Guest Blog from a UK jobseeker

I’m an unemployed under-25. Being jobless, skint and living away from my parents’ home, I’m currently on Jobseeker’s Allowance (one reason for writing this as a guest blog rather than on my own blog is that many of my family members would disapprove of my being on benefits). Under new regulations, every so often I have to attend ‘Helping you into Work’ sessions run by the jobcentre (I personally don’t find the ones I’ve attended helpful), or risk losing my benefits. Last week I went to one for under-25s run by the Prince’s Trust, telling us about a 12-week programme ending in a work experience placement. “We’ll put you with companies where you’re likely to get a job at the end,” the person giving the talk explained, “because we don’t want you going back to your Xboxes afterwards.” Well, that woke me up. I was stunned, then the hurt and anger kicked in. One of the reasons that I don’t like to admit that I’m on Jobseekers is because there’s still the image of the feckless youth, spending the dole money on cigarettes and booze, lazing about playing on their consoles instead of trying to get a job. Sure, some people do, and unfortunately they’re the ones we hear about. Most others like myself are taking up training courses and building up our CVs as best we can, applying for jobs, attending interviews and getting nowhere. Applying for jobs is time-consuming and stressful, it’s demotivating and I often feel that it’s for nothing. Reading up on interview skills, attending workshops, practising at the university careers’ centre, and still not getting past the interview stage is demoralising. It’s a tough economy, a lot of young people are struggling to get their foot on the career ladder at the moment. To then be reminded of the image of us as freeloaders sitting about all day and somehow able to afford games consoles is extremely hurtful when things are already tough. I consider myself one of the luckier ones in that I don’t have dependents and that bills, food and travel costs aren’t that high in my current situation; throwaway comments on jobless youth are more hurtful for people who’re struggling to make ends meet. Joblessness gets me down a lot – at one point my parents were so worried about my mental health that they considered sending me to volunteer near my mum’s family for a few months so that I’d at least feel useful – so comments like the above makes it sound like I’m doing nothing. And that’s not true of most under-25s. At the end of the session I told the person giving the talk that I’d found her comment hurtful, and could she please not say that in future talks. She said that she just meant it as a joke, at that point I was too angry to properly speak and left it as “I can’t afford an Xbox.” She may have apologised, I can’t remember, but I’d like to think that she realised how it came across and doesn’t make that throwaway comment to others.