Saturday, February 15, 2020

UK Welfare Reform Bill Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1750 words

UK Welfare Reform Bill - Essay Example It instead encourages them to work hard and earn their own income (Meyer and Sullivan, 2004). The bill compels all the people who claim benefits to follow an employment advisor's directions or sanctions be placed on their benefits. This is in order to ensure that any benefits claims are made in the right way. These new conditions are meant to ensure that only deserving people are considered for benefits. This bill proposes that beneficiaries work for their benefits through some sort of a workfare with a labor rate of about '1.73 hourly for 35 hours every week. This bill further proposes the piloting of this workfare and its subsequent rollout without any further primary legislation. The workfare clause of the bill has attracted a lot of criticism from various quarters who have proposed various amendments to the clause. The UK Department of Welfare and Pensions has refuted any claims of workfare increasing the likelihood to find work. The department particularly notes that workfare is not effective in getting jobs for people, especially in jurisdictions of weak labor markets that have a high rate of unemployment. The department also faults the bill's effectiveness in for individuals who have numerous barriers to work. The bill has further been accused of reducing employment chances since it limits the time for job hunting and also fails to offer the necessary experience and skills needed by the employers. Work-related activity The bill allows Jobcentre Plus and other private contractors to give mandatory directions to single parents as well as disabled and sick claimants. These directions require these claimants to undertake specific activities or risk facing sanctions on their benefits. This move will ensure that the claimants put some effort towards improving themselves rather than waiting on the government to do it for them. Increased conditions for couples This bill introduces two new changes for any couples who claim benefits. First, it removes the disabled or sick people's rights to claim ESA for couples where one of the partners can claim JSA. Second, this bill requires partners of JSA, ESA and IS claimants to participate in work-related activities or face sanctions. This in effect means that these partners have no choice but to work. Contributions for ESA and JSA This bill greatly restricts eligibility to contribute to ESA and JSA. Those working will now be forced to work longer to be able to pay the required contributions to qualify for the benefits. This will go a long way in reducing the number of qualified contributors to JSA and ESA. This will as a result force many of these claimants to means-tested benefits. The means-tested benefits are not only complex, but also suffer low take up. Others will end up not having any entitlement to means-tested benefits. Carers and maternity allowances This bill proposes the abolishment of dependent additions paid with maternity and carers' allowances. Both benefits are not means-tested and its beneficiaries are the poorest of the poor in the country. The removal of these benefits will lead to over-reliance on means-tested benefits. Those who do not pass the means test will be forced to live on a very low level of income (Scott et al, 2003). Offenders' benefit penalties The bill proposes a four-week benefit suspension for those

Sunday, February 2, 2020

Freemasonry and the Eternal East Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Freemasonry and the Eternal East - Essay Example What then are these symbols These are the symbols of the Fraternity which reveal the inner most spiritualities of life. In the true tradition of how Masonic idealism, along with the profounder aspects of the notions of a Fraternity this essay will discuss the journey of the Freemason to find reality,to find God as Manly P. states "Infinity mocks our puny efforts to imprison it in definition and dogma. Our most splendid realizations are only adumbrations of the Light. In his endeavours, man is but a mollusc seeking to encompass the ocean. Yet man may not cease his struggle to find God. There is a yearning in his soul that will not let him rest, an urge that compels him to attempt the impossible, to attain the unattainable." Manly .P goes on to state the relationship of the freemason with his soul which is heaven bound and takes the freemason to a new realm of peace and happiness. For him a mason is a true mason due to his true, pure and well prepared heart which makes room for the fraternity of builders. Once he is ready he will begin his journey to the East to search for what is lost-what he is meant to find. The eternal paradox is that freemasonry is not a philosophy of life after death.It is a philosophy of spiritual growth and spiritual healing.It is the paradox of this philosophy is that you can walk for miles and miles and wind up finding happiness at your own door. Many writers refer to freemasonry " spiritual ethics" of mankind and thus it is more than a religion.(Manly P.)As the Mason graduates from an average to a Master Mason this coming of age and blossoming from a student to a teacher as assumes the position of a "the sun (as a ) a great reflector of light, who radiates through his organism, purified by ages of preparation, the glorious power which is the light of the Lodge"(Manly P)The Master Mason has the great snake Hydra, passing through it and this will illuminate him with the rising sun towards the "immortal" East which is his end and beginning . At this end the True Master seeks many beginnings and many ends to fraternity's as his students now make his own journeys and embark upon new destinations of the self. At this moment of loneliness the Master Mason is in the moments of the finding of himself as Manly P. notes "The temple is finished and in my faithful Master is found the missing stone." This is a moment of transformation. A kind of a spiritual death and rebirth when mind and the heart of the Master Mason who has come so far will be in perfect harmony as he looks towards the eternal East the wisdom and light of which he has sought through out this journey. Freemasonry points towards the soul of the man reaching its highest understanding, the coherence and wholesomeness that comes forth from an eternal centre, and comes full circle in his search for the beauty of completeness, inner peace and in essence God. But then we come to the final query.Is this a philosophy of a life after deathWhat and where does death stand here.If we speak of death as the transformation and the journey of the Freemason during his walk to the