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An unemployed graduate is challenging the legality of a Government work experience scheme that she says forced her to work for free in Poundland.

Cait Reilly, 22, said she had to leave her voluntary work at a museum to stack shelves in the budget store for two weeks or risk losing her unemployment benefits.

Her legal team is asking a judge at London'​s High Court to quash Department for Work and Pensions regulations under which the "​sector-based work academy"​ workfare scheme was set up to help young unemployed people into work.

They say the requirement under the 2011 regulations to carry out mandatory work breaches article 4 of the European Convention on Human Rights, which prohibits slavery and forced labour.

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