I don’t actually think you quite grasp the subtlety of my business plan here. ibid. Rab to John Sergeant
I am a cost-effective waster. ibid.
I have to discover his world for myself. ibid. John Sergeant
John: What does this cemetery mean to you?
Rab: Nothing at all. ibid.
I thought all men must have no shirts and smell of bins. ibid. Mary
The toxic waster in a jacket that is James Aaron Cotter. ibid. John Sergeant
I know what you’re thinking here. I am not, I am not an alchy. Alchies get pissed and lay about in gutters. ibid. Rab in gutter
I just take it to be sociable. ibid.
Scottish women are always ready. It’s the dampness in the air that does it. ibid. Ella to John Sergeant
I wouldn’t want anything for myself, but I’d like a fatal stroke for Jamesie. ibid.
Where else can you get a fish supper at nine o’clock in the morning? ibid. Rab
It’s a 25/7 job these days avoiding work. ibid. Rab to John Sergeant
There’s nothing that destroys your faith more in human nature than meeting some poor bastard who’s as mad as yourself. ibid. Rab on holiday
Well here we are again back in the warm comforting arms of the good old British recession. You know, I stood here thirty years ago in the dole and Norman Tebbit told me to get on my bike. Now well they give me a classroom chair. That’s what three decades of the slump/boom economy has done for me. I now get lectured sitting down instead of standing up. Rab C Nesbitt s10e2: Fugue, BBC 2011
Somebody’s got to be unemployed so it might as well be them that likes it. ibid. Rab to blind disabled Muslim employment officer
People think that scum hate work. We don’t you know. We don’t. It’s jobs we hate. ibid. Rab’s commentary
The Bush administration has not offered one single aid plan for any unemployed airline worker. Mike Ruppert, The Truth & Lies of 9/11
Jobless Men Keep Going. We Can’t Take Care Of Our Own. US Chamber of Commerce poster
We need four million out of work. Keith Joseph, allegedly to chauffeur
The most obvious example is the biggest issue of all: unemployment. Every Labour leader promised to end ‘the scourge of unemployment’, as Labour’s first Prime Minister Ramsay MacDonald put it. Under MacDonald’s government, unemployment tripled in two years. Why was that? His ministers did not want to increase unemployment. But they had absolutely no control over it. It rose on the high tide of capitalist recession, whose vicious consequences were quite outside the control of governments. Paul Foot, article November 1991, ‘Will Labour Make a Difference’
In the election of 1929 every other policy was subordinated to the single specific aim of reducing unemployment. Jimmy Thomas MP, the railway union leader, was adamant that all socialistic nonsense should be rejected in favour of the practical business of getting the one million unemployed back to work.
A Labour government was elected and Thomas became Lord Privy Seal with special responsibility for the unemployed. The unemployment figures tripled in two years and Thomas, perhaps logically, joined the Tories.
John Prescott cites the post-war majority Labour government as the model of how unemployment can be wiped out. It was wiped out during that government but so it was for the next 13 years or so – under a Tory government.
The first substantial rise in unemployment after the war happened under a Labour government – in 1967. Then in 1972 unemployment reached a million under the Tories.
Labour was furious. It patented a slogan: Back to work with Labour. Under the Labour government which followed, unemployment soared to one and a half million.
The new Tory leader, Thatcher, became a champion of full employment. Then she got into office and we were back to four million unemployed.
The level of unemployment has never this century been set by the government. It has been set by the level of industrial activity, which in turn has been decided by the unelected people who own and control the means of production. Paul Foot, article June 1994, ‘Can Labour Bring Jobs?’
With more than two and a half million people unemployed is JobCentreplus working? Today, six thousand Job Centre staff went on strike over conditions. Dispatches: Tricks of the Dole Cheats, Channel 4 2012
At the heart of the system is something called the Jobseeker’s Agreement. ibid.
JobCentreplus seems to be penalising those who show initiative and organise their own work experience. ibid.
There’s not a surface equal to the old black stuff. Alan Bleasdale, Play for Today: The Black Stuff starring Bernard Hill (Yosser) & Michael Angelis (Chrissie Todd) & Alan Igbon (Loggo Logmond) & Peter Kerrigan (George Malone) & Tom Georgeson (Dixie Dean) ***** opening song, BBC 1980
I’m not scared of you any more, am I? ibid. Yosser’s missus to Yosser
We don’t want the union in our job. You know the way we work, innit. ibid. Dixie in van
You’ve been everywhere; you’re going nowhere. ibid. Dixie to Yosser
Been raped lately, luv? ibid. Yosser to student
You know who I admire? The Arabs. You know why? ’Cause the women know their place over there, they do. ibid. Yosser
The more insecure anyone is, the louder they shout. ibid. student in van
You need more than hard work to make money, you know. You need organisation, you need finance, you need contacts. ibid. Dixie
Let’s be somebody. Let’s live. Let’s do something before the worms get to us. ibid. Yosser at table
We deserve everything they throw at us. We deserve to be stewed in our own piss because we let them do it to us. ibid. George at table
You couldn’t care less if I lived or died ... Shoving, pushing and dragging just to make you and your kind that little bit richer. ibid. George to Mr McKenna
You can stick your job right up your big fat ass. ibid.
You’re finished. Do you understand me? You’re finished. ibid. Mr McKenna to gang
God knows there’s nothing like hope. ibid. George
We lost everything we got and you want sense? ibid. Yosser
I told ya, you’re too good. You’re too soft to survive. And you’re always going to be friggin’ happy, aren’t ya? Aren’t ya? You’re gonna go through life being contented. And easy going. And above all happy. Eh, you don’t want nothing, do ya? You don’t want to be rich. You don’t want to be somebody. Eh all my life I’ve wanted that. I want to be noticed, Chrissie. I want to be somebody. I want to be seen. Eh I am a human being. I am alive. I’m here now. Look at me! ibid. Yosser to Chrissie
I don’t want to be somebody, Yosser. I’m already me. ibid. Chrissie to Yosser
What’s there to grow up for? ibid. Yosser
Chrissie: How much money have we got?
Loggo: Two pound forty seven p. ibid.
Nobody on the dole counts, friend. Alan Bleasdale, Boys from the Black Stuff: Jobs for the Boys ***** Dixie Dean to benefits officer, BBC 1982
I would seriously like to bomb Middlesbrough off the face of the Earth. ibid. Chrissie in van
For every fella who dies in a police station and gets his name in the papers there’s hundreds more who get a quiet little hammering down a dark ally and crawl home to bed. ibid. Snowy Malone in van
Everything’s gone sour; everyone’s locking the door, turning the other cheek, looking after number one. ibid. Snowy in work hut
When you’re scared, unless you’re very special, you think about yourself and yours. You think about feeding the kids and paying the rent. ibid. Chrissie in work hut
Gissa job. Go on, gissit. ibid. Yosser to site boss
Doing something you’re good at – there’s nothing like it. ibid. Snowy
That’s what your superiors are for – to keep you completely in the dark. ibid. Donald the Social Security Officer