If the government genuinely means to help people find work after a long spell of unemployment, they would not have come up with Help to Work, a curious plan that insists on a daily visit to the jobcentre or an enforced period of unpaid labour. If the government means to punish them and save its own face, the plan makes more sense.

There is no evidence that "involuntary volunteering" leads to paid jobs for more than a lucky few. Several studies have shown that just about the same number get jobs after volunteering as those who don't.

What's more, forcing people into unpaid labour contradicts the spirit of volunteering. People usually volunteer because they hope to find themselves in a congenial setting, doing work that is meaningful and personally fulfilling. Otherwise it is just thankless drudgery – no less demoralising and demotivating than long-term unemployment.

Insisting that people visit the jobcentre every day for intensive coaching as an alternative to unpaid work is no less futile. In another universe, where jobcentres are genuinely helpful and supportive places, where staff are able to devote themselves wholeheartedly to understanding the needs, assets and aspirations of jobless people, it could work. In the real world, it's not like that at all. Staff are harried by targets. The atmosphere by all accounts is harsh and joyless.

And insisting on daily visits will certainly deter people from seeking their own solutions. It ties them to one place and robs them of control over their own lives. Being out of control undermines a sense of well-being. Being under a futile obligation will ratchet up a sense of worthlessness. It regiments people's time, leaving little or no scope for doing shorter spells of voluntary work – or other unpaid activities – that they themselves have chosen because they feel it could do some good. It can drive a coach and horses through any personal commitment to caring for children or elderly relatives, or fulfilling other family obligations.

So this initiative can only be understood as an additional punishment for long-term unemployed people. The ground has been well prepared by the government's divisive narrative that separates the population into two opposing camps: strivers and skivers.

According to this carefully honed mythology, strivers are people who are paid for the work they do; they work hard, investing copious effort and often long hours for low pay in order to earn a living, support their families and get on in the world. They are insiders: socially dependable, economically productive and morally righteous. Skivers, on the other hand, are lazy, unreliable and manipulative, choosing to live at others' expense so that they can sleep, watch television, abuse various substances and fritter away their time. They are outsiders: untrustworthy, unproductive and morally disreputable. They are said to get something for nothing because they make no contribution to society, while living off benefits.

There are all kinds of everyday unpaid activity – quite distinct from enforced "volunteering" – that are no less valuable than paid work: child-rearing, putting meals on the table, informal learning and teaching, and much more. In fact, the market economy would grind to a halt without them. Yet the driving philosophy behind the workfare scheme is that paid work is the only thing matters.

This helps to justify a punitive welfare regime. It must be right, so the message goes, to pile on the pressure and make the worthless skivers suffer. Whether it actually helps them find their way back into paid employment is beside the point.