"Just Give Me A Job" - Caller Tells James O'Brien About Unemployment Struggles
5 August 2019, 16:25
A caller told James O'Brien her husband has been unemployed for over a year and a half despite going to the job centre saying "he'll do anything" just to pay the bills.
A caller told James O'Brien her husband who previously worked as a head hunter, was made redundant from his job in December 2017 and has struggled to find any type of work since.
She said: "He's 46 years of age, he walked into the job centre last week and said "just give me a job, I'll do anything" and they pretty much had nothing for him."
She said because he lost his job in the recession, "no one wanted to know back then, no one wanted to hire him."
She said he tried to get every job he could get just to pay the bills, and a year on he is trying to get back into his profession, but he can't as everyone says 'you've been out of it for so long".
James O'Brien said: "They're probably not hiring anyway and if they are hiring they can go for someone with a fraction of your husband's experience and pay him a fraction of what your husband would expect."
She explained how he tried to do food delivery work just to get some money in, but due to having some points on his licence, they said they couldn't hire him for insurance reasons.
She said when he tried Christmas delivery work, "they laughed at him because he wasn't the typical person in the line up to get that job."
James O'Brien clarified: 'middle aged, middle class, white man"
The caller continued: "It's horrendous, I have a BMW parked outside the house, it's five years old, I can't afford to service it."
Speaking about having a shortage of money, she went on to say, "I needed to lose some weight and god I've done well with it because I don't need to eat."
She also said: "You have no one knocking on the door to help you because you don't tell anybody."
Watch the full exchange in the video at the top of the page.
