Be Excellent To Each Other

I assume most people have seen the Tesco news? Private company using MWA directives to get free labour?

What do we think? Personally I think it's pretty disgusting to be honest. I'm all for long-term JSA claimants doing some community volunteer work, but a private company wanting them to do a proper job for free? If they need the job doing then pay at least minimum wage for it. Is it a governmental problem that they allow private companies to do this (and Tesco are not the only ones) certainly, but companies don't have to take them up on the offer.

It seems to me that it completely undermines the idea of private industry getting us out of a situation of recession and high unemployment. If you offer private companies the ability to take on JSA workers without paying them, what incentive is there for Tesco et al to actually create real paying jobs, especially at the 'shelf-stacking' level?

haven't really seen this, but I guess it depends on the job, if it is a menial task which the doing of adds no value to the JSA's CV, then Tesco should pay them, if they are getting valuable job experience they couldn't get else where which helps them progress on the career ladder then .... maybe. didn't Malia do something no to dissimilar to case b?

Yeah, if they were doing a genuine work-shadowing, mentoring apprenticeship type thing that would be fine, and I'd think it would be good for the Government to subsidise their wages and costs in the case. If they're going to have to do low skilled work to keep their benefits, why not get people doing some sort of "Public Good" tasks, of which I'm sure there are loads kicking about.

The job in question was a night shift stacking shelves.

You mean the sort of stuff community payback criminals do?

Aye, it is pretty shitty in my opinion, people are told they have to go out and work and get off the JSA, that's fine with me. Then giving privetprivate company's like Tesco the right to have them work unskilled jobs for JSA plus expenses is just wrong, even if it does guarantee a interview to the poor sod eventually.

The Job advert in question.



Tesco have since come out and said that the advert was an IT error, and that the position was not permanent but offered three night shifts of "valuable work experience" in exchange for Job Seeker's Allowance, with a guaranteed interview at the end. The advert is still live on the Job Centre Plus sight though

Probably just hedging their bets.

Dunno really - that's possible, I guess, but I doubt it's ideal ( although I think I'd choose painting railings over a night shift stacking shelves in Tesco, all else being equal ). It's be great if they could actually give people "workfare" roles that are both useful AND related to the sort of jobs people are looking for, but even if there isn't, I don't see why the Government's subsidising Tesco with free labour, with seemingly nothing back.

lol oops, obviously meant private

I even let the 'company's' bit go. That's just how I roll these days. Chilled.

Private privet company?

Getting back on topic, oh look, public subsidy of the private sector. Again.

No, didn't.

EDIT: I think you're talking about this: Between finishing the LPC and beginning work at the VCs, I was unemployed and claiming JSA. I wrote to all the law firms in the local area, asking for work experience. Two replied, and I began with one of them. I told the DWP that I was doing WE, and they then stopped paying me any money. So I had big arguments with them, and it only became resolved when it turned out that they wrote down I was being a "Research Assistant" (my previous job from 3 years prior) and said it was a job, when it wasn't. Dealing with the DWP was ridiculous as the people behind the counter don't make the decisions, the people in Surrey, I think it is, do. And they thought I was an RA for a law firm. After months of going in each fortnight and going through their "work experience/volunteering criteria" the lady (who was thoroughly sick and tired of having the same chat) gave me a direct line to the arbiters, and I called them up and it was resolved.

Sorry, I meant that I thought you had done unpaid (by the private company) work to gain work experience because it was relevant to the work you were looking for.

I get confused as to what I've done.

The 4 main Supermarkets are the biggest UK employer after the NHS is the UK.

They are also the only people bringing any sort of good news to the gloomy employment figures.

So I guess they are taking the piss as a result. Notice that already I had to search for this on the BBC site, it soon slipped of the front page.

All the Supermarkets take the piss, almost all of the buy one get one free are subsidised by the suppliers and cost them nothing. They continue to do bulk offers that are more expensive than buying less of the same thing in many cases.

Offers are confusing and you need to be sharp at mental arithmetic to get the best deal, they will do 3 for £10 on say mince with each pack weighing 479g so it’s a bit harder to work out the KG price, often the price per KG displayed will be worked out on buying one pack of the 3 for £10 offer which individually cost more each if bought on their own.

Then there will be a pack with a weight of say 567g for £2.63 or similar so another pain in the arse bit of working out to do. All designed to make you buy what they want you to buy and confuse the average shopper. In the end most people go for the deal which is what they want.

Also what’s with those bullshit wine deals? Wine that “was” £10 now £3.99, generally a bottle of 2012 French or Italian piss, that you costs maybe £3 a bottle to the man in the street. The Supermarkets probably pay £1 buying in bulk.

Where was it ever sold for £10 a bottle?

Finally why are most of the offers on shit that is bad for you like crisps, processed food and ice-cream. Why can’t they sell fruit and veg and fresh food in the same way

You think that's bad, here pretty much all young people have done one or many praktik placements for 2 weeks or so just got get work experience, and a lot of the time without any real chance of getting a job at the end of. Basically they work for nothing, get their £300 a month from the Swedish JSA and companies get paid to take these people on to do all the menial tasks noone else wants to do.

Like school-kids doing work experience here?

Yes, but you get people in their 30s and stuff doing them too, as well as people who've recently finished school. It's basically a way to get free labour and it works as there aren't many jobs for young inexperienced people. Probably why so many people here go to Uni.

They're hardly offering full-time roles in the main though, are they?

Tesco in particular have gouged away at average hours per employee for years, but as long as they ive 16 per person per week that's not 'unemployment'. Well I couldn't live on 16 hour's Tesco wages a week, wouldn't cover the cost of my food, bills and medication.

This is all since they took away shopworker's right t Sunday off as well, some years ago.

It's good to criticise or boycott Tesco, particularly because they're not even a very good supermarket, but the people going on like this is the point at which they've started treating people like shit make me laugh. If workfare gave shelf stacking opportunities to those for whom a trial run at shelf stacking would be an opportunity above what they'd usually get or ever have had, then fair enough, for a fortnight. Eight weeks to someone who has worked jobs way beyond that in their lives already is a dereliction of common decency that renders the parties concerned completely fair game for any sort of disrespect at all.

Tesco is an empire. What do empires do? Expand until they are overstretched, then collapse. I can't fucking wait.

I really picked the wrong day to upload a video to YouTube criticising the quality of one of Tesco's products.

I use Tesco, it’s the closest one to me, and it’s open 24\7 most of the time as well. I have no supermarket loyalty at all other than the one that’s quickest to get to.

I only buy limited fruit and veg from them, dairy stuff and odds and sods. When I do the weekly shop it’s usually around £40 and there is generally a beer or two with that.

I’m interested in what I eat and like quality food, and most importantly I’m lucky enough to be able to afford it. I get meat from a local butcher and also from a butcher in the North near my parents. Fish is ordered online and is always packed same day it’s landed. All of this is frozen by me and then used as and when.

Fruit and veg I but in bulk where practical (oranges etc) from the market, a bit cheaper and often better.

Even things like shampoo I buy from £1 shops 10-15 bottles at a time, it’s all branded stuff and a fraction of the supermarket price.

Anything that is used daily (bog roll, washing up liquid) I buy in bulk from Cost CO as I hate running out of things like this. Also things like cling film and tin foil are hugely better quality and come in catering sizes.

Problem is the big Tesco’s have everything under one roof along with club card points and “bargains” so for most people shopping around to save money or improve quality is a none starter

Tesco sell me cheap stuff. I like them.

And the clubcard vouchers are then used to buy booze and fun stuff for party good times. It's a pleasant little extra at the end of the year.

So far they've got us a Longines watch for Mrs P and the current lot are going towards a first class flight to San Francisco. It is fun to play the system a bit.

I get all my fuel from Tesco. We get £50 a quarter in vouchers.

I used to get all my fuel from tesco and do the voucher thing, but i've just switched to a santander card that does 3% cashback on fuel (up to £300 a month of fuel), 2% on supermarkets and 1% on department stores. Which seems pretty nifty.

I've said to the Mrs that we should switch over to that one.

Plus if you apply through compare the market you get a free meerkat toy!

Can't stand the overused little twat.

Too easy.

Go to Pontypool, where the Tesco sits literally on top of the rest of the town sucking the life force out of it like some manga behemoth. That town centre is literally completely dead, save for a Peacocks and a Boots, but that's cause the Tesco hasn't got a clothes or Pharmacy department.

Trufax! 70p in the pound spent at Tesco goes out of the local area, whilst 70p in the pound spent at a small business remains in the local area.

In said small business owner's pocket, no doubt.

Is that difficults?

No, it's pretty easy.

Done similar in Stockport. Where, it only exists thanks to John Prescott turning down an Ikea there (it ended up in Ashton). Oh and they "accidentally" built it too big which seems to happen quite a bit. However, the Council cottoned on and there is a weird dogleg at one end of the store where an extra aisle has been permanently walled off.

I sympathise quite a bit with small businesses losing trade to supermarkets, but it doesn't change the fact that it's generally a lot more convenient to shop for many things at a supermarket. I'm not really sure what you could do about that.

If councils had any sense whatsoever they'd have a policy of cutting rents for small retailers to 1/5th of what they are now - because a string of Greggs, Poundlands, and charity shops doesn't make for a thriving city centre.

If councils had any sense, they wouldn't let the big supermarkets set up so close and then hike up the town centre car parking charges so that it makes sense to drive to them. I mean, Stockport has a Sainsburys and an Asda right on top of the town centre anyway - putting Tesco nearby was practically suicide.

Councils are bent though, aren't they?

Lower rates on the high street for indies, raise them for bookies and charity shops which are destroying high streets.

I'd like to run a book shop on my local shopping street but with an Oxfam down the way with free stock, free staff, cheap rates and so on I'll never get off the ground.

http://www.salisburyjournal.co.uk/news/ ... bookshop_/

Spluttet! I assume you're familiarity with Pontypool goes back only a few years? As someone who lived next to it for all his life, I assure you Tesco is the least of its problems. It was dying long ago from the poor local economy and the plentiful free parking in Cwmbran; then they spent two years building the Hafodrynys bypass and made the town centre almost completely unreachable from the south, which was the killing blow. Tesco has brought masses of traffic back in to Pontypool (albeit just to Tesco), not the other way around.

My wife went to College in Pontypool, family businesses have been based there for years and I've worked for Torfaen CBC in regeneration supporting those who've lived and worked in the area their whole lives. Ponty's problems are manifold, sure, but with all the funds I was tasked with providing to small businesses so that they might start up, no-one wanted to open a shop any closer than Blaenavon and those two examples were for a washing machine repair place and a pole dancing studio. I had one client open a seamstress in the market but even she lasted a year, moving to an online only service in order to make a profit.

Everyone blames the Tesco in that regard. Now it's there, like a big gray tic, the town doesn't stand a chance. Shame, as there's lovely gardens and that high St could have some nice shops down it if it was given a chance.

I could cite other examples - Hull city Centre has been absorbed by a shopping centre that nestles in the arsecrack of a new SuperTesco. Look at the Roath area now, too - Tesco on Albany Road, Crwys Road, City Road, Wellfield Road, Clifton St, Cathays Terrace.

It's odd, because I've never seen them operating in the same niche. You go to supermarkets to get the items you need to buy, knowing what you want in advance. You go into town to browse for things you might want. Is it that because people don't go into town for groceries there's a reduction in foot traffic that's hurting the business of everyone else? Or have the supermarkets really stolen that much of a market share of clothes and media/electronics sales?

I'd say so. Pretty much all the companies (that sell physical "things") we deal with here list Tesco as their #1 competitor.

It's a good time to be selling rubber suits and jelly dongs, I feel.

Or energy (ie. leccy / gas), which is one of the few things Tesco don't do.

Yet. I wouldn't be surprised if say E.ON sold them their retail business, for example.

A purely hypothetical example, of course.

Apparently "never, ever". Mind you, they said that about mobile phones (the guy that runs their billing told me).

I won't argue that it's happened plenty of times but I think Pontypool is a bad example, is all. As a family, we always shopped in Pontypool for all our stuff (we lived in Griff and I had family on the Garn) until the late '80s, when we gave up as stores started going downhill. It's been in a tailspin ever since. Compared to two decades of decline and neglect, Tesco is small potatoes.

Also, further to the discussion above, Tesco and the other supermarkets are enormously huge in the children's clothes market.