V - Cast Your Net Wide (And Miss)

One of the first things I was told when signing on was that I shouldn't even bother looking to the immediate area for work. According to my Job Advisor, my only real hope of finding a job this century was to look further afield, at least a 90 minutes journey away.

Naturally, I began looking as far north as Inverness and as far south as Stevenage.

My problem is simple: Contrary to the belief of the old and imbecilic, the people who think you can find a job by popping into your local conscription office and asking Corporal Jones to send you off to Germany to fight the Huns, or popping into your nearby mines, doffing a hat and mining coal, I don't get paid much JSA. I get around £50 a week, £100 fortnightly every time i'm paid. If you talked to any random British imbecile who has no independent thoughts and only knows what they're spoonfed by the media, they'd think i'd be living in a mansion right now, scraping up ludicrous amounts of dole money and living with twenty kids while owning ten Ferrari's and living the high life.

Though £100 sounds too much, and i'm sure there's some person older than 40 shaking his fist at the screen and going "DANGNABBIT YOU COTTON-PICKIN' SHIFTLESS WEE BUGGER! YEH SHOULD BE GRATEFUL FOR WHAT YOU'RE GIVEN!!!", you have to realise that the average trainfare to areas populated with jobs (ie; Leeds, Edinburgh, Sheffield, York) costs at least £20, and at most, £80 for a return. Keep in mind that's just to attend a possible interview: If I wanted to actually take a full time job there, guess who has no salary unless he can somehow horde his JSA and afford the rent of a local flat? This guy.

However, that isn't really a problem for me. I know what I have to do. Unlike some of my peers, I've come to terms with my inevitable fate and embrace it: I'm going to have to leave home if I want a cat in hells chance of actually achieving something.

That problem isn't really a problem. It's a necessary obstacle i'm fully prepared to overcome. Even if it drains my bank account, it's still a step i'm willing to take.

Why?

In the Tyne-Tees-Wear Region at least, there are basically three major types of jobs:

i) Care Work

ii) Construction Work

iii) IT Development

i) Care Work is utterly abundant, mostly for care assistants as the population up here grows old and starts keeling over because the youth who can escape, have escaped and did escape years ago. Those who haven't escaped are trying desperately to escape and thus will do anything to escape, include taking care work. Occasionally, you might scrape a job in the NHS, which is utterly thankless, and I honestly salute any doctor/care assistant/nurse/whatever who works with the NHS, because i'll be damned if those boys and girls aren't working their asses off for shit pay and a country (forcefed by the media) that loathes them.

ii) The North East is a traditional base for construction. You can't move for construction jobs here. Traditionally a job for the dumb, it's become a job for the shiftless chav in grey tracksuit bottoms. I WOULD call them brainless and imbecilic specimens unsuitable for any job that doesn't require them to haul goods around like a pack mule, but they are the ones with a job at the end of the day and not me, so I have zero high ground over them. The North is always looking for these jobs, and they dwarf in comparison to other jobs requiring intelligence. This is why I pined for not applying for an Apprenticeship: The absolute morons I knew went for it, and they have jobs right now. Arseholes.

iii) Although, as noted above, the North is a traditional base for construction, it's also becoming a base for IT Development. Now, six years ago when I was forced to apply to UCAS, this wasn't the case. IT Development was slowly starting up, but nowhere near the peak it was today. Had I known it would fill the job searches for the North East, I would've went for a degree in Computer Developing or Programming or whatever instead. I've always had an interest in computers and in programming, but I never knew that knowing the ins and outs of JAVA and C++ would actually give me a job up here. In London? Sure, but not up here. Six years later, I wake up in a cold sweat, crying that I was fucking stupid enough to go for an English degree.

You may wonder what the point of this is: Well, this isn't really a rant per se, but more an explanation of my circumstances. Currently, I'm hoarding money from my JSA to head down to York and Leeds with a satchel full of CV's, because even if I fail, it at least gives me a day out. There's nothing here in Middlesbrough aside from the three job types labelled above...and cleaning work, but trust me when I say i've essentially applied for dozens of cleaning posts over the past fortnight (I'm not above mopping up piss for a paycheck. Anyone who is, is clearly delusional about the current economic situation.) which means my chances of finding a job at home are worthless.

So i'm applying elsewhere. Though the three job types above are abundant, there are a wider range of jobs available out there elsewhere. One major hope for me is to secure a job in Scotland, where at least I have the possibility of crawling to the doorstep of some of my family members and begging for help, rather than just falling to my knees and begging for help here. That and..I love Scotland. Simple. Plus Edinburgh has a vast abundance of job types.

My only real bitter feeling towards being forced away from home is that the Tories seem to believe I should be moving South rather than heading North, and that my job applications seem to go unnoticed by the companies. My Job Advisor advised me to throw my net wide, and keep dragging it in. One day, i'll snag something, even if my net is empty these first ten thousand times. 

The Jobcentre should really twist arms more often when it comes to distance. Trying to find a job in the nearby area is hopeless, but at least moving elsewhere gives you some glimmer of hope, not just of finding a job, but of gaining independence. (Which is probably a major worry in the eyes of many youth who feel robbed blind by the shiftless and worthless Tory-Lib Dem Coalition) Right now, i'm missing, but at least i'm not delusional: I know I have no hope of finding a job here.

It's the one thing stopping me from cutting my own throat: Knowing that, one day, i'll cast my net wide and i'll finally land something.

And even if it is mopping up piss in Inverness, at least I can lean against the mop and realise that i've finally achieved my dream and escaped England.