ship, it almost collided with a small vessel in the Mozambique Channel, because the second mate ordered me out of the wheelhouse and onto the port wing, whilst the other vessel approached abeam to starboard. Also on that ship, the Naticina, whilst on cargo watch during the day, I witnessed crude oil flowing from the side of a Dutch Shell M boat in Europort. I shouted and gesticulated to the officer on deck, who upon seeing the oil, dashed into the pumproom wearing his number one uniform, to shut the sea valve. I shudder to think what would have happened if it had occurred at night. You could spend many years getting the necessary qualifications, and within months be fired. There was no automation, no cargo control room with remotely operated valves. The sluice valves would often be in a remote, dark location, jammed shut so that you needed a wheel spanner to turn them. There was no satellite navigation. That did not materialize until about 1985. The stress was enormous, with no way to relax. On the bridge, the back of my neck went rigged with pain, whilst carrying out lookout duties. The pay was crap, 16 pounds at start, and 32 pounds in the final year. The consensus was that we were just cheap labour. If you made a mistake and got fired, no one else would want to employ you in the profession, since you would not get a job reference. My apprenticeship was a total waste of time, and messed up my future, although I couldn't see it at the time. I still suffer from heart palpitations, even though I drink decaffeinated coffee and tea. The first ship I was on carried carcinogenic chemicals. As a result I still fear I will succumb to cancer.

Capitalism tears communities apart, as people chase that rainbow. Under a technocracy, self fulfillment and happiness would be the priorities. The trouble with a failed apprenticeship, is that you don't realise the damage it has done to your life, until many years later. When I did approach a solicitor for compensation, I was told that I had left it too late, and should have done it within 3 years. Later on I omitted my sea going career from my CV, because I found it a distraction. It was irrelevant to the jobs I was applying for, whilst I could sense, 'if he don't want an adventurous life at sea, then he definitely won't want to work for us here' mentality pervading the interview room. In reality we sailed from a remote oil refinery to a single buoyed mooring or platform to load crude oil. There was nowhere to go ashore to. I would have stuck it out for ten years if the pay had been tax free, but there was no company advice. I never received any company publications on remuneration, training, tax, etc. As a result most employees thought the company regarded us as sub-human.

This is my cv, the personal details in italics, would not be made available to an employer. You have to keep it positive. This cv is a failure for the following reasons:

1 It's too complicated. Many young HR (Human Resources) Managers would not understand it in a hurry. And it will be in a hurry when the HR manager forgets to get a job reference before the applicant turns up for the interview, as happened to me at least once. I could hear them talking in the corridor. The HR Manager said the cv was fiction and because of that the interviewing manager refused to see examples of my work and my exam certificates. Few employers check your higher education qualifications.

2 List only companies that you know will provide a job reference, because if you list others then it will be regarded as fiction and end up in the bin. Agencies you have worked for do not provide job references because all they want is for one of their bods to get in there on a contract basis. The company you actually work at on contract will not provide a reference because it has no record of you having worked there, because all the payments go to the agency, or your limited company.

3 Keep company names, addresses and contact details up to date, together with the name of the permanently employed person you were working under. This is essential in order for the HR department to obtain a job reference. Without a job reference you will not get the job, because no one is prepared to stick their neck's out for you, and risk losing their own job.

4 Don't ask questions at an interview. The chances are that the people interviewing you can't answer technical questions, like what do you make, and can I have an employee contract form? You will embarrass them, whilst doing so displays your ignorance. Don't ask about the working hours. You will be expected to work umpteen hours of unpaid overtime, no matter what the law says.

5 If you are asked why you left a company, just say you wanted a change, or wanted to work nearer to home. Never say anything negative about an employer.

6 There will be times when you realise that the interviewer interviewed you simply to give themselves something to do, or they were trying to glean some knowledge from you. Come out of that interview wanting to kill them, and not wanting to commit suicide. Don't let the bastards get you down.

7 Turn up smartly dressed with a recent hair cut. Remove those hairs from nostrils and ears, and trim those eye lashes, whilst covering up those tattoos. If possible bring along examples of your work and your collection of exam certificates. Talk loudly and clearly, because I swear some are as deaf as a post. Always smile, and when leaving do so with a smile and a handshake. Check out well in advance where the place of interview is, and how to get there. Don't be satisfied with a photocopy of a road atlas page. Search for it on Google Earth and see where you are going to park your car, or where the nearest bus or train stop is. Don't turn up inebriated or half comatosed.

8 Whilst at the interview, ask yourself the question, do you really want to work with these people, do you like the working environment, is it easy and cost effective to commute there? What are the toilets like, do they have a canteen, if not, where is the nearest pub / cafe that serves meals, and is there a proper car park? Is the job stressful? I have suffered from stress for decades. I wake up to find myself covered in sweat and my heart pounding away. Don't burn yourself out at work by taking on too many problems, or working too many hours away from your family and friends.

9 Almost all the permanent jobs I've quit are because of poor working conditions resulting in ill health. When you leave always give one months notice, otherwise your employer will not provide a job reference. If you have already received an official warning, your new employer will not receive a job reference, so always ensure that you receive a job offer before you transfer. Never transfer to a smaller or less financially secure company. Never work for a company making a low tech product. The more high tech it is, the greater the profits and hence the more secure your job should be. Check out solvency through company records on the internet. If you do want to enter the world of contracting, or project related employment, remember that you will always need at least one secure company that is going to provide you with a job reference. In some cases this means handing in your notice after you have completed your apprenticeship, and before you end up with an official warning. In this world of hire, fire and forget, that will not be far off. Just tell them that you are relocating to look after mum for instance, because you need a good report in your personnel file.

10 The chances are that you will not hear from the company again unless you receive a job offer. It's always best to phone up the HR (personnel) department. Find out how many applicants there were, what future recruitment there will be, any redundancies planned, etc. This will give you a clearer indication of future employment trends in that profession.

11 Ignore this advice at your peril.

The average HR manager would be unable to get a job reference from any of the companies listed on my cv. However, there is one company that would, and I only found out about it when told by a recruitment agency. That company's name and address is not listed on my cv, because I didn't work at that address. This goes to show just how complicated personnel recruitment is. Getting the right job, or even a job at all, is more by chance than anything else. I interpret this as a national crime. Educating and training someone for ten to twenty years and then abandoning them, amounts to a gross waste of tax payer's money. Criminal waste. It's about time the matter was put right. There is no excuse for HMG's failure to do so.

As for actually starting a career after school, there is one inescapable fact, and that is that most of the professional jobs in the global economy have moved on from the developed world to developing countries, whilst any one person in China reading this will probably say, 'and moved on again'. Apprenticeships in my day were four years long. In the middle ages they were seven years. Today they are a confidence trick by HMG, lasting just months. For advice, go to the youth employment centre, where you will enroll for a national insurance card, or go to a local library or Jobcentre. If you want an apprenticeship then ideally the Jobcentre web site should list job vacancies in graphical format over years, in order to show trend, so that you can then select a profession to study for. The Jobcentre should list addresses for information for each profession, where to study, and list the major employers of that profession. For professionals, if you want an office job you will need IT skills, which you should have no difficulty in getting at evening class, or train yourself. If you are looking for real money then you will have to go self employed, probably writing software programs for smart phones. If you don't have a brilliant mind then try working self employed in waste disposal. I do not recommend working away from home, as you will only lose touch with your friends.

Employment is something that HMG is always concerned about. However there is room for considerable improvement in the system. A few years ago HMG was financing TV advertisements urging UK companies to export. That of course beggars the question, what do we export and to whom? The advertisement did not list a government department, nor any contact information. HMG should be monitoring the economies of all nations, with a view to passing on export opportunities to UK based companies, at least to those that pay a realistic rate of corporation tax. HMG has embassies in just about every country. Their economies should be monitored already, by the foreign office, BIS or MI6. This data should be put on a government website. The database would be accessible to UK based companies via a PIN issued by the Inland Revenue, HMG's tax gathering department.

In a socialist nation the state looks after you from cradle to grave, whilst the individual bemoans the fact that he or she does not have the right to elect a political leader, blaming them for their ill luck. In a democracy, the individual is cast out into the disorganized world after completing their basic education. It is a sad fact that whether you succeed in life is largely due to contacts through your parents and friends, or through shear luck. It would appear that only a world technocracy can put an end to this madness.

Ideas 4...Employment, Getting A Job -
So you want to employ someone.

In October 2020 the fashion store chain H&M were fined 32.1 million pounds in Germany for keeping family, religion and sickness records of their employees, in contravention of the EU GDPR (European Union's General Data Protection Regulations). And what are they I thought. This regulation refers to data protection and privacy, which is enshrined in the 1950 European Convention on Human Rights, so I don't suppose there will be any of this once we're out of the EU at the end of 2020. It became compliant in 2018. A company can only collect data that it tells the subject it needs, and for only as long as it needs it. Names, email addresses, location, ethnicity, gender, biometrics, religious beliefs, web cookies, and political opinions are all personal data. The data must be encrypted. The data centre has to comply with seven protection and accountability principles. The company must be GDPR compliant, including the appointment of a data protection officer. I'm not sure what this regulation is trying to achieve. It won't stop employers treating employees like dirt. Refusing to give them adequate training, supervision, decent working environment, up to date tools, realistic salary, job security and a job reference, etc. It won't stop jobs being contracted out, nor the proliferation of spiv employment agencies handling black lists of workers. All of these are more important than privacy. This is why we are pulling out of the EU, because it's nothing more than an expensive gentleman's club just as remote from reality as that bunch in the pleasure Palace of Westminster.

Now that the UK is out of the EU there is a dire shortage of about one million workers. Where have all the workers gone, UK management is saying? Well, for a start off, many people have simply retired to that place in the sun, whilst many young people have accepted their inheritance and decided that they will never become a slave like their parents. HMG is learning the hard way that without extensive employment laws, you are not going to get people into worthwhile employment.

What was acceptable to employees a few decades ago, isn't any longer. This is what it takes to recruit someone to work for you now and in the not too distant future. Please note that a technocracy would support a command economy and full employment, instead of a welfare benefit system. Employment would be promoted to maintain health and reduce crime, not as a means to generate wealth. If the global economy was left to the latter, then all manufacturing, in a world of AI, would be take place in a low tax and low energy cost nation, to the detriment of every other country.

Looking at this list an employer is likely to throw away any thought of being benevolent. This is the age of fierce competition, 5% profit margin if you're lucky, unpredictable high interest rates and purchase trends, and the constant risk of having your company black listed. You look at all these requirements and you just know that they would all vanish if you employed automation, AI and contracted out everything, running the risk that your companies knowledge base would whither away, leaving the company no future. The alternative is to increase your profit margin by acquiring a monopoly, or invest in high tech products and services.

A glowing example of democracy not working is this. Many politicians become politicians because they can't get a job in anything else, due mainly to the UK's failed recruitment system. And yet none of them has gone to the trouble of fixing the situation once they are in parliament. To fix this problem in the way described on this website, would boost the economy hugely, and yet apathy rules. At a time when the nation is effectively bankrupt, this situation beggars belief, doesn't it? Democracy is a fraud.

With the introduction of AI and androids, job vacancies will be very few in future. Courses reserved for people, as opposed to androids, are as follows: politicians and advisers, members of the legal profession, surgeons, consultants, CEO, entertainers (actors, musicians, circus, ballet, opera & pop singers, motor sports, football, chess, golf, tennis, etc.) Vacancies in the holiday, retirement and mental illness sectors are likely to remain high for the foreseeable future. Artificial Intelligence and bio-engineering research are likely to be high employment areas for some time. Disaster relief, caused by AI managed projects going awry, due to lack of supervision and government standards, could well turn out to be the boom industry of the twenty-first century. As IT becomes more advanced and people's attitudes change, IT will take over even these jobs. You may therefore decide to become a technocrat. I searched the internet for a higher education course employing Microsoft's Bing AI Chat to the problem.

Question: Find university course for government administrators that includes politics, law, technology, IT, command economy through AI & intel, research, business creation, languages.

The result was: One such course is the MSc Government, Policy and Politics offered by Birkbeck University of London. Another option is the online short courses in public policy and government offered by the Blavatnik School of Government at Oxford University. You can create your own course by selecting modules listed on the Open University website. See the Uni Guide and Open university for more details.

Because of government mismanagement, many people have decided to retire early and buy that place in the sun with their inheritance. And with much of the UK economy now illegal, with the Bank of England not knowing how at least a third of our cash is being used, that place in the Sun abroad, served by a foreign currency, looks a far safer bet. What employers fail to realise is that whilst their working conditions may have been acceptable to a workforce twenty years ago, attitudes change. Attitudes will change amongst the electorate also, from democracy to technocracy. What we need is a technocracy within every organisation, not just government. Global Britannia to Great Britain to Gone Bust is fifty years! That situation would not be irreversible if we had a technocracy.

This brings us to the subject of slavery. In August 2023 the United Nation's Judge Patrick Robinson, stated that HMG owed at least £18.8 trillion in reparations to 14 countries, with which it had engaged in the cross-Atlantic slave trade. Clearly this amount will never be paid, if only for the reason that we are bankrupt. There is of course an even more obvious reason, and that is that just about every country was involved in the slave trade at some point in their history. Take the UK for instance. Should the British ask for reparations from the French for sending us the Normans, former Vikings. Should we take a similar stance towards the Italians for sending us the Romans. They exterminated the builders of Stonehenge, the druids, the priests of the Celts. More recently, should I demand compensation for the poor training and abuse during my apprenticeship, plus loss of employment due to PM Margaret Thatcher telling industry to relocate to eastern Europe and the far east, and from HMG for failing to create social rules for people like in-laws to comply with, plus its failure to create a modern personnel recruitment system? Is waiting for the telephone to ring from an employment agency, 75% of the time, slavery? Is a companies refusal to supply a job reference, including weekly work record, an act of slavery? In August 2023 the High Pay Centre announced that CEO's in UK companies were being paid on average £3.91 million in 2022 and £3.38 million in 2021. That's 118 times the average pay for workers in the UK, which stood at £33,000. Is that slavery? We live in a far from perfect world, which can only be made better through the establishment of a world technocracy. In August 2023 Nadine Dorries MP called parliament a zombie, in her resignation speech. Such a description is pretty accurate considering MPs are cocooned from seeing the big picture, being told to concentrate only on problems in their constituency. I would describe HMG as a walking disaster area, dragging the nation along the ground, to its next fix from the Bank of England.

Many unemployed are highly desperate illegal migrants from Africa and the middle east. HMG and the EU have made it very clear that you are not welcome. There is however a solution to your problem which for some reason HMG has ignored. The Forbes publication lists four countries in the Americas that would probably welcome you without a background check, because of their low European numbers compared to their indigenous Indian population. Those four countries are Mexico, Chile, Colombia and Peru. There is also Abruzzo in Italy. Bing AI lists Panama, Belize, Nicaragua, Paraguay and Dominican Republic.

In large companies that receive maybe one million applicants per annum, cv's are checked by software programs including AI. You may therefore like to have your cv checked by AI before you distribute it, or even get AI to write it out from scratch. Just make sure it's full of those key words that the program is looking for and counting. There will come a day when job interviews are conducted via Skype or Zoom. In which case you may prefer to present to the interviewer, your virtual self. The AI interviewer may prefer it.

In March 2024 the BBC, under Freedom of Information, received data from the Student Loans Company, that revealed that the largest student debt was £231,000, the largest repayment was £110,000, whilst the largest accumulated interest was £55,000. Any outstanding debts are cancelled after 30 years. However, with no government body telling prospective students what course to go on, based upon the nation's economic need plus the capability of the student, it's hard to see how this system can be justified, since it means that with ever growing automation, graduates will be lumbered with debt most of their lives. A permanent indicator of failure. It will encourage many to go abroad, or be permanently welfare dependant.

Whether politicians like it or not, as time progresses people will live off grid, because the standard model of living has failed. Capitalism, the global economy and multi-party democracy will fade into history, as technology provides people with the independence they deserve. It may take hundreds of years for a world technocracy to be created, but I am certain it will happen.