Members of Stafford Socialist Party did a stall outside Stafford College of FE recently.
We set up at around 10.00 and had two hours of what proved to be a very popular stall with the first group of students coming over who remembered us from the demos held in the town last December.
We raised the issue of youth unemployment and also the forthcoming Jarrow March for jobs. The campaign proved very popular with many students telling us of their experience at trying to find work, with various quotes such as;
“I was looking all summer for something but couldn’t find anything”
“I was working in catering but they didn’t keep me on”
The poor amount of minimum wage raised a lot of anger with one student saying her job in a fast food chain paid £4.30 an hour!
One person also told us that as he had tried and then failed to find work, he was looking to join the Army as a last resort as he would not do it if he could find a decent job!
I asked one lad whether he had gone to the Jobs Fair that had recently been held in Stafford and he replied that he had and said what a waste of time it was. He said that the employers he spoke to told him there were no vacancies on that day and recommended that he check their relevant websites!
There was also anger about the closure of Connexions as there is no longer an office in Stafford.
On the whole, the stall was very successful with one lad expressing an interest in coming to our next branch meeting and quite a few others filling in our cards for more information.
