Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. anyone drawing unemployment benefit; also as adj.

1941		K. Tennant Battlers 93: As I was walking down the street, the copper said to me: / ‘Do you belong to the doley-oh mob? Well, just come with me.’ / Grabbed me by the collar, tried to run me in; I upped with me fist and knocked him stiff, and we all began to sing.
1965		(con. 1930s) N. Hilliard Power of Joy 213: ‘Is that all your dolie old man can afford, thirty bob?’ He’d tried to explain that his father was working but it hadn’t made any difference. To the well-off it seemed that all who worked for wages were dolies or red-feds.
2001		OnLine Dict. of Playground Sl. 🌐 doley adj. someone who’s only means of subsistence is the money paid to them by the state to avoid hardship because they are unable or unwilling to work.
2013		K. Sampson Killing Pool 279: I’m sat in the bagwash like some fucking doley.

2. someone who illegally draws unemployment benefit while working.

2000

Indep. on Sun. 12 Mar. 15: The ‘dolies’ [those claiming benefits while working] are in a minority.