Figures obtained by the union for the day following the work and pensions secretary’s statement about unemployed workers ‘getting on the bus’, show there are 15,000 people in Cardiff chasing just 1,700 jobs.

In what sense are they chasing these jobs, I wonder.

In the sense that the Quorn chases a fox? Doubt it. A fair number of that 15k are too busy chasing the dragon to chase a job. Others will have made a “lifestyle choice”. And who’s to say the bloke off the Merthyr Tydfil bus wouldn’t be one of the lucky 1,700 anyhow?

Besides, 89 jobs were created in the private sector in Cardiff today.

There may be 15,000 people and 1,700 jobs in Cardiff, but how does that invalidate the idea that someone from outside Cardiff with the required skills should travel to Cardiff and get a job?

Is there now some sort of range outside which a person is not supposed to seek work?

Actually, there might be. When I was unemployed a few years ago, the job centre seemed stunned that I considered a commute of up to one hour to be my realistic limit. The average most job seekers were willing to consider was 15 minutes.

Anyway, just because other people want a job doesn’t then mean you shouldn’t try to get that job just because you don’t live in the same town.

Fucking hell flowerpower, why are you so hateful?

The extra million or so unemployed the country has this year compared to two/tree years ago… these people are heroin addicts? or lazy? or suddenly changed their “Lifestyle choice”? Or has something happened outside their control?

Sunny,

is that IDS quote in the first email accurate, and what you are referring to when you write: “Iain Duncan Smith made the ridiculous claim on Newsnight … that people from… probably didn’t realise they could just get on a bus to find work”?

If so, I really don’t understand how you can portray his words in that way. IDS appears to be chiding the unions, whom he reckons have said “anyone who commutes to work is somehow doing the wrong thing” and he’s saying arguing against that by saying commuting is something ordinary decent people do to find work. Where on earth does he suggest “people from Merthyr Tydfil …. ” or indeed suggest that people who aren’t getting the bus to find work are lazy?

oh sorry I have read it again – that quote in the first email isn’t what he said on Newsnight is it… it’s a new quote provided by the press office.

as you were!

Full disclosure, I currently spend about 30 hours a week commuting and to be honest that is a length of time nobody should have to do to earn money, I’m glad its short term.

Time is also not the only factor, I currently cycle 2 miles, get 20 minute train to Reading, then 30 min to Paddington, then 20 min to Charing cross, then 30 min to a town in NW Kent, the 6 min bus journey and of course vice versa. Frankly, its mental, and I plan on cutting it down to an hour commute as soon as I find somewhere to live in east London.

However, public transport outside london, even in london on a weekend, can make my commute longer and much more stressful and rapidly become expensive. My commute is roughly costing my what my rent in London will do, lunacy.

Just saying “travel to work long distances” isn’t much of an answer. Likewise saying move there isn’t much of a plan because, as anyone trying to rent in London at the moment will tell you, the market is frozen. There are no easy solutions.

“who’s to say the bloke off the Merthyr Tydfil bus wouldn’t be one of the lucky 1,700 anyhow?”

If you live in the estates IDS was talking about then the commute is more like 2 and half – 3 hours.

This is because to get to and from merthyr bus station is a lengthy walk before 7.30 am or after 6pm if you live in estates like the Gurnos. This is due to the fact there are no local buses outside of these times. After 11pm forget about even getting back to merthyr from cardiff (so shift work, bar work etc is out).

Furthermore during rush hour the Merthyr to Cardiff bus is around 90mins (although you could also use the train, which is around an hour.)

Add to this the fact not all jobs are in cardiff city centre – somebody could be faced with a further commute to the outskirts of cardiff etc.(extremely likely for traditional working class manual jobs). Again rush hour traffic in cardiff is bad.

So faced with this imagine you are an employer in cardiff faced with 2 candidates for one job. One lives local, the other lives on the outskirts of merthyr.

You can employ the local person or the person who:

1. Faces a lengthy commute every day.
2. Relies on a transport system that frequently doesn’t run in the winter. (Merthyr is cold and at altitude).
3. Will be unable to stay late, or work shifts. (or require expensive taxis to do so).
4. Is going to be unable to carry a laptop or expensive piece of equipment (as they have to walk home through an area with its fair share of crime).
5. Is unlikely to turn up to your office party.

So who do you think gets the job?

Also see it from an incentive point of view – why spend 13 hour days for the wages of an 8 hour day? Also consider how much you will have to spend on the transport cost? What if you have childcare commitments?

I see our resident right-wingers can’t see the obvious even if hit in the face with the stats.

‘Is there now some sort of range outside which a person is not supposed to seek work?’

There’s no upper limit where the Jobseeker CAN look for work but there’s an upper limit where they can be COERCED into looking: it’s called the Travel to Work Area and it’s specified in their Jobseeker Agreement.

You might find people would apply for jobs further away if they didnt make applying for travel costs to interviews so degrading: contacting employers to confirm they have attended interviews undermines any pay negotiation they might be having.

You might find people would be happy to commute if they were given second homes closer to were the work is. They could even ‘flip’ their houses to make extra money. I can’t think why that’s never been tried before.

Why are the DWP and other departments making highly political statements?

Time is also not the only factor, I currently cycle 2 miles, get 20 minute train to Reading, then 30 min to Paddington, then 20 min to Charing cross, then 30 min to a town in NW Kent, the 6 min bus journey and of course vice versa. Frankly, its mental, and I plan on cutting it down to an hour commute as soon as I find somewhere to live in east London.

There is a strong argument for using the social housing stock to provide a temporary home for those getting a new job in a different locality rather than using it to provide subsidised accomodation to the indolent for life.

No?

pagar – so when they get settled down they are evicted then?

Sunny @ 8

I see our resident right-wingers can’t see the obvious even if hit in the face with the stats.

The unemployment rate in Merthyr Tydfil is 6.2%, while in next door Brecon & Radnor (to the North), it’s 2.3%.

In Pontypridd (to the South), it’s 3%.

In Cardiff North (the nearest bit of Cardiff to Merthyr Tydfil), it’s 2.5%.

So, with three nearby towns with less than half the unemployment rate of Merthyr, and with unemployment only fractionally above the frictional 2%, why is IDS’s bus suggestion so risible?

Ah yes: the stats.

@1 “Besides, 89 jobs were created in the private sector in Cardiff today.”

Is that one announcement? Is it net of jobs being lost? What skill level do they require?

Anyway 89 jobs, then. Woop-de-doo! So now there are 15,000 people on JSA and 1,789 jobs (or 14,921 jobseekers and 1,700 jobs, if the positions are filled).There’s still a problem that there are fewer jobs than people looking for them, before we start bussing people in from the Valleys.

Your lazy assumption that everyone on benefit is an idle scrounger is probably a projection of your own morality, thinking about it. You are jealous, admit it.

Merthyr to Brecon now, flowerpower? I suppose they could eschew the bus and hike over the beacons…

Sheesh!

“You are jealous, admit it.”

Not really fair on Flowerpower, but I lol’d regardless!

@ 15

Merthyr to Brecon now, flowerpower? I suppose they could eschew the bus and hike over the beacons…

Or take the X43 bus departing Merthyr Tydfil at 0708 and arriving at Brecon at 0745…..

Miss that and there’s another at 0753, arriving Brecon at half past eight…….

a whole 37 minutes commute, sheesh!

@ 17:

And there’s one at 7.53 that gets into Brecon at 8.30. But let’s face it – Brits just aren’t resilient, robust and resourceful any more. Eastern europeans haven’t grown up having a sense of entitlement inculcated in them. They’ll travel a thousand miles for a job.
And I notice that IDS didn’t even mention commuting.

Or take the X43 bus departing Merthyr Tydfil at 0708 and arriving at Brecon at 0745…..

a whole 37 minutes commute, sheesh!

And how many jobs do you think there are in Brecon? It isn’t a large town; mostly a service centre for the surrounding agricultural area (the latter fact is why the constituency has a low unemployment rate). And getting from Merthyr to Brecon involves crossing one of the higher parts of the Brecon Beacons. So in the winter, you simply aren’t going to be able to get to work a lot of the time, which rules out regular employment in a manual occupation.

Why the hell would you want to go to Brecon to join the army, right now 22 jobs are available in Brecon, Merthyr to Cardiff is 22 miles down the main road, buses never take the main roads they take the roads with the most stops.

We have 2.300 jobs in Cardiff the vast majority are in sales, and a lot are commission only, then you have a few looking for dentist and dental nurses, but none in the council, a lot are in care but not full time two hours in the morning and two hours in the evening, you must have your own car.

Lots of jobs around but would you call working for commission a job.

Flowerpower, it looks like you’ve used parliamentry consituencies as your geographical region to get that data. However this means the commuting times you’ve used are misleading. You are basically measuring commuting times from bus stop to bus stop and not considering how long it takes to get to and from home and place of work to each bus stop either side.

Brecon and Radnorshire is a big area with lots of hills, it doesn’t just mean Brecon and the villages by the A470 – which are the areas from Merthyr that are do-able commutes provided you don’t work shifts, and we ignore the fact that during the winter the bus sometimes doesn’t run (it snows on that route).

Secondly Merthyr isn’t just the town, but a constituency that includes former mining villages like Aberfan, and also some places in the neighbouring Rhymney Valley. It might not look a big distance between Rhymney and Merthyr on google maps, but there is a big mountain in between. Commuting is all very well if you live next door to merthyr train station and have a job in Cardiff city centre, its fucking impossibile if you live in a place like Treharris.

Similarly Pontypridd isn’t just the town, but surrounding areas. The places to the south like Church Village and Tonteg are 30 min bus rides/20 min drives away from Cardiff (well, a bit longer in rush hours) and thus most of the population there commutes to cardiff. (doing exactly what IDS said). Furthermore Pontypridd has a major public sector employer – the university of the glamorgan. Its these factors that explain the lower unemployment rate. You are essentially committing the statistical fail of not comparing like with like.

The best comparison is with the neighbouring constituency of Blaenae Gwent. Similar industrial past, similar issues with transport etc. And what do you know? The unemployment stats are also similar. Maybe they are lazy and too thick to know what a bus is as well?

Also, its worth bearing in mind that until the recent recession Merthyr was improving, it’s just lazy journalists go to Merthyr for their ‘benefit scroungers’ stories because its a cliche and there is a premier travel inn just off the A470. Most people living in the town itself work and have jobs – some even commute to cardiff. Its the outlying areas where the issues are.

The irony is that the reason for the improvements over the last 10 years are due the regeneration of the heads of the valleys scheme. The real irony here is that part of the regeneration scheme was about improving transport – i.e improving the rail services, making the A470 and A465 dual carriageways. So IDS can only say “its a 1 hour bus ride” precisely because of the regeneration scheme that his party have opposed.

Planeshift sounds like he/she knows what they’re talking about. Pay attention folks!

What’s the solution? Cheaper housing nearer the jobs? Cheaper travel costs?
Oh, I know! Perhaps a charity could be persuaded to set up centres for the poor to live, and bring the work to them, for them to do in the ‘centre’. Saves on travel and sorts out the housing problem in one stroke. They could call these centres, umm, Workhouses!

“What’s the solution?”

With infinate money and ignoring the carbon emissions, free cars and driving lessons for all

Realistically:

It is worth repeating that prior to the recession we saw improvements in the heads of the valleys. So it is a matter of continuing with the things that worked, and extending them. Decades of neglect were not going to be turned around in a few years, and we need to recognise that. So essentially:

Reliable and confortable transport where services are planned around the idea that people are using transport to commute (hence the need for evening services, and timetables that reflect people need to change buses/trains). Special commuter rates that keep the cost down and maintain the incentive to commute for jobs.

Continue with the project to create a heads of the valleys university, the low carbon zone’s project to bring new future industry jobs in the area (already happening). Increase provision of adult education so people have the qualifications to obtain jobs when they arrive. Maintain the level of public sector spending, so we don’t get a double dip recession. Provide free childcare. Try and cut down prejudice amongst employers about the valleys and people who live there.

In the longer term more powers to the Welsh assembly to do things like set differential tax rates to encourage businesses to locate in areas of higher unemployment. Encourage more entreprenuership, but also ensure credit is availble for that (others will know more than me about the mechanisms that can achieve it).

Also transfer far more powers so we can create our own welfare system here that doesn’t have the absurd marginal withdrawl rates. Also allow us to set our own rules on social housing and how people can move from one area to another. As the Daily Mail don’t report on assembly matters, and the taxpayers alliance only have one employee here, we have a far greater chance of getting these things right.

Also a tax on journalists similar to a swear box – every time they write “Merthyr” in an article they should pay a tax that will go into a fund that pays for them to go on basic statistics courses.

Well better tell the bus company to please use the A470 and not go around the small towns and roads, we need to get the bus into Cardiff so people can go to work. Of course it would be nice if we could get a bus to go from Merthyr to Cardiff quick, sadly the company says it has to pick up passengers.

Similarly Pontypridd isn’t just the town, but surrounding areas. The places to the south like Church Village and Tonteg are 30 min bus rides/20 min drives away from Cardiff (well, a bit longer in rush hours) and thus most of the population there commutes to cardiff. (doing exactly what IDS said). Furthermore Pontypridd has a major public sector employer – the university of the glamorgan. Its these factors that explain the lower unemployment rate. You are essentially committing the statistical fail of not comparing like with like.

Not only that, but the south of the constituency (and parts of Ponty itself now) is middle class Cardiff commuter territory. It also includes the Treforest industrial estate. So, yeah, it isn’t going to have high unemployment.

Reality check: you are arguing over a 25 mile commute between Merthyr and Cardiff. That really isn’t very far at all. I suspect your thinking has been negatively biased by the experience of living in a minute principality of a rather small country

Reality check – it’s not the distance so much it’s that there are few jobs everywhere. With a million fewer due to spending cuts and their impact on the private sector.

15,000 people in Cardiff chasing just 1,700 jobs

Really? There are just 1700 jobs in the whole of Cardiff?

There are just 1700 people working in jobs in Cardiff?

Obviously not. You mean that someone has found 1700 jobs being advertised in Cardiff at this moment.

If on average it takes a month to fill each position, and on average 1700 positions are being advertised at any one time, that means that 20,000 new jobs are created in Cardiff each year.

“: you are arguing over a 25 mile commute between Merthyr and Cardiff. That really isn’t very far at all. ”

I can only assume you are not familiar with the geography of south wales. We have a lot of hills. If you had a literacy level above that of a child, you would read what the actual commuting times were above.

Well Planeshift, if people really can’t get on a bus, then maybe it’s time to call the removal van, ‘cos something tells me that no time soon is the world economy going to take a detour up the valley to deliver a spanking new job to the doorstep of every house in Merthyr.