To see benefits as a safety net, not handouts?

It was a very flawed study.

And excluded any 'work' at all.

So if a Mother worked for a fortnight in a cafe aged 16 and was sacked before she went on to have multiple children starting as a teenager, that couldn't be counted.

She'd 'worked'.

You aren’t unreasonable. Benefits are there for people that need it for a time but not for ever. They are there to help until you can find something else.

I suppose that’s true, but you had to take crap jobs or lose your benefits. I do however think our DC’s generation, born in the 70s & 80s, had far more opportunities in terms of further ed and social mobility. We left school at 15, and went into jobs. DH grew up in a council estate, quite rough, only one of his younger siblings went on to further education. But the next generation of nieces and nephews and our DC was different. They nearly all have highly paid, professional careers.

Their DC, born in this century, are the ones who may now have difficulty in finding careers.

Tbf, to the best of my knowledge employment was easier to come by in those days, though?

That's encouraging given a family such as ours was would get much more help nowadays.

Being unemployed was pretty much a short term thing years ago. People working and paying NI did get earnings related unemployment benefits for a period, and there was some stigma attached to people (men) who weren't in regular work.

Our young family got unemployment benefit when DH’s job folded, that was over fifty years ago. It was hand to mouth, but it was galvanising! DH drove a van, worked on a building site, and built up self employment to a reasonable income. We had two DC, couldn’t risk having more we couldn’t afford. I got temporary work to fit round his hours, eventually going back to a permanent job. My friend’s DH worked 8-4.30 Mon to Fri, she worked evenings and Saturdays in a chippy. Another did some bar work. None of us had childcare apart from our DHs and occasionally each other.

I don’t remember any ‘top up’ benefits, there wasn’t even Child Benefit for the first child until 1979. So the alternative to not working for nuclear families like ours wasn’t appealing.

It's not appealing now.

Can I point out that autism is a disability? Although I do think if you say you (general you) have autism and it doesn't affect you then I am sceptical if you actually have it. My son is still not speaking much at four and I will eat my hat if he doesn't get a diagnosis. Currently waiting on a DLA decision. Maybe you should apply again?

Being unemployed was pretty much a short term thing years ago. People working and paying NI did get earnings related unemployment benefits for a period, and there was some stigma attached to people (men) who weren't in regular work.

Our young family got unemployment benefit when DH’s job folded, that was over fifty years ago. It was hand to mouth, but it was galvanising! DH drove a van, worked on a building site, and built up self employment to a reasonable income. We had two DC, couldn’t risk having more we couldn’t afford. I got temporary work to fit round his hours, eventually going back to a permanent job. My friend’s DH worked 8-4.30 Mon to Fri, she worked evenings and Saturdays in a chippy. Another did some bar work. None of us had childcare apart from our DHs and occasionally each other.

I don’t remember any ‘top up’ benefits, there wasn’t even Child Benefit for the first child until 1979. So the alternative to not working for nuclear families like ours wasn’t appealing.

You may not consider it a huge amount of support, but it’s more than anybody else is going to get.

I work for a council and our service is based in community libraries as are many others. Across the council.service we offer help and advice with various aspects of life and also provide a base for citizens advice who can assist with form filling. That's available to everyone in the borough, no matter their origins.

What you describe doesn't sound like a "huge amount of support" - is there anything else on offer specifically to refugees and migrants?

How exciting…an agenda!

Nope, just a person with a master’s in statistical analysis (a while ago, now, though) who gets a bit riled up by data being misrepresented. A misrepresentation you yourself have demonstrated so beautifully…

Well, in our local Council it involves somebody sitting with you to fill out the forms which is not entirely unreasonable as their English is generally very poor.
But we have indigenous population with very poor English as well that could do with help to navigate the system and that would not be available to them. No funding you see.

The process was sped up, the artwork for in my link explains that's one of the reasons behind increased homelessness among migrants.

Can you outline what the huge amounts of support looks like?

They need to speed up the process of granting or denying asylum. We can all agree on that.
However, actually asylum seekers are given a great deal of support to navigate the system
Which most people young or old Do Not get access to. Yes, they are expected to look for work and generally they’re keen to do so.
But again this huge amounts of support, you could argue our young people don’t need it because they’ve been able to at least access education whether they’ve taken advantage of it or not.
But it does still feel unfair

So when people come to the UK as asylum seekers, they go through a long process, during which time they're given an allowance of £49.28 per person per week (reduced to £9.95 if they're housed somewhere food is provided, even if that food is inedible). If they're granted leave to remain they will be given 28 days notice to leave their home office accommodation. In practice, this is often much less because of the time it takes to receive the notice. They will then have to apply for Universal Credit (they won't have been allowed to work while waiting for their case to be heard) and look for private sector rented accommodation. They'll need to find a month's advance rent and deposit. Numbers of homeless migrants have shot up over recent years as the notice period for Home Office accommodation reduced.
In reality, there are no "free houses" for refugees. They have to navigate the same Kafkaesque system as other renters while struggling with language barriers, lack of familiarity with UK systems, UC expecting them to start looking for work instantly, oh and obviously all the trauma involved with being a refugee. Obviously legal aid is available (limited appointments with lawyers who don't know you and only have a short time to familiarise themselves with your case) because what would happen otherwise?

Yes this country is broken. It must be, to treat the vulnerable and destitute as it does.

BBC News - Number of homeless refugees in England soars, BBC has found - BBC News
www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cy9y3n43192o?app-referrer=deep-link

Depends on context doesn't it, through my work I see families of 3rd/4th generation benefit claimants all of whom have never worked despite various interventions and support. I don't think that can be called a safety net. I also think it's really sad for children growing up not to want more from life because they've never seen anything different.
I do think we need a welfare system for those in need.

Why would an employer want to negotiate a higher wage with someone living rurally, when they could just hire someone who can drive (or more easily access public transport) for less. That makes no sense.

They should build some social housing and rent it out at affordable rates.
That's the way to try and solve that.

The problem being an awful lot of people came across the channel today who'll get legal aid (thanks tax payers) to ensure they can have a free house.
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/migrants-detected-crossing-the-english-channel-in-small-boats/migrants-detected-crossing-the-english-channel-in-small-boats-last-7-days

Don't tell me they'll get a job. Our young people need jobs.

This country is broken.

I don't recall having to say what class I was when applying for benefits 😆

It's classicism I'll give you a couple of anecdotal examples of this. There's a guy I know he has the same education level as me (masters degree), he has the same earning power as me but he lives in a better area than me and pays 1/10th the rent I did, why? He was born in a council house and was provided a council home with below market rent when he became 18 he had a kid which he didn't want with a woman he was unmarried too and because he was already on the system they got extra benefits. I was born in a rather sought after area of London and I'm not one of sixteen children.

Another example: I'm epileptic and my brother has Aspergers. When we were little mum got Invalid Carers Allowance and we had a lifetime award because epilepsy and autism don't go away. When we became 16 that turned into DLA. Around 2004 the government decided to change the criteria for DLA so my brother and I lost our lifetime award entirely, apparently we weren't disabled enough. I fought that for years with the justification of 'well you're well enough to work' as the justification. Well duh? How else would I survive?

When Covid rolled around like many people I lost my job. It didn't take me long to get a new one but when I applied for JSA I was refused because "you'll have no problem finding work and you've got enough saved up to keep you going".

Meanwhile you've got people like my DH former friend who is 'disabled' like all of his family, unemployed and borderline illiterate and because all his family are on benefits for various things (ADHD, Autism, BPD). He gets benefits and then flies off to Japan for 90 days. Happily bragging about it.