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this post was submitted on 27 Jun 2025
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Pasting my comment from Lemmygrad:
Much as it would be totally in character for Starmers Labour, that is not what’s happening here.
Dying To Work charter aims to protect terminally ill people from dismissal and give them flexible work conditions. Civil Services signing up to it, boosting the total number of protected employees from 1.5 mln to 3.5 mln, is a very good thing.
Here’s how it started: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OEf21fpcDjI
The example charter: https://www.dyingtowork.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2017/09/Example-Charter.pdf
This is a classic example of labour struggle, fighting for the working rights of vulnerable people. It’s a Trade Union Congress initiative, all the UK unions support it and you should too.
From the charter: "We will provide our employees with the security of work, peace of mind and the right to choose the best course of action for themselves and their families which helps them through this challenging period with dignity and without undue financial loss"
The fact that they even mention financial loss is enough to show that there will be pressure put on people to continue working even when they don't feel up to it. Why would anyone want to keep going to work while they are dying for any reason other than money? It would be better to provide properly for sick and dying people so they aren't pressured to keep working.
It's no different than what labour are doing with the disabled, acting like it's a favour to disabled people to force them back into work because it's what's best for them. When really it's about not having to pay them benefits any more.
It's very different.
One is protecting employees from dismissal and making employers offer working conditions that suit terminally ill employees. It does not force employees to stay at work and it does not cancel any benefits.
The other is cutting benefits to force disabled people into work they are not fit to do.
The 2 policies are part of the same machine. The whole point is to keep more workers in the economy to boost the profit rate.
This policy in particular reduces the "excuse" that some dying and/or disabled people might have that they cannot find work because their employer fired them. This policy makes the other policy more effective, and also acts as propaganda/social conditioning to make the other policy go down more easily.
It's not a government policy, it's a trade union initiative. UK government signed the charter as an employer of 2 mln civil servants. It's a good thing when large employers concede to trade unions and give their workers more rights. It's a small improvement but that's what trade unions do, they try to negotiate better working conditions and rights with employers, they don't cardinally change the system.
Fuck Starmers govt, but let's not piss on the work trade unions do and present fight against unfair dismissals as some nefarious plot to exploit the people.
It's not a policy and it absolutely does not do that. It has no effect on whether people qualify for benefits or not. All it does is that employers who sign up to this charter vouch to not fire their employees for getting ill, and to be supportive in finding suitable working arrangements. It doesn't prevent employees from leaving their jobs and it doesn't diminish their chances of getting benefits.
Right now there's a lot of talk about how disabled people should be made to find "some work that they can do" rather than getting benefits. This is now normalised and accepted by most of society. Got cancer/blind/paralysed/whatever? well no you can't rest at home. There must be some work you can do and the DWP will refuse you disability benefits because there must be some work you can do.
Well this trades unions policy is the first step down that road for the terminally ill. At first it gives terminally ill people the right to work (and again, who on earth wants to spend their last months working?) but soon the government/DWP will start using it as an excuse to deny dying people benefits even if they want to die peacefully at home instead of at their desk. No excuse to stay off work while you're dying, after all you can't be fired and they have to find some work you can do! These other dying people are working, so can you! So what if you feel sick, exhausted or keep fainting? Your employer is legally obliged to modify your work so you can keep doing it!
And this already happens with the non-terminally ill. People have literally dropped down dead at their desks after being denied disability benefits and having to go back to work. If you think this won't end up being used against terminally ill people, you have way more faith in this sick government than i do.
Yes, that is the policy I am talking about. The UK government wants this initiative to be expanded, so it signing onto this charter. It's a fairly standard thing for governments to trial potential policies by implementing them on their own employees. The government signing on also further normalises the initiative, giving it momentum that could be used to create a national law.
The move should be considered in a broader context. Suppose starmer's government manages to make this initiative into a national wide law. This would represent a victory for the trade unions? Certainly. Would it, in theory constitute an extra right? Yes. In a better context, would this be a nice law to have? Yeah.
However, in the context of starmer's broader eugenics agenda, it would be a win for the eugenicists. It would give them ammunition to point how the dying and disabled don't need government assistance because they can get a job and can't be fired for having a terminal illness. It plays right into that narrative in a time where the UK government knows that their disability benefit cuts are controversial.
If the government was increasing benefits, or expanding them, or making them easier to get or anything of that sort of nature, I would in fact be praising this very initiative/move.