Trainees turn down jobs

Press, 8 March 1988, Page 6

Trainees turn down jobs

By SUE LANCASTER

Some Canterbury Access training providers are ".horrified” to find some of their trainees turning down jobs because they cannot afford to become employed. Canterbury's biggest Access training provider, the Christchurch Polytechnic, is most concerned about the problem. It has noted several instances ofmarried people with dependent children turning jobs down because they would; earn less than on the unemplovment benefit. ;

The polytechnic’s head of special programmes. Ms Cynthia Roberts, said her co-ordinators were horrified, to find why some qf their trainees were not going into em-

ployment. The) situation had become I so bad that one Access tutor asked if he should) turn people away who ijvere married with dependent children, because | they affected his results. Access training providers have to reach targets they' Iset which |, include getting some trainees into employment Ms j Roberts said that married people with' dependent chilldren were not at present peing discriminated! against on Access courses but the problem raised that possibility. It was not an argument for lowering i he domestic purposes dr unemployment benef ts, she said. “If; you are really struggling! on what you are

getting you are not going to accept' a job that is going to) give you less." I Ms Roberts said )that the trainees involved were usually the most hardworking. conscientious and ! punctual. They turned down the ; jobs offered to them reluctantly.

One trainee had said he would receive $lOO less a week if he took one job offered.! I i An unemployed person who is I married receives $224.60 |a week, according to the £ocial Welfare Department. He or she) then receives in Family) Support $36 for the first child and $l6 for .each subsequent child. Such persons would continue to receive Family Support payment as low-income workers.) ■■

The acting president of the interim Canterbury Council of Trade Unions, Mrs Hilary Brown, said that before the latest wage round there would have been people earning less) than the unemployment benefit.

There would now be many people earning about $225 a week after taking . the additional working costs of transport and clothing into account, she) said. Ms Roberts said that child care costs also had to be taken into account for) some families. They had to ask themselves whether it was worth while for them to take on the: additional hassle of working for little or no benefit.

Access funding, page 3