Abolition of child benefit for higher rate taxpayers is an attack on women

Zeph - I thought you were responding to my post (replying to Lucky). Sorry.

(btw - I used an increase of 5% in my rough calculation).

Maybe, but that's a separate point isn't it?

Zeph -

" a lot of those in that bracket would be quite happy to see an increase in the 40% rate"

You might be right (who knows?) But the approx £1.5bn that will raise won't go far. An incoming Labour government would need to find a lot more.

If MN is anything to judge by, actually a lot of those in that bracket would be quite happy to see an increase in the 40% rate. But the abolition of CB for this group represents the equivalent of a truly enormous tax rise if you're on £44k or so and has of course been implemented in a hugely unfair way with the dual income household "anomaly".

Sorry to contradict you slightly Lucky1979 but I'd say Ed M is paying close attention to the reaction from the £45k-£55k earners.

This group represent the 'bulk' of the £45k -£100k earners (though still only approx 2 million tax payers). If they are sensitive to tax rises - then it's going to be difficult for Labour to raise the tax it'll need to build public services back.

The ability to afford a tax rise will vary - but if parents with dependant dcs would struggle - what about parents with kids at uni or 30 somethings manically saving to buy their first home?

"I am talking about the Tory voters at the bottom of the higher rate tax, ie those on £45,0000 odd a year. They could well be the 'new' Tory voters and they will Not Be Happy, as they certainly do not class themselves as well off."

They are a really small proportion of the population though. You're not going to win an election with just them. You need to speak to the people on the average wage as, well, there are 85% of people who are not HRT who I don't notice getting that upset about the whole thing.

The 45K - 50K earners (who seem to be the ones upset on here) are even a small proportion of the 15% will need to have a think about the newly left-leaning Labour and really work out if they would be better off, because I bet Labour wouldn't be giving CB back to them. I notice Ed Miliband has been very quiet about the whole affair, don't think he's that bothered really. You might well end up with not getting your CB back plus a heft in income tax as well.

She didn't look like she needed it but I suppose you never can tell

It's the inevitable downside of removing a Universal Benefit, isn't it? Once there's a definition for qualification, people will go to great lengths to meet the definition. Loopholes will be found and will have to be closed off. If she needs £20/week that badly maybe she's worse off than she looks :)

I've overheard at least one conversation where a very well off woman who still owns property in London intends to list that as her address and the father of her children will list the family home, they aren't married so what will they do about that I wonder ? She's not filling out a benefit form that asks about her marital status or living arrangements after all.

I would be one of those Tory voters that earns enough to pay 40% tax and whilst as a single parent I'm not exactly dancing a jig at having both CTC and CB withdrawn in fairly quick succession, I never thought it was particularly fair that I got benefits in the first place. It's not the prevailing view on Mumsnet at the moment but many others - not just the silver-spoon brigade - feel the same way.

Well-off Tory voters in the DC/GO bracket probably have simply no idea about CB, hardly even realise it exists.

I am talking about the Tory voters at the bottom of the higher rate tax, ie those on £45,0000 odd a year. They could well be the 'new' Tory voters and they will Not Be Happy, as they certainly do not class themselves as well off.

Obviously the lower rate tax payers (traditionally non Tory voters) are not affected anyway.

Don't be so sure. The people who thought that CB should be paid to everyone, rich or poor, as a principle would not have been natural Tory voters in the first place. Well-off Tory voters who are losing CB won't like it to start with but will struggle to argue against the principle of the better-off paying for themselves - because that's a fairly standard conservative position.

And for that swathe of the population on moderate to low earnings, paying basic rate tax, they are unaffected by the CB change and may also find the idea of the cap on benefits quite appealing into the bargain. I think if anyone was alienated by the last Government, it was that group

Actually I think that, in one fell swoop, DC has alienated a vast swathe of the population:

The people who think that CB should be paid on principle, as a universal benefit, nothing to do with income.

But also the Daily Mail readers people who rant against benefit scroungers who now find themselves in the position of losing a benefit.

Job well done really. As someone old enough to remember the Tories last time round, I am not in the faintest bit surprised. Hopefully it will ensure a much larger loss for them at the next general election.

(However, the 'sharp elbowed middle classes' will find a way round it, with 'creative' accounting no doubt, DC shouldn't underestimate them.....).

It will be quite funny if the net result of this is more divorces, won't it? The blue rinses will be gibbering with rage.

Whereas I think it's a bloody good thing when women wake up and realise how badly they are treated and decide they deserve more respect than some of them get from their husbands. How awful to feel as though the work you are doing at home, raising children, enabling the family to function, is worth nothing. How awful. It is astonishing that these attitudes are still so prevalent in 2010, astonishing and depressing.

So why should we be allowing affluent middleclass dads to get away with it?

My ex earns £200k a year and is getting away with it, but then he has no class.
It seems to me that whilst divorce might be easier, assuming you ever married in the first place and have the education to realise how the British courts work with regards to child support, actually getting it out of the absent parent is harder than ever.
My advice to my daughters is no baby without a wedding ring and think twice about any man who is self employed since they seem to be the hardest to pin down.

But isn't there a bit of class hypocrisy here?

As a society we vilify working class dads who just expect the state to be financially responsible for their children.

So why should we be allowing affluent middleclass dads to get away with it?

"Are you seriously telling me that over the past 60 years all those men have vanished ?"

Of course not. But divorce is now a lot easier than it was in the 1950's, there is no social stigma to being unmarried and woman are no longer left destitute if they choose to live independently. Someone earlier predicted 'a peak in the divorce rates'....well maybe if people are only staying with a financially controlling spouse because they have CB to fall back on, CB was actually contributing to an abusive situation, not alleviating it?

the government can't make decisions for the entire country based on a few people who are with mad, controlling twats.

Sorry but that is exactly what they did when CB was introduced in the first place to give the woman some money that her hubby couldn't blow in the pub on a Friday night leaving her with nothing to feed the kids with.
Are you seriously telling me that over the past 60 years all those men have vanished ? I know at least one intelligent woman who had a child with a man like that.

ValiumSingleton - there are some dreadful men and women out there. I don't believe that they are the majority though, and the government can't make decisions for the entire country based on a few people who are with mad, controlling twats. Bet she transfers the CB across to him as well anyway.

She should be offered help to leave, not money to preserve her dreadful status quo.

"But how horrible to think of your DH as generous. That sounds as if he's being charitable. It's your right to have money, you are enabling him to work"

I agree HerB

As a state educated, 40 something - I didn't realise this attitude is still so widespread in 2010 Britain. I'm not surprised that Cameron didn't know - it's well hidden.

However (in contradiction of my earlier post) if CB is all that's holding these relationships together - maybe a a few extra divorces, in two years, will be a good thing?

Sorry to do this, I know it's bad online etiquette, but look at this which I took from another forum.... a hardworking taxpaying woman who would end up SCREWED

" didnt think been married would be so stressful. All we seem to discuss is money. I get paid and I transfer all my wages over to him (which is for our savings)and then I get an allowance. All our wedding money is in his account. If I try to discuss this so I can keep my independence, there is yet another fight. I pay half the mortgage (even though he will not put my name of the mortgage) correct me if i am wrong but this is not the way it should be. I feel like i am better off to shut up and say nothing and go along with it. I want this to change and fast. I refuse to spend the rest of my married life feeling smoothered. I need advice on how to approach this."

David Cameron has never met men like this lady's husband but they are out there and they will go MAD without their tiny bit of CA

Oops sorry, don't mean to imply that anyone's DH is awful.

But how horrible to think of your DH as generous. That sounds as if he's being charitable. It's your right to have money, you are enabling him to work.

If I were still with my X, this would be the straw that broke the camel's back. I couldn't go on, I couldn't fool myself any longer.

As bb99 says, there are a shocking amount of men out there who don't have joint bank accounts.

It is absolutely shocking how many men with SAHMs see the money they earn as "their" money.

They really have no idea of how much it would cost them to get the cleaning, laundering and childminding services of a SAHM, plus the freedom of not having the mental work of organising their household and their children for themselves do they?

And this cut in child benefit re-iterates the idea that child rearing is worthless to society. It will only re-inforce the sense of entitlement of these awful men.

Joint bank accounts only work if their SALARY gets paid into it.

DH keeps his salary in his bank account and puts the house keeping in the joint account