I understand o sung wu's position that the military isn't for everyone. However, we can never be completely sure who will succeed in there until we give a few a go. I know some ex-service people who become complete ratbags in any other context. Some straight A students don't make it through basic training. Going back to the poor boy who died, I find some if the complaints being made unreasonable. He wasn't cheap labour for a business, he was emptying bins at a showground. That job should require a five minute induction. He complained of a back problem. However, those schemes can't make it too easy for scammers to get out of work. I doubt they were working too hard. He was getting $450 per fortnight. I think that is a fairly reasonable amount.

The huge US military is effectively a training/unemployment scheme. A huge percentage of their tradesmen & women have been trained in the defence force. It offers the opportunity to many from the rust belt of the US to get the training that is no longer available in their shrinking home towns.

Without it the US would be a much more unhappy place. We would do well to do something similar, but with training only offered to those with the ability & education to handle the knowledge training required.

For those not able to handle trade training, a land army, used to clear the huge areas of invasive noxious weeds, & feral animals that our national parks have become, would at least get them used to getting out of bed in the morning, & doing something useful.

Paul,

Work for the dole can also be considered an internship which gives the intern work experience to hone his skills, a chance to determine what he would really like to do, and something to put on his CV that will give him a head start on other applicants.

With respect SPECIAL DELIVERY; not wanting to sound rude but what precisely do you want to do, given the limited amount or resources this already debt laden country has? Create an analogous organisation similar to the Army, heavy on the discipline and personal responsibility etc. And have suitable ex-service personnel, teach them, these important values in life, while instilling them with personal discipline?

They tried a similar programme in the UK. Both directing staff (all ex soldiers of varying ranks) and participants, were all attired in Army style uniforms and their ace in the hole was, if anyone chose to buck the system, they were ordered to leave, and were consequently met at the main gate by police. There only departure to your proposal SD, each of the participants were convicted youths, and recidivists. And it was the UK Court who mandated they either attend this 'quasi Army Camp' or alternatively, go to Gaol or Borstal, depending on their age. But Dole bludgers - threaten to cut-off their dole I guess?

Paul105, I belong to a volunteer group that gathers one Sunday afternoon a month and collects rubbish from the sides of roads, drinking camps and a local aboriginal town camp.
We do it because we hate the sight of all that rubbish destroying the pristine beauty of the Kimberley.
Our dignity is not diminished, we don’t feel demeaned, we dont feel like second class citizens.
And the most glaring piece of Information about the group is that not one unemployed person belongs to it! Despite numerous, well publicised requests for more members, the only people who turn up are small business owners, well paid employees or retired people like myself.
Quite frankly I think many unemployed would benefit from having to work for their income.
As for destroying a persons dignity by making them work for the dole, I would think the opposite is true. There is nothing more soul destroying than being given money for nothing.

I'm retired now, but the thought that I'd not be able to find work of any kind, would cause me to enter a deep depression. For me at least, work was like a kind of therapy, whenever someone in my private life got me down, it was the fact that I needed to 'buck-up' and go off to work, was therapy in itself. Then again, no matter how much skin 'n bark I might've lost from my Inspector during the previous shift - without the ability of attending work, would be utterly devastating for me.

There was something quite satisfying for me at least, that I was always secure in the knowledge that I had a good job to go to, on a regular basis. The very thought of being made unemployed, was a complete anathema to me, as it would be for many other folk too I would imagine.

It's for this reason, I feel quite sorry for those who are out of work and are trying hard in seeking meaningful employment. Even those who deliberately elude work, in order they can lay around content, to subsist on the dole cheque; for the latter, they don't know what they're missing by avoiding work altogether?