Jobcentre Plus - Popular Culture

Popular Culture

The Jobcentre Plus service (and its forerunners the Social Security office, Unemployment Benefit office and Jobcentre/Labour Exchange) have featured in all forms of popular culture, often depicted in a general way to suggest poverty or unemployment. In the 1980s in particular, the Social Security office was frequently used as shorthand for the British recession.

Dramatic representations have included the sitcoms Hancock's Half Hour, Some Mothers Do 'Ave 'Em, Shelley, George and Mildred, Bread, Rab C. Nesbitt, the drama series Boys from the Blackstuff and the films Made in Britain and The Full Monty.

In the black comedy series The League of Gentlemen, a recurring character is Pauline Campbell-Jones (played by Steve Pemberton), the demented leader of a Restart course for a group of unemployed people.

Love on the Dole is a novel by Walter Greenwood, about working class poverty in 1930s northern England. It has been made into both a play and film.

In music, the reggae group UB40 took their name from the form used to 'sign on' at the Unemployment Benefit office (the form is now designated ES40JP). The initials "DHSS" are recited several times by singer George Michael in Wham!'s 1983 hit single Wham Rap!, a tongue-in-cheek celebration of wilful unemployment. The first album by Half Man Half Biscuit was called Back in the DHSS, a play on The Beatles song "Back in the U.S.S.R.".