UPON hearing 50 jobs weren’t the subject of hundreds of CVs being waved in the air, ties at the ready and hair brushed to the side for the interview, I fail see how work-shy city jobseekers have the right to keep claiming benefits.

When the Government announced there would be harsher penalties and restrictions for people who had been living off the State for more than two years, some people on my Facebook wall posted angry comments.

They claimed their civil rights were being taken away and it was just a way of enslaving the population – after all, they were entitled to that money because they paid tax and National Insurance – the money they had paid in the past was designed to support them if they lost their job and didn’t work for a while.

Well, no, I disagree. Tax is paid to help run the country, whereas National Insurance is paid simply as your National Insurance, it isn’t called ‘savings to get you through until you find a job you like’.

I have had a job since I was 14, and 10 years later I have never been out of a job, working my way through college and university, working everywhere and anywhere that would pay me because I had and still have a certain lifestyle to maintain.

If I were never to claim jobseekers allowance I wouldn’t get a refund of my national insurance, so why do these people think it is their God-given right to not have a job for so long and claim that cash back?

It’s becoming a lifestyle choice I cannot condone.

Yes, many things are wrong with the benefit system. I am not entitled to claim for many workers’ benefits including income support and working tax credits even though I have a full-time job and live alone, all because I am not yet 25.

But don’t sit and be angry because you can’t change the country’s system.

Get off your backside, get a job, any job – it doesn’t matter if it’s flipping burgers, scanning tins of beans or moving boxes. It doesn’t have to be your dream job for now, but you have to work to change your own life for the better.