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Four TDs going to see what it's like to live on the dole for a week.

2

Comments

  • #32
    Kamik
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 106 ✭✭Kamik


    PLEASE lets be honest about it!
    As part of a new documentary series for TV3, four TDs will be saying goodbye to their salaries and cutting up the credit cards.

    THAT will NOT happen!
    Their salaries will still be paid into their bank account as normal (just not withdrawn) and while they MAY not be allowed to use their credit cards for a miserable week they will still own one!

    Damn! even in a fun game politicians still can not be honest!
    Pull the wool over your eyes but you can still smell the stench of inaccuracy!


  • #33
    Dartz
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,458 ✭✭✭Dartz


    If they wanted to **** with them, on the final day, the present will come up to them and calmly say that they will not be allowed to return to work, and will spend another 'week' on the show.

    And a week after that.

    Y'know, just to add a little uncertaintly to everything. Maybe even ask them to actually apply for a job or two.


  • #34
    Hotfail.com
    Closed Accounts Posts: 2,928 ✭✭✭Hotfail.com


    Kamik wrote: »
    PLEASE lets be honest about it!


    THAT will NOT happen!
    Their salaries will still be paid into their bank account as normal (just not withdrawn) and while they MAY not be allowed to use their credit cards for a miserable week they will still own one!

    Damn! even in a fun game politicians still can not be honest!
    Pull the wool over your eyes but you can still smell the stench of inaccuracy!

    It's a load of shíte, I think everyone can see that.


  • #35
    kowloon
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2, Paid Member Posts: 14,189 ✭✭✭✭kowloon


    Ayleen Green Stirrup wrote: »
    The premise reminds me of a wonderful piece of investigative journalism I read some years back.

    Just the thing I was thinking of. You could live well on welfare if all of the longer term expenses are out of the picture. That's before any of the effects of knowing there's a light at the end of the tunnel are accounted for.


  • #36
    osarusan
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 17,059 ✭✭✭✭osarusan


    Stupid pointless publicity stunt.

    A week isn't long enough to see how costs needs to be covered over longer periods of time.

    anyway, no matter how long the experiment lasts, they won't experience the feeling of not knowing when/if you're going to get a job. That uncertainty and fear was, for me at least, the worst thing about being on the dole.


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  • #37
    Tordelback
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 677 ✭✭✭Tordelback


    All this will do is reinforce the idea that the dole is plenty to live on for a week: which it is. What is difficult is to live on it for a year, or two, or more - unable to replace things that wear out, unable to save, unable to pay for sports clubs or gyms, unable to plan, unable to participate in the world you used to belong to, unable to imagine a future that is anything but worse than the present as everything slowly falls apart, all the while getting used to the way that people now see you, especially those that are supposed to be helping you: just one more lazy fecking parasite. That's what's hard about being unemployed. Not having to shop in Lidl and forego an early-morning round at Druid's Glen.


  • #38
    In Lonesome Dove
    Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 479 ✭✭In Lonesome Dove


    I think this is admirable but one week is absolutely nothing to experience what it's really like. Bills such as esb, gas, oil, home heating such as coal and briquettes, rubbish removal - well they all add up over time and a week on dole isn't reflective of what's it's really like. Not to mention if an appliance breaks, it often remains broken. A week doesn't take into account if an unexpected event such as a family funeral comes along.

    All that will happen here is these TDs will come out saying - life on the dole is a walk in the park and it will be used as an excuse come budget time to cut the dole.


  • #39
    conorhal
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 7,097 ✭✭✭conorhal


    LostBoy101 wrote: »
    Journal reporting this laughable piece of journalism.




    http://www.thejournal.ie/tds-social-welfare-tv3-1640775-Aug2014/


    I think a week on the dole is not going to help evaluate the full picture as they are not taking into account the ESB, Heating, Property Tax and Water Tax bills. Another PR stunt in my opinion.


    Just give the electorate another 18 months and we'll do our best to see that as many members of this current government as possible get to enjoy a more extended experience of the dole queue........


  • #40
    Riverireland
    Closed Accounts Posts: 833 ✭✭✭Riverireland


    Last_Minute wrote: »
    It's a lot different when you know after a week you're going home to a lovely mansion in a nice part of town. The thing about the dole is that if you are long term unemployed then you have very little to look forward to.

    True, they would need to do it for at least a year to get an understanding of it.


  • #41
    Boskowski
    Closed Accounts Posts: 5,360 ✭✭✭Boskowski


    Autonomous wrote: »
    It should be a least a month, with these to pay....ESB, LPT, TV license, water charges, school books, car tax, a hospital visit and medication to buy too.

    Is that because someone on the dole has to pay all of that every month?


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  • #42
    Spring Onion
    Closed Accounts Posts: 1,087 ✭✭✭Spring Onion


    This is such an assholish idea, they should be ashamed. Patronising idiots.


  • #43
    Berserker
    Closed Accounts Posts: 9,043 ✭✭✭Berserker


    Publicity stunt supreme. Classic TV3 stuff. It's on a par with that awful SF documentary talking to Mary-Lou doing her weekly shopping in Superquinn.

    I guess it'll be four newbies pretending to be in touch with the common man and women. They better schedule a manicure for the day after it finishes because their hands and nails will be destroyed after a full week of playing the PS4 and/or Xbox.


  • #44
    Mr Freeze
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 6,618 ✭✭✭Mr Freeze


    As part of a new documentary series for TV3,

    Stopped reading there.


  • #45
    whiskeyman
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 12,564 ✭✭✭✭whiskeyman


    I bet they'll still claim expenses travelling to their new abodes of the less well off...


  • #46
    Ush1
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 11,484 ✭✭✭✭Ush1


    Autonomous wrote: »
    It should be a least a month, with these to pay....ESB, LPT, TV license, water charges, school books, car tax, a hospital visit and medication to buy too.

    Umm, isn't quite a lot of what you've listed subsidised if you're social welfare?


  • #47
    smellmepower
    Closed Accounts Posts: 829 ✭✭✭smellmepower


    Will they face the embarrassment of having queue up in the post office for their weekly handout?will they have to deal with the incompetent condescending twats in FAS (or whatever its been re-branded to) trying to force them on to useless courses just to cover their own well paid backsides?when they meet people they sort of know in the street,will they make up a story about what they've been up to lately because they're too ashamed to admit they're signing on?

    Nah,it'll be like that secret millionaire show,only they won't be giving out any money at the end,they'll be fecking off back to their luxurious homes and well paid,secure jobs whilst disdainfully claiming that living off SW isn't hard at all and sure people just need to look harder for liveable wage jobs that aren't there.


  • #48
    smellmepower
    Closed Accounts Posts: 829 ✭✭✭smellmepower


    Ush1 wrote: »
    Umm, isn't quite a lot of what you've listed subsidised if you're social welfare?

    Hospital visit and medication IF you qualify for a medical card.

    Back to school clothing and footwear allowance wouldn't come near cost of covering book costs,especially for a secondary school student.

    No discount for household utilities or water/LPT/waste.


  • #49
    ShagNastii
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 5,737 ✭✭✭ShagNastii


    I know it gets jumped on by most here but I’d love to have one or two of the TDs placed with one or two of the many scroungers we all know. The people who see the dole as a wage and not a helping hand whilst you are between jobs. When I graduated college I took part-time job in the bar I worked in to get myself through college until I broke by balls to get out of there and get into the good position I’m in now.

    It used to break my heart when day in day out you would have to listen to the EVERYDAY crowd talk crap about the economy and “that shower on the take up in Leinster house”. Between drinking, smoking and betting I hadn’t a clue (and still don’t know) how they afforded it. None working and I’d be 99% sure none of them know what a CV is or pursued gainful employee during my few months there.

    Nil chance of that happening though. It will be some 30-something couples up to their tits in negative equity he used to be a builder, she’ll be a squeezed to the hilt nurse. TV3 will love the taste of their martyrdom.


  • #50
    Timberrrrrrrr
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 26,295 ✭✭✭✭Timberrrrrrrr


    If they are doing this then it should be for at least 3 months, If they were serious about "getting a feel" fr life on the dole then a week is nowhere near enough time to understand the hardships people have to go through.


  • #51
    sunbeam
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,830 ✭✭✭sunbeam


    Dartz wrote: »
    If they wanted to **** with them, on the final day, the present will come up to them and calmly say that they will not be allowed to return to work, and will spend another 'week' on the show.

    And a week after that.

    Y'know, just to add a little uncertaintly to everything. Maybe even ask them to actually apply for a job or two.

    I used to fantasise about that when I was a carer. Stick them on 'I'm A Carer-Get Me Out of Here' to experience the reality of a week of 24/7 caring for a severely incapacitated person on a meagre carers allowance with zero help, then calmly inform them that like most carers they wouldn't just get to walk away whenever they pleased. Of course nobody would subject their loved ones to being 'cared' for by a TD, so it probably wouldn't work.


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  • #52
    Dave_The_Sheep
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 7,917 ✭✭✭Dave_The_Sheep


    Who cares about this publicity stunt? Don't pay attention to this ****e.


  • #53
    Berserker
    Closed Accounts Posts: 9,043 ✭✭✭Berserker


    Dave_The_Sheep wrote: »
    Who cares about this publicity stunt? Don't pay attention to this ****e.

    Sadly people will. It's up there with the average industrial wage nonsense. As I said before, if a successful business person or top class academic was up against the winner of Ireland's biggest <Whatever>, you and I both know that the "celebrity" would win. This kind of nonsense works.


  • #54
    Valetta
    Closed Accounts Posts: 2,611 ✭✭✭Valetta


    Timberrrrrrrr wrote: »
    If they are doing this then it should be for at least 3 months, If they were serious about "getting a feel" fr life on the dole then a week is nowhere near enough time to understand the hardships people have to go through.

    I find it quite insulting that people assume TDs, or anyone who is well off cannot understand the hardship involved.

    It's an easy swipe to take, but it is not necessary for someone to "live the life" to understand what it is like.


  • #55
    MJ23
    Closed Accounts Posts: 3,039 ✭✭✭MJ23


    Walk around town for the day, go to the bookies, go to the chipper, go for a few pints.
    Repeat, as above, every day for the rest of your life.
    Never stray further than half a mile away from home.


  • #56
    Dave_The_Sheep
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 7,917 ✭✭✭Dave_The_Sheep


    Berserker wrote: »
    Sadly people will. It's up there with the average industrial wage nonsense. As I said before, if a successful business person or top class academic was up against the winner of Ireland's biggest <Whatever>, you and I both know that the "celebrity" would win. This kind of nonsense works.

    Sadly, this is true.


  • #57
    I Heart Internet
    Closed Accounts Posts: 4,678 ✭✭✭I Heart Internet


    This won't work as well as the UK version as SW levels in Ireland are significantly higher.

    You wouldn't be able to tell the difference in living standards between a family "living on benefits" and a family on a low-middle income from employment.

    Only the tracksuits and late morning naps would give it away.


  • #58
    Dave_The_Sheep
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 7,917 ✭✭✭Dave_The_Sheep


    Valetta wrote: »
    It's an easy swipe to take, but it is not necessary for someone to "live the life" to understand what it is like.

    Which would be fine if they were a "man for the people" instead of a "man of the people" as the Gladiator quote goes. However, TDs seem to simply be a "man taking the people for a ride".


  • #59
    Timberrrrrrrr
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 26,295 ✭✭✭✭Timberrrrrrrr


    MJ23 wrote: »
    Walk around town for the day, go to the bookies, go to the chipper, go for a few pints.
    Repeat, as above, every day for the rest of your life.
    Never stray further than half a mile away from home.

    You think this accurately describes unemployed people?


  • #60
    Berserker
    Closed Accounts Posts: 9,043 ✭✭✭Berserker


    MJ23 wrote: »
    Walk around town for the day, go to the bookies, go to the chipper, go for a few pints.
    Repeat, as above, every day for the rest of your life.
    Never stray further than half a mile away from home.

    Now, now, don't forget the summer holiday to Magorka, most of which is spent in the Irish bar.
    Timberrrrrrrr wrote: »
    You think this accurately describes unemployed people?

    For the purpose of this forum, yes.


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  • #61
    Tordelback
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 677 ✭✭✭Tordelback


    That particular 'scratcher' strawman is demonstrably nonsense - the historic long-term unemployment rate over the past few decades is about 3-4% here, and currently running at around 7% - against the 12.5% overall unemployment rate. So at worst you're talking about less than a third of people on the dole being habitual social welfare recipients (of which a proportion will be deserving by any metric), with only about half of all recipients out of work for more than a year. Characterising dole claimants as low-aiming lotus-eaters is statistical b*ll*cks.


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