Jeremy Hunt: "Don't expect us to pay for your children"

I agree, Dueling. A man can father way more children than any one woman can produce. And all too often, men walk away and are not being held in any way financially responsible for the children they were part of creating.

Obviously there might be a few families on benefits who keep having kids to get more money but what happens if a normal hard working family with 4 or 5 kids that they had when they could afford to suddenly hit hard times/lose their job etc? do they suddenly become benefit scroungers as well? will they be judged without people knowing their circumstances?

i think the previous scheme to get unemployed parents back into work prob cost more per week than paying the out of work benefits as they were giving grants for new work clothes and would pay for the childcare every week which iam sure would be a lot more than the average weekly benefits.

personally i wouldnt have any more children as i cant afford them

As far as I understand it, from an economic perspective we need more children (to pay for our ageing population) wheras from an ecological perspective we need less. The two are in direct opposition, but I can't see many mainstream politicians putting ecological before economical, so i think we'll always have some support for those having children.

In Scotland we need Johnny Foreigner to have children as we have a dwindling population.

It's all very well trying to tackle the 'benefits culture' but you need to provide jobs for people to go to.

There are no jobs where I live.

All our children will pay for our old age, that is why we need more children.

Fine. Don't expect my children to pay for your old age...

Gramercy I did not hear the Radio 4 programme last night, have you any links on this? It sounds interesting.

complimentary - so much shit in your post, such little time and I actually can't be arsed, but here we go.

Please explain the following.

What will happen if a Benefit Scounger Johnny Foreigner (I'm lumping the Scots and the Welsh in with this as they're not ENGLISH) gets pregnant? Enforced abortion followed by sterilisation?

These are Porrit's words

'I think we will work our way towards a position that says having more than two children is irresponsible.'

and that is what lies behind the government's messages and the bashing of benefit scroungers with large families. In the end, little by little, the message will work, because people don't understand what is behind the message.

I wonder if what they really mean is "if you can't afford to put a child into childcare and go out to workthen don't have one".

They want to do something about the feckless fathers for a start. I know tht not all relationships which break up end up with dads being crap but a huge majority of dads do just walk away and not give a toss.

Complimentary Don't be such a racist twat.

But as was pointed out on PM on Radio 4 last night, that the Every Child Matters policy has backfired in that the well-intentioned philosophy of believing that economic wellbeing of children would raise them out of poverty has led to children being viewed by some as, if not cash cows, then definitely as more advantageous than participating in the workforce.

And there has been no positive effect on "moral poverty" - social mobility, educational outcomes etc have worsened.

"Is this government literally going to leave children to starve?
This lot are worse than Thatcher"

no they aren't. They are trying to send a message, it is not all for real. They want to change the climate, to make it socially unacceptable. They will eventually succeed. Porrit was interviewed on TV and they said "but people will never accept being restricted to two children". He said something to the effect of "it's a long campaign, but in the end it will succeed", just as people have been persuaded to believe in global warming, in drink-diving messages, in anti-smoking messages and in wearing seatbelt messages.

The government's messages are part of the long campaign. But don't be polarised and think that this is just the Tories, "sustainability" Ed Miliband is similar.

Jeremy Hunt. Is right, don't have children you cannot afford to pay for and don't expect the hard pressed taxpayer to subsidise and pay for your large family. In my experience the English are not having many children, and it is foreigners who have the largest families. Whoever has children should be expected to pay for them and not the state. It makes perfect common sense to me! Yes have as many children as you like, but don't expect me to pay for them! I would already be paying for them to use the schools, hospitals and housing!.

Exactly Shirley. So the unemployed are all meant to get off their arses and get a job ....while the government takes an axe to tens of thousands of public sector jobs .

And this is meant to stimulate the economy?

It's all so depressing.

I find it quite Dickensian with all this talk about the "deserving poor" Only a matter of time before we're back to workhouses and gruel.

I would quite like to know where all these jobs are for the Benefit Scroungers to get off their arses and do, because last time I looked the job market was looking a little...bleak.

its all very well quoting articles and statistic but what do you do when your whole body aches for a baby, or your contraception fails, or you just plain want a big family.

are large families to become the preserve of the rich and n'er do wells?

Read the article and you will see that there is only one major opponent of the green philosophy of death and population control consensus. It is the organisation that is attacked and vilified by progressives - the Roman Catholic Church.

NomDePlume, you're eaxctly right. None of them are green. Remember that green God, Al Gore. In the States some people got hold of his energy expenditure for his mansion via the Freedom of Information Act in the States. None of them are green, but they are all in favour of population control.

I haven't read Icke on this, but if he says the same then he is right. All you have to do is read the green guru Porrit's article. It is staring you in the face.

Two child limit on families, green adviser

arf @ rhyming slang.

"Unfortunately, Call Me Dave is also visited a Norwegian glacier to see the effect of global warming at first hand."

Probably in his private helicopter.....

Nom de Plume

It's not about money and benefits, it's about population control. The benefits scroungers stuff is only to get the public to go along with it.