Ed Balls forgets to engage brain

[Madge5]

Is anyone else as enraged as I with Ed Balls' comments this morning regarding the Tories tax cuts for married couples?
He said it's unfair because the man can beat up his wife then leave taking the tax break with him to his next marriage and start all over again. Eh? Is this what really happens in marriages? Are we women being beaten up by our husbands, are we left destitute, unable to stand up again and remarry?
Or is he implying this is what happens in poorer families, who are the ones to benefit from this proposal.

[ronshar]

No its just the usual Labour party bollocks.

I would love for my DH to get my tax allowance as I am at home looking after the children and so not using mine!

He doesnt beat me nor is he planning to I hope!

[DuelingFanjo]

I'd love to know what Cameron means when he says

"but I think we know now from years of evidence that a society where more people are married is a stronger society."

[DuelingFanjo]

sorry - George Osborne said it.

[DuelingFanjo]

Abd I don't know what Ed Balls said fully but the BBC are quoting it as

"It's gesture politics which is deeply, deeply unfair. It's targeted at some lower income families but only a lower income family where you can afford to have one parent who stays at home full-time."

It would not support widows or people whose partners walked out on them", he added.

[DuelingFanjo]

OH - the OP got the quote completely wrong anyway

he said

"I don't think it's right for politicians to come along and say you're bette if you're married, to say to children you're not quite as good if your parents are not married. as specially if you parent is a single parent because an abusive father beat up your mum and then left. The idea that you are then told that you're second class and should be worse of; if you are a widow for whatever reason the idea that you should be getting less support...." and so on

can be heard in full here

[DuelingFanjo]

though maybe there was more to the interview where he did say "it's unfair because the man can beat up his wife then leave taking the tax break with him to his next marriage and start all over again" ?

link OP?

[unfitmother]

Good precis DuelingFanjo

I watched the interview Ed Balls was 'fanbloodytastic' and summed up the banality of the poilcy really well, OP is quoting one sentance, out of context.

[unfitmother]

He did say that, as an example of how poorly thought out this election bribe is. Any person left by a partner, abusive or not, would lose the tax break on divorce (or being widowed). New marrrige by former partner would give them a new tax break.

[anastaisia]

Actually, I see this policy as being an equaliser for the group of parents who currently miss out on govrnment support they would be entitled already if both parents worked or they were single.

And I say that as a single working mother, not as a married SAHM.

I personally don't think it should be judged on marriage though, living together as if you are married should be enough. But Labours current tax credit support does favour couples/individuals who do things the way Labour want: year off mat leave, back to work a min of 16 hours, use registered childcare.

[Madge5]

But surely the first wife can also remarry and claim back the tax break? Or am I living on another planet? How about stay at home dads; do they get beaten up by their philandering wives who then leave to remarry and take their tax break with them leaving the first husband without?
BTW, I don't think I got the quote wrong, the one quoted by DuelingFanjo was not the one on BBC News 24 this morning.

[DuelingFanjo]

I am pretty sure his point was that people get married but don't always stay married because sometimes they marry fuckwits. Why should they and their children be penalised and treated differently because they are single just because their marriage broke up through no fault of their own, as would be the case if a man became violent towards his spouse.

He used a bad example to try and explain how tax breaks for married people discriminates against the unmarried, including those who choose not to be married and those who once were married but for whatever reason are no longer married.

yes, anyone can re-marry and get the £150 benefit if they are earning under a certain wage but why should married people be rewarded for simply being married?

the only reason anyone would think extra money for being married was a good idea is because they believe marriage is better than cohabiting or being single. It's a reward for doing what they think is a good thing and it's strongly connected to the tory idea that a typical family with married parents is good, a 'broken' family is bad.

[Quattrocento]

Of course EB is, for example ...

They are lunatics all these politicians. It is not the wives or the husbands who should have transferable tax allowances. It's the CHILDREN. They have personal allowances from birth and have to pay tax should their income exceed the thresholds. It's their allowances that should be transferable to either parent ...

[claig]

"Ed Balls forgets to engage brain"

err, what brain?

[TDiddy]

I think the idea that people will get married for a 150 tax break is what is most barking mad? However much, I don't warm to Ed Balls, we have to blame the Tories for this one?

[MmeBlueberry]

The point of the policy is to elevate the status of marriage - to encourage and normalise marriage within our society, in line with what other countries do.

The amount of money is token at this time because the country is broke, but there will be scope for expanding it as the economy improves under Tory management.

Children are recognised in the tax system - it's call Child Benefit.

[TDiddy]

Understood but from another perspective you could say the idea is "further stigmatise single parenthood". Many single parents don't choose to be single.

There must be better ways of rewarding responsible parenting.

[TDiddy]

This policy is born out the simplistic analysis that married couples are better for children etc. But no one has provide that there is "causation behind this correlation". That is, how do we no that the marriage instution is the CAUSE of stable, happy household.

[MmeBlueberry]

More single parents come from cohabiting relationsips than fom married ones. Marriage is more likely to succeed than cohabitation. Married people are less likely to run at the first sign of trouble.

[TDiddy]

MmeBlueberry - you may be correct but, I must say that you should not be tempting into thinking that the correlation of two factors means "causation". It is possible, even likely, that you are comparing biased samples: So, possible that on the whole, those who are committed and less "likely to run" are the ones who sign up to marriage in the first place...so it may not be marriage that is doing the trick but the nature/outlook of the people who sign up for marriage.

These are generalisations so I do not want to offend unmarried folk but I am saying that it is annoying that politicians use statistics dishonestly to grab headlines.

This is very dishonest if not irresponsible. I think that there should be better more direct ways of encouraging responsible parenting. But this is about sending signals to the middles classes to get their votes. Pure and simple.

[TDiddy]

Quattrocento - good point about having allowances attached to the children.

[Madge5]

Why do we always think in black and white terms? Why is it that if marriage is good, cohabiting and single parenting must therefore be bad? Why can't it be, cohabiting and single parenting is good but marriage is better, even if it's fractionally better?
And as far as single parenting versus marriage is concerned, just ask the children. All the ones I know, including my own would far rather their mum and dad lived together than apart, regardless of how grown up the split is. So maybe that's the statistic that should be done.

[TDiddy]

Madge5 - good points. The social scientists could do far better key factor analysis than married vs unmarried but that wouldn't win as many votes.

It's the Tories this time but they all do this lazy sort of policy making because that is what catches the eye. Hard graft politics doesn't win votes. Simple as that.

[MmeBlueberry]

You can bury your head in the sand all you like, TDiddy.

It doesn't actually matter about causation. Experience shows that marriage is more successful than cohabitation. There are planty of hypotheses as to why this is so. I'm sure if you were of a mind to it, you could plow through many studies and do a meta-analysis which would confirm what is basically common sense.

There are important elements that are in abundance in marriages, that are less so in co-habitations. Of course, some co-habitations are marriages without the paperwork, but most aren't, and some marriages are more akin to co-habitations. When you are dealing with people, there are many grey areas.

Having stable family units is a good thing, and marriage increases the odds of families sticking together.

The main purpose of a taxation system is clearly to raise revenue, but a secondary purpose is to influence behaviour. I am glad that I live in a country where this happens as I like to choose for myself whether to do one thing or another - much better than to have the latest government whim dictated by law. We are not in a police state and we should be thankful for this blessing.

[jkklpu]

Although I agree that the Tory marriage bribe is bloody nonsense, I have always had a problem with Ed Balls as I think he looks just like Buzz Lightyear.