David Cameron's conference speech - live stream from 11.15am today

If they can swing it, then there will be a recovery soon. They put us through hard times to gain the approval of the "markets" and have built up good faith with the "markets". If they want to remain in office, they know they will have to turn the economy round. They will try their best to find a way. If they don't succeed, then there is every chance that they will get kicked out.

Some people say they will maintain that budget because they are "caring".

I haven't though, I work hard not to even though I feel it more and more as time goes on. I DO feel they are quite happy to paint me as claimant scum; the universality of UC is going to reinforce that image I feel. When tax credit claimant cannot be separated from IS claimant, we all become 'scroungers'.

Feel pretty sure in my own mind that is intentional.

Actually I'm not one person in that opinion: my family like many from the SW are Lib Dem and have been for many years, I remember spending my childhood treading up and down delivering leaflets, Dad stood and I was invited to, massive signs in Dad's garden and my home as the local base address....

Last count that was another 11 new members for the Labour Party. The only Lib Dem voter in my family who remains is my BIL, who makes Schnapps look like a campaigner for the Yellow Softies Party.

I am not convinced Labour will get in next time, after all they are fronted by a PR man who is very talented at his job. I am pretty certain if they don't DH will end up losing his business as it just becomes harder and harder to fall within their rules and regs- workfare if your business has a bad month and you don't make MW? Really? We have good months and bad ones, it's the nature of the industry.

I think they should slash the foreign aid budget and in these dire times, should spend that money on disabled people, the elderly, on hospitals so that not one more person dies of dehydration on a ward, and on building houses and creating employment. But we all know they won't do that, and New Labour wouldn't have cut it either.

'I'd prefer Labour of the two'

That's fine. But you are only one person. It depends what the entire public think. But let's not paint individuals as Tory scum when to a great extent they are only continuing with New Labour style policies.

Labour never reversed outsourcing in hospitals and I think they were the ones that started giving contracts to A4E and many other large providers. They can spin all they like, but the public has a long memory.

But opposition towards current policies are also important, because if there is enough fuss, then the politicians will have to listen and do some U-turns, as the Tories have already done.

I don;t think people understood the coalition would be so unbalanced. It's Tory under another name.

I'd prefer Labour of the two because I know I felt safer then than now. I'd prefer something different entirely.

Workfare was introduced by labour yes but fully enacted before the testing rigmarole was sufficiently complete. BOTH parties have a lot to answer for on that score.

Except I am not anti workfare for certain claimants, I just want compassionate workfare. One that realises childcare is not always accessible, understands there is a world of health between full and disabled; that people have skill sets and skill deficits (put me in a a charity and I will fly, in an accounts dept and I will bankrupt them within a week); that is sensible with distance and travel- they could send me on workfare were I not exempt into England, a trip so costly with tolls that DH used to pay £100 a month in those alone!

I am opposed to jobs in real employments being taken by free workers.

OTOH if someone said to me earn your Carer's Allowance by answering phones term time and when kids in school at a charity 10 - 2 a week I will jump at it, I tried volunteering but they were full of students and workfare people. The new local voluntary body (where the receivers pay for the services of volunteers- wtf?) charges people to ask for volunteer work, as so many students need it to complete their courses they were inundated. The organisation can;t manage difficult cases but is used as an excuse not to provide much in our town now- another kick in the respite!

It's a mess.

I don't agree that there is more good in the Coalition.
I honestly feel we do not have an opposition any more.

Good, because it is not black and white. There is good and bad in both parties. The public decided to kick Labour out because they felt there was more good in the Tories and the Coalition than in New Labour, having seen what they did over 13 years. If the public decide that they were wrong, they will reelect Labour.

Oh too right. I'll never forgive Labour for ATOS nor Milibean for his assertions that he'd stick by Welfare Reform.

Arguing against Cameron does not equate to liking Labour or having been happy with previous policy.

Workfare was introduced into Britain by New Labour, just like tuition fees. Labour just handed the baton over to the Tories and they have run with it. Don't believe the cheap tricks of some of the opposition MPs who claimed expenses for bath plugs, flipped homes, sent their children to private schools and earn a pretty packet.

Anyone reading this would think that Cameron was a machine and that he wasn't human. He understands more about disability than the majority of the public. He was fortunate to have money and didn't have the extra stresses that some other parents of disabled children had, but he understands disability more than most of us.

New Labour was in power when Amazon moved HQ, which is a legal thing to do, and when bankers were pocketing huge bonuses and some companies were paying low rates of tax (which was also legal). New Labour knighted some bankers for "services to banking". There were newspaper reports headlined "work or lose your home" under New Labour which were about some of Labour's policy towards the unemployed.

All the parties look after the great and the good, unfortunately, and "squeeze" the middle in order to pay for the poor.

Filethe you know, he can.

But the minute he talks about him in political debate, Ivan becomes political property. A politician makes comments that are debated as his profession: you cannot have some areas that are off limits for discussion and yet be able to make political capital from them.

It simply cannot work like that.

OOps sorry I got that messed up didn;t I? My excuse is a bad day with ds1. I do apologise.

DH was a hardworking tax payer before being a student, so was I: at my palce of study 46% of students were adulst, it's really not that clean cut any more.

Domestic what you seem to miss is that DH is a hard working taxpayer!

It's the student LOAN that would pay for it- LOAN. We would pay, with interest, but the admin got fucked up.

Urgh, could people please stop talking about David Cameron 'using' and 'wheeling out' his dead son.

That boy is his son and he died - DC can talk about him any time he fucking well likes.

sorry that should say Universal Credit thread, active at the moment on MN.

Let's also not forget the interests of the City and the big accounting firms in helping rich individuals and companies to hide wealth.

When I worked in tax long ago for a large accounting firm you will all have heard of, the firm was creaming off huge amounts in tax avoidance cash by dreaming up the schemes by which the big companies distribute and account for profit.

These are the Tories true people- accountants, City lawyers, bankers and multinationals. They are the sons of these people, their friends, their milieu. Their interests are entrenched within the party (and New Labour desperately aspired to be the same). Tories believe that what is good for these people is good for the country. The desperately confused individualist moralism of lower-income Tory supporters buys right into that.

for further proof of how current and future Tory policies are clobbering small in favour of big business have a look at the Universal Credit stuff. People on there who are EXACTLY the 'strivers' Cameron goes on about- people starting their own businesses from scratch- are being absolutely shafted by a system which will withdraw tax credit support in their early years.

If there is one thing a Tory government SHOULD be doing surely it is supporting startup businesses? The more of these grow and succeed, the better for the economy.

Instead they favour the interests of multinationals which, as Rosieres so sensibly argues, will never pull out of an entire European market due to reasonable tax rises. If that were the case they'd have been out of Scandinavia long ago.

Rosieres, hear, hear - it's good to read such a coherent argument. I totally agree with your points.

^"Cameron is accused of being an out-of-touch toff who is privileged and has never faced hardship. But that is not true, his money and background don't make him immune to suffering. I think he mentioned his disabled son who died young and his father who had no heels and who had his legs amputated, partly to show that he does know about disability and that he is not a heartless uncaring person.

The Tory scum and heartless image that is painted of Tories is a caricature and a cheap trick used by political opponents who are often just as privileged."^

Claig, political opponents have no need of cheap tricks to paint the Tories in this way or to create any caricature. The Tories do this themselves to perfection. If Cameron is not a 'heartless, uncaring person', why are so many of his policies designed to protect the funds of the wealthy and take away even more from those who have scarcely enough to make ends meet? Cameron and his party are so out of touch with general society (as opposed to the privileged elite) it beggars belief. They have no interest in helping people from disadvantaged backgrounds to better themselves, they simply want to protect the elite and their privileges. Witness the behaviour they tolerate unquestioningly from financial institutions, versus, for example, their decision to cap benefits at £26,000 despite research from the Rowntree Foundation saying that around £36,000 is needed to provide a normal living these days with costs for housing and other basic needs set so high.

Glitterknickaz glad I am not alone as I have not seen these comments.

Yes, please direct me the comments that state money eased the emotional heartbreak. I think you will find there are none.

Comments do exist stating that the family's experiences of living with disability are very different to the vast majority of those who are doing so on benefits.