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The Conservation ‘Volunteers’ Who Are Forced To Work Unpaid

The Conservation Volunteers (formally BTCV) have been revealed as one of the UK's largest exploiters of forced labour. Tell them what you think today as part of the National Week of Action Against Workfare

The continued exodus of charity shops from the Government’s workfare schemes leaves the Mandatory Work Activity scheme looking perilously close to collapse.

Oxfam, Marie Curie and Shelter, who all refused workfare in their stores, have now been joined by others. Scope (1) say they are ending mandatory work schemes as have Age UK (2) (though not necessarily in their independent stores). Cancer Research UK (3) have said they are pulling out of mandatory work activity placements. Meanwhile British Heart Foundation (4) have said they are ‘moving away’ from mandated work, though have continued to take placements in their stores.

It now seems that the largest providers of mandated workfare are likely to be conservation and environmental charities such as The Conservation Volunteers (TCV), a misnamed charity who have been quietly building an army of unpaid workers.

TCV (formally known as BTCV) , have previously boasted of employing 20,000 unpaid workers on various government schemes since the 1980s. They currently hold lucrative contracts with the DWP to deliver Mandatory Work Activity. The so-called charity have forced 589 people into unpaid work, often for private companies on this scheme alone.

This is on top of the countless people who have been forced to work without pay on their conservation projects.

Sue Pearson, a spokesperson for the charity, even boasts of how they have attempted to get round DWP rules which state placements must have a ‘community benefit’. Speaking to the Guardian, Pearson explains how claimants forced to work in a food preparation factory had been required to “gather up recycling materials” in order to meet DWP criteria (5).

TCV are the worst kind of workfare exploiters. As well as bullying people into working for no pay, they also put jobs and working conditions at risk by sending claimants to work for free in profit making companies.

With such an eager attitude towards exploiting benefit claimants, it seems likely that TVC will be quite happy to make use of new rules which mean that sick and disabled claimants can now be forced into unpaid work. A statement concerning the organisation’s use of workfare was updated on December 3rd, International Disabled People's Day, and the day that workfare for sick and disabled claimants began (6).

It suggests they are already salivating at the thought of thousands more people to exploit, stating that they will merely undertake a health assessment of those they intend to force to work. Everybody on out of work sickness or disability benefits has been signed off as unfit to work by their own GP.

As part of the Week of Action Against Workfare Charities (7) contact TCV this Friday 14th December and help expose the charity’s dirty little workfare secrets to anyone who thought they might be an ethical organisation.

TCV are on twitter @tcvtweets.
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