Bully-boy landlords

My landlord served me seven days notice the other day because I'm in arrears - I wasn't especially worried as he often says this. The amount we're talking about is less than £150!

When I say landlord, I mean one of the two managers of the place where I live. I live in a Bed and Breakfast cum hostel. The deal is that Housing Benefit pay my rent and I pay a surcharge on top of that of £25 per week. This is to cover electricity, heating, hot water and breakfast. (Breakfast is two sausages, two eggs, baked beans and two toast.)

The next time I saw this man he assured me he meant it "this time". It wasn't until I spoke to one of the security people on the front door who forewarned me that Mr X was really gunning for me and had spoken to the lawyers that I became alarmed.

So I took myself down to the jobcentre to use their free phones and phoned the advice people at Shelter. I knew I had very few rights as I only had a licence to live in my room, nothing like a tenancy. I was under the impression that due to the length of my stay, my landlord had to give me more than a week's notice.

When I got through and spoke to one of Shelter's advisers she quickly disabused me of this notion. I didn't have a legal leg to stand on - I had no more rights than a guest in a hotel who hadn't paid the bill! The adviser was able to give chapter and verse on the small claims court in terms of getting my stuff back, and also to point me in the direction of Community Legal Advice for any future difficulties.

So I went back to my room, packed up three boxes of important bits and pieces, stashed these in the room of one of the few people in my B and B I can call a mate, along with my suit and a leather jacket. I  then wrote a careful note to the landlord with future payment dates and pondered my lot.

The thing that really pissed me off was that it was so arbitrary, that I could become homeless on just the whim of someone else! Come the morning, nothing happened.

Future Jobs Fund and the careless adviser

My jobcentre adviser is someone I wish I never met. Pushy, impatient and stuck up. Through my adviser I have occasionally been forwarded to various different FJF (Future Job Fund) jobs. FJF jobs offer community-focused jobs specifically targeted at young people. It’s a minimum of 25 hours a week, with a contract of six months and paid at national minimum wage.

One of the things I hate is I can only access the FJF jobs through my adviser. This means I can't access them through the Internet or though the jobcentre's job search machines. There are times when I go to the jobcentre to see my adviser to get an update on jobs and I'm told “We don’t have any jobs for you this week. See you next time.” They don’t care about their clients.

I want an alternative way to access available FJF jobs other than through my jobcentre adviser who rarely updates me. My adviser gets frustrated when I take my time going through the vacancy list. There is no rush. I made myself crystal clear about the jobs that interest me, yet I’m being forwarded for jobs that my adviser wants me to do.

Sometimes I get an interview. The interviewer expects me to have some company knowledge. This is when I have asked my adviser for additional information about the company and the sort of the questions I may get asked at the interview. Didn’t get anything back. From my point of view it seems that my jobcentre adviser doesn’t want to do the job. It’s like they love seeing me back there at the jobcentre week in, week out.

In May 2010 they began to cut the FJF programme from a couple of organisations and the number is increasing. According to statistics this was the most progressive employment scheme in the generation. This offers people from the ages of 18-24 a chance for a real job in a real working environment.

My brother who is 19 years old currently has a job which is an FJF job is a community arts worker. He tells me he enjoys his work, meeting new people and learning tons of new things everyday. Also adding "it's difficult enough as it is for people my age to find work, stopping the FJF programme just makes it harder for young people to get into employment."

Those who have not worked before or getting back into employment have a chance to train and also put something more on their CV and they are taking that away.