It’s the 25th of November 2015 and I’m 50 years old, I’m really happy living in Weymouth with my wonderful wife, Mary, and we enjoy a quality of life that is extremely high compared with most people in the UK and, by default, most people in the world. We are priviledged to have been born and brought up well in the UK, educated to some extent and kicked out into the world with a reasonable understanding of the value of money.
As I sit here typing away, our 19 year old son is in bed upstairs and will probably not venture out of bed for another 4 hours, gone midday. He’s unemployed and broke, no money in his bank account and no forseeable income stream about to appear in the near future. He was employed during the summer as a Lifeguard in a local holiday park and they are likely to re-employ him in April next year. In my view he needs a job to see him through the winter months, he needs money and he’s not going to get any more from Mary nor I, he’s 19 now and so, a man, he needs to look after himself and be in command of his own future.
If that sounds a bit tough you should also know that in the last few weeks since his Lifeguard job finished due to end of season in this area, he’s turned down a job that was offered to him by Sainsbury’s, we asked a friend who works there to give him some coaching before his application to stand him in good stead which they kindly did in their own time, imagine our embarrassment when, having passed the online test and the interview, he’s offered a job and turns it down, we then have to admit that to our good friend who probably thinks “I wont bother offering my help to them again!”.
On top of that, another friend made us aware of a Flooring Apprenticeship that has just become available, when we talk to our son he tells us that he wants an apprenticeship but not as a flooring fitter.
With prior knowledge of all the above, how do you think we felt when a phone call comes in whilst we were in bed last night, from our son who went out with his friends, telling us that he cannot get anything from an ATM, his bank telling him he has no money left. Our patience is running out.
In his defence he’s been through a schooling system that failed him miserably, he has learning difficulties, his reading and writing age is well below school leaving age and yet the school continued to put him through an academic program that he was completely unsuited to. He needs a skill in my view, the school should have seen that a mile off, everyone who met him during his childhood agreed with those sentiments and yet the paid professionals of the educational system continued to put him in academic classes. If he’d started learning practical trades at 13, by the time he was leaving school at 16/17 he’d have been employable, useful to society and capable of earning himself a living wage.
As it stands, he’s got virtually no recognisable qualifications, except for the RNLI Lifeguard certificate, and we have got to the point where, to stop Mary & I from arguing amongst ourselves on the only subject we ever get mad about, our son, Mary is going to take him down to the local Job Centre and sign him on to JobSeekers Allowance. I’m against this from a moral point of view, never having taken a penny from the state, only paid into the pot…..lots! I’m of the opinion that once he realises he can get money whilst unemployed, something that he’s blissfully unaware of at the moment, he’ll make a career move in that direction and stay in bed like all the other lazy layabouts on the benefit system, it’s a system that does little to encourage people into work, you tick boxes that say you’re looking for work and they pay you!
Enough ranting for the time being, watch this space, if he gets a job before April I’ll be amazed. There we go.