{"id":10449,"date":"2016-11-03T17:07:57","date_gmt":"2016-11-03T17:07:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/unitelive.org\/?p=10449"},"modified":"2016-11-10T12:38:15","modified_gmt":"2016-11-10T12:38:15","slug":"me-versus-the-world","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/?p=10449","title":{"rendered":"\u00e2\u20ac\u0098Me versus the world\u00e2\u20ac\u2122"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/div>\n

With Ken Loach\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s award-winning film I, Daniel Blake<\/em> exposing the cruel reality of life those caught up in Britain\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s brutal benefits\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 system, we asked people to tell us what it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s like to be at the sharp end of this government\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s cruel and punitive benefits\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 regime.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

So meet the real-life\u00c2\u00a0Daniel Blakes \u00e2\u20ac\u201c names have been changed to protect identity.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Today we meet Tommy.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u015bI was first sanctioned four years ago after becoming homeless. I went to the cash machine as usual to find that my ESA (employment support allowance) had not been paid.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u015bFirst thing in the morning I went to my local job centre to try to find out why my benefits had not gone in and spoke with an adviser who looked on the system. All she said was that I had been sanctioned for eight weeks and said that I should ring the 0845 number. I had explained that I was street homeless and had no calling credit to ring the 0845 number but was only met by her telling me that I had to ring the number to get the decision re-considered by the \u00e2\u20ac\u0098decision-maker\u00e2\u20ac\u2122.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u015bI explained to her again about my situation and this time she asked the security guard to escort me out. Luckily I bumped into a friend who let me use their mobile to make the call.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u015bAfter 20 minutes on hold I spoke to a woman who explained again that as I had no permanent address and didn’t notify DWP about my change in circumstances was why I had been sanctioned \u00e2\u20ac\u201c but she would put a form through and I had to wait for a call from the decision maker within the next week.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u015bI asked how I was supposed to survive for the week with no money and having to live on the streets and all she said was “I don’t know sir”.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u015bThe next seven days were awful. There were many times I felt like giving up. On the seventh day the \u00e2\u20ac\u0098decision maker\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 called me and asked about my situation again which I explained all over again.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u015bLuckily the \u00e2\u20ac\u0098decision maker\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 decided to overturn the sanction and immediately released my payment but said next time this happens again the sanction would remain. The whole process made me feel like I was a criminal on a public trial and made me feel that it was me versus the whole world.\u00e2\u20ac\u0165<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Tomorrow\u00c2\u00a0UNITElive meets more \u00e2\u20ac\u0098Daniel Blakes.\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

With Ken Loach\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s award-winning film I, Daniel Blake exposing the cruel reality of life those caught up in Britain\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s brutal benefits\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 system, we asked people to tell us what it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s like to be at the sharp end of this government\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s cruel and punitive benefits\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 regime.   So meet the real-life\u00c2\u00a0Daniel Blakes \u00e2\u20ac\u201c names have been […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":10451,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[17],"tags":[76,491,625],"wps_subtitle":"Homeless Tommy: how sanctions made him feel 'on trial'","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10449"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=10449"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10449\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10452,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10449\/revisions\/10452"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/10451"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=10449"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=10449"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=10449"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}