Good idea or not?

[anotheoldgit]

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-116940 9/Browns-pledge-make-19-year-old-50-hours-volu ntary-work.html

The Prime Minister said a pledge to introduce compulsory community service would be included in Labour's next general election manifesto.

And we all know what happens to Labour's manifesto pledges, once they get in power?

[Joy11]

Great idea if it comes to fruition, but it won't I fear, if we were given everything promised to us by the main parties when they trawl out their manifestos, we would be very happy people....

[BilluSugger]

Bring back National Service

[gelda]

50 hours by the time they are 19 ! don't make me laugh, they could take more than 3 years to do that, I say stop benefits if they refuse to take jobs that are offered them.

[New Judge]

Wonderful idea! And salmon live in trees and eat pencils for their lunch.

Bear in mind that this government (and many of its predecessors of both persuasions) has been unable to get large numbers of people to do any useful work at all even for payment. Furthermore, many young people cannot be persuaded to attend school until they reach 16 (soon to be 18) as the law requires.

There is ample opportunity for young people who want to undertake work in the community to do so. Many of them do, most of them don�t.

The idea that all under nineteen year olds will suddenly take to the idea of working for nothing doing things in which they have no interest is somewhat optimistic. The notion that benefit payments will be stopped for those that fail to comply is equally far fetched.

The cost of administering (and enforcing) all this? Unknown, but likely to be squillions of pounds. The benefits of forcing people to do things they don�t want to do (and presumably penalising them if they don�t)? Also unknown (but likely to be closely adjacent to nil).

Sure sign an election is due next year.

[rov1200]

It would be a good idea if taken up. But if the 50 hours are to be spread in a peacemeal fashion over some years it would be an administative nightmare. If the 50 hours are to done in two consecutive weeks it would make more sense. Also there should be no opt outs for either work or training placements except for signing on to the military services. The supervision would be tremendous so they should be attached to existing bodies that carry out some form of service to the public. Nobody works for nothing so they should be paid the minimum wage for the 2 weeks.
Also it should be implemented well before the next election otherwise these pledges turn out to be just spin.

[Lonnie]

Its a good idea, but in this era of Human Rights, not enforcable.

[Grizelda43]

It would be a good idea, but like everything else this government comes up with, not enforceable. I believe that the words used were "compulsory and volunteer". This in itself is an oxymoron, with the emphasis on "moron"