OUR SAY: The truth about 'dole bludgers'

Is docking welfare payments for missed job interviews fair?

No Caption. Picture: Contributed

THE term 'dole bludger' is so insensitive and offensive that I hope I never hear it again, and the sooner this broken system is overhauled the better.

I will admit there are people who game the system to their advantage, and that isn't fair. There's also a lot of other people who game the system in all sorts of other welfare payments, but they don't seem to receive the same amount of scrutiny or disparagement.

I was on Newstart for three months after graduating university, and I was on the carousel of needless appointments with a job agency, unnecessary job applications to meet a quota, as well as working the job I had through most of my time at uni.

At those appointments I saw a lot of people I wouldn't dream of calling bludgers. I saw people who had worked their entire lives only to be made redundant by cost-cutting measures in tears, working on a resume only to find their skills are useless in an evolving world. Is that something a bludger would do?

I applied for hundreds of jobs I had no intention of ever doing, just to meet requirements, but then if I got a call back or got hired, I'd have no choice but to take it. What good would a trained journalist be as a labourer?

I also had a payment suspended because I couldn't make an appointment because I was working. I was punished for doing the right thing.

Go to any job agency appointment and meet Newstart recipients, and I guarantee you won't find bludgers.

Originally published as OUR SAY: The truth about 'dole bludgers'