In hoping the benefits cap may prove to be A Good Thing?

So suggesting that people cook or learn a trade is sexist and/or outated? Considering no school leavers other than those belonging to close personal mates of Cameron's will be able to afford to go to uni and become any sort of grad, IT or otherwise, its either that or more people will be signing on in the next few years.

I merely make the point that we live in a society where many are overweight/unhealthy. The government are happy to let them eat themselves silly, smoke their lungs black, and drink themselves to obliteration. All because they can charge these people tax on their cigarettes and booze. These same people are then a strain on the NHS. If any child is given the basics of cooking, girl or boy, they wouldn't need to eat convenience food as they would have the option of cooking for themselves. I grew up in a house with a mother who couldn't cook, and our diet was appalling- as many kids are now obese, this trend is obviously growing.

Its not sexist, merely stating a fact. Healthy people= less strain on the NHS.

Having a trade gives people an option other than benefit.

I just wanted to agree with chipmunk.

I have always worked since having Ds (single parent) and now I'm at Uni because I couldn't find childcare, car died etc. IMO the system is screwed and until it is much easier to work and claim correctly a benefits cap is just going to cock up the system even more. It's too complicated at the moment which is why people find it easier to stay on benefits and not work.

For example I had to work and was self employed in order to earn enough to fit around looking after DS.Whist working I had Child Tax Credit saying I owed £3000 (!) for incorrect nursery fees. This took 5 whole months to sort out whilst they were clawing it back from my tax credits. After arguing they agreed I was right and dropped the case. I have been contacted every year by Inland Revenue since I finished my self employed work in 2009. Today I have received a penalty for not filling out a tax form despite having a letter from them two weeks ago saying I didn't have to fill out my return (because I gave up 3 whole bloody years ago).
Sort out the Universal tax system otherwise the working poor are buggered.

we need trades in this country, plumbing/carpentry/mechanics, yet everything is put into bloody IT, a dying economy if ever I saw one

You think "everything" is ploughed into IT? My DH, who works in IT, is currently hiring (or trying to) for at least 3 new positions. The problem is he won't look at school leavers (they think IT = can use Word or Excel) but the new grads expect to earn £30k/yr despite not being able to string a professional email together, and have no work experience to date. For those in the middle (keen go-getters happy to take £20k for their first year and increase their skills), there are lots of opportunites. A thriving economy needs a variety of manual, skilled, professional jobs... manufacturing sector/service sector all complement each other - your post is far too simplistic.

Frankly, it sounds like something a miner, time-warped from the 1980s, might suggest. No place in modern Britain, if we want to keep pace with the world's changing power balance and the emerging markets.

Girl's were taught how to cook when I was at school, we didn't end up needing to eat expensive and unhealthy ready meals as we left school knowing the basics of cooking.

urgh. must. back. away. from. this. sexist. and. rose-tinted. post.

There have been proposals knocking around for years to end universal access to cb. It has always been shelved as a vote loser. Although I think it will eventually happen.

Sorry I was under the impression our out of touch PM had proposed to bring in tax breaks for young married couples with children as an incentive to stop one parent families increasing. (IOW paying people to stay together, at the detriment of the children who live in a house with parents who hate each other).

It doesn't detract from the fact that, despite some families earning £80k a year, they still get CB. How about scrap it for those earning over £35k a year? Then the "squeezed middle" will still get what its entitled to. Those who are forced into private housing will still get the help they need. And those who probably spend on lunch what some people survive on from CB can go without with no hardship.

I agree with the state nurseries, more and cheaper after school clubs (when I was at school, for £1 a night you could take part in dance, football or art until 5pm) and cheaper play schemes in the holidays. There are many two parent families where both parent's work and one income goes mostly towards paying childcare costs.

Rents, food, clothing, everything is going up. Car Insurance is ridiculous, petrol likewise. Rates for gas and electric, despite whole sale prices falling for two years are still at barely affordable levels to the point some lower income families have to choose between having electric on or heating as they can't afford both (and don't forget, these lower income families are often living with pre-payment metres which charge extra for the metre being there, so once again they are picked on again) . This is the wrong time to cap HB and any other benefit.

And rather than new IT lessons, how about teaching kids a trade- we need trades in this country, plumbing/carpentry/mechanics, yet everything is put into bloody IT, a dying economy if ever I saw one. Girl's were taught how to cook when I was at school, we didn't end up needing to eat expensive and unhealthy ready meals as we left school knowing the basics of cooking.

It is estimated that 50,000 households will be affected by this.

This is a quote from Iain Duncan Smith. Are they changing HB so that if you go out to work all HB stops? Or does he have no idea how HB works?

It is also about fairness to those who are on these benefits; it is not fair to trap somebody in an expensive house which they cannot afford then to go to work on the back of, because they would lose their housing benefit if they went to work ? so they are disincentivised from going to work.

And what is this?

"The public thinks that homelessness is about not having any accommodation to go to."

"That?s not the definition, inside Government and things like Shelter. It?s if children have to share rooms."

Buy to Let helped screw rents. If property stocks decrease rents increase.

*Because if all we care about is e.g. child poverty, let's increase the child benefit element which is open to everyone. None of this 20 quid here or 30 quid there nonsense - let's give everyone £150 a week for each child

Oh wait, the country would end up bankrupt? Woops!*

We are paying child benefit to those on a family income of up to £80,000. Does that make sense to you? The same child benefit payment goes to a family earning £79,000 as to one earning £24,000.

But we can't cut child benefit to those families on up to £80k - they may well vote Conservative. So lets cap benefits to £26,000, stopping child benefit being paid for their children. They don't vote Conservative, and it will also help with the voters on low family incomes who are struggling.

Lets get those on family incomes of £35k and under angry at those on benefits getting stuff they don't. It'll distract them from wondering why they're being taxed so heavily when they earn so little, despite working long hours. It'll stop them asking why we only pay them the same level of child benefit we give to those on more than double their income. It'll stop them asking why we're not looking out for their interests or offering them more help.

The present administration fails to recognise that the whole of the welfare state is based upon Keynsian economics, that requires wages to be high enough for families to live on and there to be near full employment aswell as benefits being at a level where work is preferable, (which is OK because no one is out of work for long.)

Tinkering with just one part of this system cannot hope to produce the desired effect. Government is involved the equation and they need to be more proactive in my opinion.

The money that could be saved by more social housing, (doing away with the need for profits) Government funded nurseries, so people did not have to pay so much in childcare (a lot of which is state funded), apprenticeships in a wider range of jobs to get young people working rather than thinking their only options are crippling debt from university(and don't get me started on that) or the dole and increasing the minimum wage to reflect the increase in the cost of living.

This is before they clamp down on big business tax avoidance and so on.

The benefit cap is stupid and propaganderist (sic) £35,000 a year is not what it was and bandying that figure around all the time is sensationalist, as if there are loads of people recieving that much! Lets be honest £400 a week in rent is not that unusual is it? so that's £20800 a year of rent leaves £100 a week for everything else hardly a life of luxury.

I would equate it with the constant howls of 'we spent a record amount on the nhs last year! Something needs to be done to reighn in spending (for example)' As if inflation doesn't mean that everything costs more every year I don't go around asda screaming a Pound for a tin of soup! I've never spent that much before-well I do, but you know what I mean

I agree high housing costs are a major problem for many families. Even those not on benefits and so not affected by this often pay a very high proportion of their income on housing costs.

But tbh I was surprised on the news to hear how many people thsi will affect - I had assumed it would only be a handful and was mainly a headline grabbing policy. But no it will affect thousands and thousands of people.

mrs heffley, i think what you are aying is basically the same as hullygully further up. not that you disagree or agree with caps, but are highlighting that the low to middling paid will be worse off/are worse off than those entitled to help in the form of a benefit, whether that be tax credits, housing benefit or other.
I dont receive benefits and after paying a large rent and childcare, food, utilities etc i have very little to nothing left each month. I used to work for the NHS and had to give it up as I could no longer afford to pay my rent and bills on the salary earned or find childcare for the hours worked. I now work in the private sector in a completley unrelated job, on what most would regard a good wage but i still need to re-evaluate the area we live in as the rents are so high, but also need to consider my son who is mid gcse, byt the time he finsihes the next will be mid gcse and so on.
to put this into perspective, 3 years ago, i rented a 4 bedroom detached house in a small cul de sac on a lovely development for £1100 a month, i now rent about 5 streets away a 3 bed semi detached house for £1150 a month. The same house i used to rent is back on the market for £1700 a month. A £600 increase in 3 years? I left that house as when the contract came to an end they put the rent up by £300 a month. In the period of one year rental prices shot up by at least 30% in the whole of the area and most neighbouring suburbs.

lesley - sorry, I didn't realise that. I read it as each earning £35,000.

But the point remains that very few families get this magical 26,000 in benefits. And the reason the few that do receive this amount get it is to pay the landlords of the properties they are renting.

It's housing costs that are doing this. If you bring down housing costs, everyone benefits - middle earners as well and there is no need to cap anything. If there was enough social housing available, people wouldn't need to rent privately and pay such exorbitant rents in the first place.

If rents were reasonable, the benefits cap could actually be set lower again, but until rents are reasonable this will simply cause mass relocation and homelessness, because the HB limit over the rest of the country, where claimants are claiming far less than 26k, is also being reduced according to the lowest percentile in that area.

I think it's worth noting that when the Welfare State was introduced it came in alongside a massive expansion of council housing and the introduction of rent controls on private landlords. That's because Beveridge understood that a flat rate benefit would never be sufficient for poorer people in more expensive parts of the country.

Blaming the poor for their circumstances, and imagining that everything would be fine if they would only go to work, or work longer hours, or stop having kids, entirely misses the point.

The fact is, housing costs have spiralled out of control thanks to lack of supply (of social housing in particular) and increased demand. That means housing now takes up a far bigger proportion of our income, and of the welfare budget.

I wonder what will happen in London and the South East when those in low-paid employment - cleaners, catering etc - can no longer afford to live near, or travel to, where the work is?

My scenario is based on 1 person earning £20k and one earning £15k - combined income of £35k

tax breaks for married couples - what, you mean if one of the couple was born in 1935 or older?!

What ill-informed people deem themselves worthy of contributing to this thread! It's all opinion, and not based in reality. Just like the sense of entitlement constantly on show on this thread - the benefits pot is finite, and paid for by taxpayers. I think we are perfectly entitled to add in a handout cap. After all, isn't that what working citizen's salaries are, essentially?

Because if all we care about is e.g. child poverty, let's increase the child benefit element which is open to everyone. None of this 20 quid here or 30 quid there nonsense - let's give everyone £150 a week for each child.

Oh wait, the country would end up bankrupt? Woops!

And its not about seeing people as greedy or lazy. Many people on benefits are working or desperate to work. Its about setting benefits as a safety net. Not at a level that potentially gives people the same income as a working family on a reasonable wage.

lesley, the combined income of that scenario is £75,000 - of course they don't need benefits.

The £26,000 cap is for the entire household, not individuals.

For a couple both working on 35k with 2 kids without childcare costs, their entitlement to benefits is only child allowance and a very small amount of tax credits - about £600-£700 per year. Where I live they wouldn't be entitled to housing benefit on top of this level of income.

So this means a working couple could potentially only be £2,000 to £3,000 better off a year than the top cap on welfare benefits. This still seems a very generous cap to me.

Sorry if people on benefits can get £35K and at the moment a lot more (not including school dinners,free prescriptions etc) then those in the squeezed middle should get help too sorry.

That's not the middle! That's part of the problem. £35K has been used to target those who earn that amount or less as a family; to make them think, 'Why should they get what we don't?'

How about asking a different question. Why do those on a family income of £35k before tax get so little support? Why are we paying benefits (child benefit) to those on a family income of up to £80k when there are people struggling on less than half that? Why aren't we doing more to help those people?

And for those of you who seem to see the people whose benefits will be cut as scroungers, how do you see their eg 10 month old babies? Even if you think these people are 'greedy' or 'lazy', do you think their toddlers are? Do their 5 year olds have an 'entitled' attitude?

Maybe they shouldn't have had 'children they can't afford'. But they did. Those children exist, and it's their homes that will be lost and their plates that will have less food on. They're not responsible for the choices of their parents but they're the ones that will suffer as a result of these cuts. The government wants their child benefit included in the cap - a universal benefit that will still be paid to the children of families on incomes up to £80,000.

No they're not.

Sorry if people on benefits can get £35K and at the moment a lot more (not including school dinners,free prescriptions etc) then those in the squeezed middle should get help too sorry. You can't say one section of society is living in poverty but not the other.Those not on benefits will actually be worse off as paying the entire rent/mortgage bill not getting £100 a month in free school meals,water capped etc.

So that's a hell of a lot of people who deserve help.

Unfortunately we're broke(partly due to uncapped benefits in the first place)so why should some people get help and not others?

Obviously not fair.

Soooooooo lets cap benefits-ta da it's now fair.Really don't see the problem.

Not when you consider Tax Credits, tax breaks for married couples, and child benefit- however much you earn or don't earn, everyone is entitled to Child Benefit.
My remark on unaffordable amounts related to Housing Benefit. They will force people onto the street, or into sub standard accommodation, or into living with their family which means overcrowding and the knock on effect that causes.
Sort out the housing crisis (over a million homes empty which could house a large number of those on housing waiting lists), sort out migrant employment, sort out employment full stop so there are jobs for people to go to, then, by all means, moan about those who are on benefits who despite the Daily Mail trying to make all benefit claimants out to be scroungers, including using made up figures on DLA procured from our lying cheating government, for the most part do not want to be on benefit but it's either that or go shake a tin in a subway.

It speaks for itself- university fees were never going to hit the well of. The government knew this but did it anyway. As I say, this is our government, who rather than make businesses like Vodaphone pay what they owe, rather than stopping ex-bank chiefs being given gold handshakes for doing precisely nothing, they pick on the hardest up, on the disabled and on children.

Nice.

If you want to deal with exhorbitant private rents, tackle the buy to let market or target taxation at that income.

These changes will make very little difference to rents - the vast majority of private landlords reject tennants on housing benefits and those that do tend to charge bang on average market rate. If a 4 bed that's open to housing benefit is £X/month a 4 bed in the next street that's not open to those on benefits is £X/month + 10-15%.

If landlords find they can't get the rent paid through housing benefits they will get the property empty, make improvements, and relet on the private market for increased rent. In the short term it might have a stall effect on rent inflation but it's unlikely to actually lower rents. It's more likely to be of helpful to those looking to buy as landlords may well look to offload some properties so you might save £20-30k on a £500k house.

Thousands of people continue to migrate to the South East and London in particular every year for work. They more than outpace any current or planned home building. It's basic supply and demand - number of people goes up, number of available homes doesn't match that growth therefore demand is higher than supply so rents rise.

The current economic climate means more people than ever are likely to need to move to the South East and London - outside of these areas job opportunities have fallen more steeply. The situation is only likely to get worse.

*off not of!

If the average worker is living on an unaffordable amount then that's a problem!
The answer to that problem however isn't to cut benefits.

They are playing us of one against another - an old trick!

Can't you see that?!