Now I’m what ye call a stupid oul mug,
For I worked hard all through my life,
To keep the oul wolf away from the door,
For myself and the kids and the wife.
I reaped and I sowed, and I worked on the land,
I shovelled the dung and the soil,
Till my hands were as rough as an oul badger’s arse,
From the cold and the heat and the toil.
Then I got a job with computers and such,
And I sat at a desk for my pains,
And thought to myself that long and at last,
I had got started using my brains.
But now I have learned how wrong I could be;
The common sense that I have lacked,
For one fine day the receivers walked in,
And told the whole lot we were sacked.
No problem, I thought, I have paid all my tax,
And my stamps and my full contributions,
Sure I’ll sign on the dole, and sit on my hole,
And they will make my restitutions!
Well, thought to myself with my stamps and my health,
Sure b’God I just couldn’t go wrong.
So I dandered along, and collected a chit,
And sat down with the rest of the throng.
There were lads out of school, in jeans as a rule,
With their knees showing out through the rips,
There were young lassies there, with their bellies all bare,
And wee dolphins tattooed on their hips.
There were accents from all across the wide world,
From Poland, Ukraine, Zimbabwe,
There was even a few of the locals there too –
Lithuanians from near Tandragee
Well, a thing on the wall, my number did call,
With a voice like a computer geek,
And a fella called Graham, just took down my name,
And said to come back Tuesday week!
But, I said, I only come in to sign on,
I got sacked, without my pay packet,
He said there’s a queue, so there’s nowt we can do,
So there’s no point in making a racket.
Well, I filled in a form, forty-six pages long,
And they told me my claim it was sound,
So after a month of running in twice a week,
B’God – I got fifty six pound!
Well, I went in once again, to try to explain,
just why I was getting this strife,
So they said that on my contributions, y’see,
I would get bugger all for the wife.
I explained she’d this habit of eating, y’know,
And she liked the odd Benson & Hedges
When the weather was cold, she insisted on clothes,
to prevent getting blue round the edges
They told me I needed to fill in a form,
to send my claim up for revision,
It was only some forty-six pages long,
I thought I had got double vision.
The missus would need for to claim income-based,
as she had no stamps of her own,
And we needed to bring in the full evidence,
of every damn thing we did own.
Did I have any money in my bank account;
Credit Union, or ‘Save as You Earn’?
Did I have any diamonds hid under the floor,
or a numbered account in Lucerne?
Had I got any cash, in a big offshore stash,
in Euros or maybe gold bullion?
Did I own a van that was used by a man,
Smuggling diesel down by Slieve Gullion?
Well, then they went through all the same for the wife,
Any children we might have concealed?
And the dog and the cats, and the mice and the rats,
And the cow living in the next field
The next bloody question confused me somewhat –
I thought it was fun they were pokin’
They asked if the childer was paying me rent –
Says I, now you’ve GOTTA be jokin’!
Well, after eight weeks, or maybe some more,
We got put up to eighty-eight pound.
Then some redundancy money came through,
And the feckers, they knocked it back down!
Well, I got me a job, and I’m working again,
But I still feel a bit of a fool,
For now I’ve caught on just where I went wrong,
All those years ago, when I left school.
For I was a knob, that started a job,
When I quit the schooling, I am thinking,
If I weren’t so thick, I’d have signed on the sick,
And started out shagging and drinking,
For if I had ten weans, then the capital gains,
Would keep all my bills in abeyance
I could sit on the dole, just scratching my hole,
and live on the family allowance.
And to go one better, get a wee Doctor’s letter,
to say I’m addicted to drink,
For if we’re alcoholics – and a total oul bollix,
We would get extra money, I think!
And of course, the best tack, would be have a bad back,
Not that I’d be thinking of skivin’
For I’d get DLA, and an increase in pay,
and a car I could use taxi drivin’!
If I battered the wife, gave her plenty of strife,
the Social would be bending my ear,
With the kids knicking cars, and hanging round bars,
we’d be in Disneyland every year!
The people I met in the buroo office now,
They were all as nice as could be,
But the system it seems, is no longer designed,
To suit oul buck eejits like me
If you spend all your life just learning the rules,
And all of the things you can claim,
If you camp at the office, each day of your life,
Then money will flow down your drain,
But if it is occasional insurance you need,
To help out when you’re down on your luck
Then I would suggest highway robbery,
For ‘Jobseekers’ is not worth a . . . Damn!