Benefit Thieves

I’m mad, mad as hell, that’s what I am today. Mad with the people who make some distinction between the working poor and the unemployed poor. Well when I was working, I was part of the working poor. On paper I earned way above the national average, but that’s no use when you live in London. The threshold for tax credits and housing benefit was way below my income, so I subsisted.

Housing costs are the problem; I pay/have paid a fortune in rent. That’s not because I enjoyed giving my money away hand over fist to a buy-to-let landlord. No it’s because there was no affordable housing.

If you were poor in the 70s and 80s. There were options. Housing co-ops, Social Housing, Squats. Or just affordable rents. In the 80s and 90s I could get a mortgage, because property prices were realistic. I paid £200 a month in 1997 for my mortgage, and that was a 90% one. I would be pushed to find a weekly rent for that these days. I’m talking about North London, not anywhere else.

I sold my last house when my relationship broke down. But once everything was divided-up, there was little left over for a deposit. So I went back to renting, and that’s where I find myself now.

Because I’m unemployed, Housing Benefit pays my rent. But everything else comes out of the £64 a week. And that requires some serious creative accounting. I’ve sold things, I’ve accepted handouts from family and I’ve even tried to sell my body.

I’ve been close to getting work, had a couple of interviews. Been promised a job working in Europe, but that’s remains just a promise.


My current strategy involves getting part time work, using one of my old skills. One I’ve not actually practiced for thirteen years. Because of the huge gap in my CV when I did something completely different; it’s unlikely I’m going to get any response. But I’m trying, trying to be creative.

A friend of mine was made redundant a month before me. He has three kids, a mortgage and does not receive housing benefit. Or rather he receives a sum that covers part of his mortgage repayment. The shortfall, that includes the cost of supporting a family, is made up by relatives.

Like me he’s at the wrong end of 40. Ageism in our profession is rife, and never discussed. But that’s the great buttress holding both of us back. When a prospective employer sees our respective CVs, he/she does not see a wealth of experience; they see a tired-out old man. And even if we look young and healthy, have our own teeth and hair; we are dammed by the chronology on our CVs.


Before accusing people of being benefit thieves; consider their circumstances first. There is a huge amount of wasted talent, consigned to the dustbin. So employers can employ cheaper, younger, team-players (yes another euphemism for not being old).

And to repeat the theme of an earlier post; everything I have learned is just floating about in the ether. I have virtually a photographic memory for facts, and can put these facts to creative use. But the only openings for people like me appear to involve handing out wire-baskets at supermarket entrances.

All The Time In The World

I’ve been reading The Alexandria Quartet since 1982. That’s the date inscribed on the book. I used to do that in my youth, write my name along with the date and sometimes the location. So that’s why I know Justine, Balthazar, Mountolive and Clea have been with me for 28 years.

I bought it in a Manchester bookstore, after an argument with my then Girlfriend. The theory was I would use-up my new free time getting to grips with Lawrence Durrell’s difficult books. And I knew they were difficult, because that’s all my old English teacher had to say about Lawrence Durrell.

She was teaching My Family and Other Animals, the memoir by his easier brother Gerald. Lawrence features in the book, so I suppose that’s how he managed to find his way into the classroom discussion. The Quartet was also still in fashion. George Cukor had a stab at filming Justine, with Dirk Bogarde as Pursewarden in the late sixties.

My break-up lasted a whole weekend, which just about got me past page one. The Alexandria Quartet‘s not a book of course, its four interwoven books, published at different times. Durrell quotes Sigmund Freud and De Sade at the beginning of Justine. And he was a difficult bugger, the sort of bugger who names his daughter after a lesbian goddess.

I know a little of what became of the English teacher, she left under a cloud. She was caught by her husband in flagrante delicto with a pupil. Why she chose to give the boy extra tuition in her home I have no idea. Gossip had her husband chasing the unfortunate schoolboy down the seafront, and blacking his eye.

The English teacher’s story would fit nicely into the gritty British New Wave, seeing that it happened in a dreary Northern Seaside town, a million miles from Alexandria. It would fit nicely into most TV Soaps; and a lot of plot driven potboilers.

So after I finish re-reading Richard Yates; I think its time to try Balthazar again. Put two fingers-up to East Enders et all. Annoy the hell out of my Jobcentre nemesis, who hates people reading before an interview. I’ve got all the time in the world.

My Way

I read last night that Malcolm McLaren had died in New York. The location changed in the morning to Switzerland. The news reports had also been fleshed out with tributes and appreciations.

For people of a certain age, it’s impossible to deny the impact this man had. You either loved him, hated him, were indifferent, or you were a mix of all three. I liked the vaudevillian, or if your English, music hall aspect of his personality. I liked the clothes and the way he debunked the Sex Pistols myth. He was hated for a while, when the post-Rotten Pistols recorded comedy singles. But I found it quite funny and it dovetailed nicely into the death of punk’s first generation. My Way is a fitting funeral song, and probably captures his personality better than their first four singles.

I was stranded in an Argos car park, the radio was on. The DJ opened with God Save The Queen. He then went on to say the song still possessed the power it had in 1977. And ignoring the context, this was the BBC playing a song they refused to play at the time. There was little power in the song. Time has moved on, taken out of its 70s context, the song is merely an old curiosity; rather like the wobbly sets and RP voices of the time.

I can understand why people go to Punk Weekends at Holiday Camps, it’s the same reason why the Strokes were popular, and why middle-class teenagers like the whole Goth/Emo/Punk thing. But I can’t recall Malcolm McLaren ever getting caught-up with Punk nostalgia; bar appearing as a talking head talking about himself.

When I heard of his death from mesothelioma, there was no desire in me to play a Sex Pistols tune; or play Buffalo Gals. Instead I made an odd connection between Malcolm and a long dead relative. My Uncle Peter.

Peter worked in the shipyards as an electrician. In the 80s he worked on the Thames Barrier, after the yards were closed down. He sourced me a half price pair of Doctor Martens back in 1977, and those DMs pogoed along with the Sex Pistols amongst others. They met the DJ John Peel at a Reading Festival, invading the stage with Sham 69 fans.

Uncle Peter was no great fan of punk, but his boots were for a time. I can’t recall if the boots wore out or were thrown out. But they went the way of those black suede Chelsea boots and big Eighties hair. Peter found work closer to home, and lead a sedate life. He played bowls, got drunk every Christmas Eve – returning home with inappropriate underwear for his wife.

He was approaching the big 60 when his lung collapsed playing football. A joint birthday had been arranged with his Sister-in-Law at the local Catholic Club.
The collapsed lung, turned out to be cancer, and the cancer diagnosed as mesothelioma.

In the Sixties and Seventies, Asbestos was used as an insulator. The hulls of ships he crawled about, contained tiny microscopic fibres, which became embedded in his lungs. They bided their time, ticking away slowly , until it was time to change Uncle Peters cells for good.

Peter never saw his 60th birthday. There was no joint birthday. And I have a terrible memory of looking into his eyes, weeks before his death. He was skeletal, with grey parchment skin. His body shook. But it was the terror in his eyes that I took away with me.

I just hope that Malcolm McLaren had a better death in Switzerland. I hope he managed to do it his way.

The Long and the Short and the Tall

My day-to-day life as a Dole Wallah is little changed from the working one. I wake early and eat breakfast at a desk. On the desk is a computer and some writing detritus. No difference there. I read the Guardian Obituaries and news, I then drill down to the arts and maybe some business news.

At some point in the day I will read a couple of blogs; I may even make a comment. No major difference there, on an average working day there was some slack time. Of course there were meltdown-days too, that sometimes stretched into the weekend, meltdown-weeks. But mostly with a little organization I found time for my excursions on the internet.

I take exercise during the day. When working I ran home, through crowded city streets and pollution. The difference now is I avoid the streets and the cars, but otherwise no difference.


I pop four pills in the morning, they keep me alive. This is where my working and my Dole Wallah days diverge. My working life did not involve pill-popping, I was healthy and rarely succumbed to office-worker style ailments like colds and flu.

When I work again, I will have to take the pills at my desk. First thing is out of the question. I need to shave before the pill-popping ceremony. If I don’t, I bleed heavily. My blood is thinned to prevent clotting, so even the slightest cut spurts like a geyser.
As a Dole Wallah I have days with stubble, but at work I never have days with stubble, another divergence.


The Long and the Short and the Tall is a play by Willis Hall; it was directed by Lindsay Anderson at the Royal Court. And made into a film. I mentioned it in my response to some Guardian blog commenter who made a sweeping statement about WWII being just a war against Hitler for Europeans. Too much History Channel maybe? I was trying to make a cultural point about the Pacific conflict, how it seeped into lots of English speaking art. My diversion for the day.


During the boom-time, BCC (Before Credit Crunch). I had one or two diversions a day. But as the sackings accumulated, so did the diversions. By the end I could squeeze my working-week into a day. My internet travels, were a diversion from reality. Rather like a prisoner on death row, I waited for the inevitable. The telephone call.

I even had a sneak preview of what it would be like. The man who sat opposite accidentally put his phone on speaker when his call came. It must have been nerves. I heard the ultimate boss asking him to make his way to a meeting room. Later the man came back for his coat; he left without saying a word.

When the call came, I decided to have my coat and bag brought to me. And whatever was in my desk, I asked them to throw. Most of the important stuff was on my work computer anyway, stored away in text documents. I lost that when I lost my job. The accumulated knowledge of Seven Years, erased.

But like the old men who used to sit in my parents living room, discussing Rommel and Dunkirk. I carry around in my head memories from a time before. Snippets of those text documents; procedures, passwords and the natural ability that helped me along the way. And it’s going to take a lot more than a Format or a Heart Attack, or a Credit Crunch to erase those.

Eli's Coming

In the morning I wake late, its Easter Sunday. An email about some work sits in my inbox. It’s a Sunday and its Easter; but beggars can’t be choosers. So I reply. The next thought I have is Three Dog Night’s version of Laura Nyro’s song Eli’s Coming.

The Impecunious Mr Yates #2

For those who don’t like chocolate eggs or Stations of the Cross; there is always Richard Yates’s Easter Parade. Or The Long Good Friday.


Here’s a link to the Guardian Book blog from yesterday; and to The Long Good Friday Theme Tune.

Happy Easter !

E=MC2 – Jobsearch #2

I’ve added another name to my list of scammers and hucksters today. Experienced another cynical attempt to extract money from the hapless, hopeful and helpless. I’m going to align myself with the hopeful, and invent a Crappola Detector.

The Crappola Detector © is as real as the job I was offered today. But if it did exist, my wasted time this afternoon would have been put to better use. Like applying for a job that actually existed. Or adding five hundred words to my Novel.

Instead there’s a great gaping hole full of wasted energy.

I’m hooked-up to quite a few Job Sites, including Gumtree. And it’s Gumtree that sends me more of the casual and part-time jobs. And because the cost of advertising is low, the site attracts Crappola merchants by the ton. And it attracts suckers like me, who have nothing to loose but their dignity.

Amongst the photographers seeking life models and the free psychic readings, was a company looking for film extras. The ad gave a film title and Director’s name, and a shooting schedule in May. But the real honey-trap was a £90 a day fee. I was suckered and mailed them with my details.

Mistake Number One: I forgot to check out the film title and Director. A simple Google search (done after the event) produced nothing except links to the Gumtree ad.

Mistake Number Two: I replied with my real e-mail address. Now the hucksters have this and will no doubt have filed it under sucker.

Their first mistake was to respond too quickly, their second was to offer me an immediate booking for the larger fee of £100 a day. All I had to do was pay a £20 registration fee – mistake number three.

I’m sure a Crappola Detector would now be registering a pile suitable for a family of dung beetles.

A visit to the company’s website revealed one of those identikit templates favoured by scammers. And for a business described as an employment agency, there was no way for potential clients to view their roster of talent. People who work in the film business have a hundred and one methods of finding actors/extras and crew; they will not use a site that supposedly keeps their people behind an invisible password protected link. Stupidly they also claim the impossible; their site can actually distinguish between a potential clients IP address and a casual browser. Rubbish.


So the website is terrible, what about the address. Street view reveals a shabby suburban semi. So a company that claims to act as an employment agency for film cast and crew and also produces films has no office. Strange.

I Googled the principle person involved with the company, this person has a laughably fake web page. A myspace full of Glamour Model friends and also claims to be a film producer as well as a bit part actor. He also claims to be illiterate, be in his early twenties and you’ve guessed it have a roster of Glamour Models at his beck and call.

Now any sensible person would just give up, dust themselves down and put the whole experience down to experience. But I’m hooked, the Boy Mogul, who goes by a couple of names has got me interested.

I check the properties of their word document, which was created by the mogul himself, but it has another company name as the owner. I also Google his alias, the name of the person supposedly representing me, the name registration fee cheques are made out to. Films are big bucks, but this piddling company only deals in cheques. Scam.

Google leads me to Facebook, Facebook to some petty criminal’s page. The meathead has been abandoned by his pregnant girlfriend and spends a fair proportion of his day moaning about this. Looks like she left him because he’s just out of jail. Public enemy number one lives in one of those Sixties New Towns, I waste far too much of my time perusing his sorry life.

Google also leads me a site called www.ukscreen.com , this contains a synopsis of the Boy Mogul’s previous film – he’s the writer, director and Star. And the three other principles, yes you’ve guessed it are Glamour Models.

I waste some more time on www.ukscreen.com, its comic. My favourite entry is for a Kenneth Gawne, apparently a film producer. But he’s one of those film producers who can’t write or do maths. Here he is describing his film :

The film has been shot in both in 3 countries on two continents - we began shooting in the Californian desert, continued in Paris and concluded filming in Scotland this summer. The cast and crew has been an international mix of people from California, Ohio, France, Scotland, England and Northern Ireland. So despite working on an exceedingly small budget (basically the film was funded on student loans and cost around £5,000 in total) we have ended up with a professional looking final product


I ‘m sure the travel costs were more than that exceedingly small budget, but I’m also sure it’s about as real as Boy Moguls film career.

My Crappola Detector is now registering off the scale. It’s quite easy to map out these peoples fake identities, Facebook, Myspace, a couple of domains, a couple of fake websites, and some fake entries on a couple of dodgy film sites. And no imdb entry, funny. The James Fox line, I don’t think I can let you stay in the film business – springs to mind. The one sampled by Big Audio Dynamite in their song E=MC2.

But I’m out of time; my daughter needs to be collected from school. And I have to leave the fabulous world of the pretend film business.