Helping the government save money

Add into that those who get prescriptions from their dentist for fluoride toothpaste. Utterly ridiculous. My sister in law works in a dental surgery and they have a pre-inked stamp and would stamp entire packs of paper prescriptions in advance for the dentist to sign and hand out, basically to anyone who asked for one! Yes, "some" people with specific teeth issues need higher strength fluoride toothpaste, but the dentists are "happy" enough to give prescriptions to anyone. No surprise it's the "freebie" brigade who ask for them, i.e. OAPs, disabled, unemployed, etc.

It is ludicrous. I helped my grandmother with her online prescription last month. Amongst about 11 medications, she throws ibuprofen and paracetamol in her basket every month. Not because she has any sort of chronic pain condition, but just because she can.

They would cost literally pence for her as an individual. But for the taxpayer, multiple pensioners billing basic and cheap medications to us every month stacks up.

Even with a chronic pain condition, I think anyone with the means to do so (essentially anyone but the homeless) should pay for their own cheap painkillers like paracetamol and ibuprofen. Generous free prescriptions are another bribe for pensioners as a voting block.

I agree OP.
I think my DH should get free prescriptions for his medication for a condition caused by going to war. He also needs hearing aids for damaged eardrums caused by firing a light gun whilst in the army for 20yrs. We paid over £300 for them.

It is ludicrous. I helped my grandmother with her online prescription last month. Amongst about 11 medications, she throws ibuprofen and paracetamol in her basket every month. Not because she has any sort of chronic pain condition, but just because she can.

They would cost literally pence for her as an individual. But for the taxpayer, multiple pensioners billing basic and cheap medications to us every month stacks up.

Even with a chronic pain condition, I think anyone with the means to do so (essentially anyone but the homeless) should pay for their own cheap painkillers like paracetamol and ibuprofen. Generous free prescriptions are another bribe for pensioners as a voting block.

Well in my post of 10:02 I told you about my experience of being given an exemption certificate as part of getting my cancer diagnosis, and your wish to "kickstart a discussion" clearly isn't strong enough to bother to engage with that post. At the time I had a reasonably paid job and would not have qualified for benefits but I certainly didn't have a magic money tree to rustle up a spare £115 for a prepayment certificate on that horrible dat. If you genuinely think a mum like me, in my 40s, should immediately on being given news like that either have to fork out a sum.of money like that or cope with the process of means-testing admin, whilst in mental freefall with no idea how long she will be capable of working, or how long she'll be alive - well there's something seriously wrong with your humanity and empathy.

I also made a suggestion for how the government coukd tackle and reduce a current expenditure of £66bn per year but you haven't bothered to respond to that either.

So I do not believe you actually want to kickstart a discussion, you just want to punish sick people for getting sick.

Illness is not a sin to be punished, nor a failing that wise people avoid. It doesn't matter whether someone is rich or poor, no one deserves to have to purchase access to their healthcare. Healthy people, whether rich or poor, don't deserve to keep more of their money than sick people in the same income bracket. 3 million people per year who don't qualify for an exemption certificate buy a prepayment certificate, which indicates that they need more than 12 prescriptions per year. Most people need fewer than 3 prescriptions per year. The government would get more money by abolishing all prescription charges for everyone, and raising taxes by £30 per year per person (£2.50 per month) so that these costs are shared by everyone rather than specifically being paid for by those who are most sick.

Here's another idea that would save huge amounts of government expenditure - pass a law that all the privately-owned rental properties where the landlords continually fail to meet their obligations to ensure the property is a healthy and safe place to live while charging extortionate rents - which cause high government expenditure on dealing with health issues from living in cold damp mouldy properties as well as pushing up expenditure on Housing Benefit - should be forfeit and taken over by social housing providers with no compensation to the exploitative former owners who so thoroughly failed to meet their obligations. These non-profit organisations can then sell some of the properties to developers to be fixed up and sold to First Time Buyers (with a clause in the title deeds that they must only be owned by single-property owner-occupiers for 20 years) and use the money to fix up the remainder to be rented to people who need to be in rented accommodation for any reason rather than buying at a fair and reasonable rent thus slashing the housing benefit bill by way more than your nasty let's-attack-ill-people idea.

But those people can claim free prescriptions?

But she is paying into the system more than most!!! How unfair is that - she’s paying massive amounts of tax - she should be able to get essential medicines.

But we can’t afford to give freebies to people who have a lot of money.

It is ludicrous. I helped my grandmother with her online prescription last month. Amongst about 11 medications, she throws ibuprofen and paracetamol in her basket every month. Not because she has any sort of chronic pain condition, but just because she can.

They would cost literally pence for her as an individual. But for the taxpayer, multiple pensioners billing basic and cheap medications to us every month stacks up.

Even with a chronic pain condition, I think anyone with the means to do so (essentially anyone but the homeless) should pay for their own cheap painkillers like paracetamol and ibuprofen. Generous free prescriptions are another bribe for pensioners as a voting block.

It doesn't have to be like that though. How did the trial I wonder, the 2 years are up now surely.

A pre payment certificate costs £120 a year. You can pay it in installments.

How does 80 year old Mabel, on state pension, remortgage her (fully paid for) home?
if she sells up……she still has to f’ing live somewhere.

I was thinking of people who live in Britain, is that a problem?

It's not really all.about the money though. It gets said repeatedly that it isn't but yet that's all that people see.

Personally I'd like to see the universal income that was trialed come in. Every household gets that and they can either live on that or work on top for more coin. No other types of benefits available. If you're pure minted you can opt out.

Stops the almighty taxpayer feeling hard done too.

Universal basic income is massively expensive and would see tax hikes. It would also mean those who cannot work would be on the lowest amount with no additional help. There’s good reasons that no major economies have adopted the process.

government has moved further and further away from universal benefits and more towards means testing and targeting benefits and I can only see that increasing.

It's not really all.about the money though. It gets said repeatedly that it isn't but yet that's all that people see.

Personally I'd like to see the universal income that was trialed come in. Every household gets that and they can either live on that or work on top for more coin. No other types of benefits available. If you're pure minted you can opt out.

Stops the almighty taxpayer feeling hard done too.