TORIES

"The history of the Tory party is one of privelige, wealth and utter disregard for anyone outside that terrain." Totally agree CapabilityGold, and I don't see how anyone can argue against that really."

Shows how much you know about Disraeli and one-nation conservatism then.

Sallyjaygorce - if you want to find out about their core ideas, and at risk of sounding like a libdembot there's a pocket guide to policy here from their website. Bit bloody dry though so maybe better to flick through the site. Does cover a bit of everything wrt finance, families, environment etc.

lowenergy - you pick up on labour having not closed the gap between rich and poor, making university expensive (and can i just say they are f*ing bastards and hypocrites for that), and them being "toffs". What I don't get is, if you're pissed off with labour for having done these things, why would you favour the tories when they will (pretty much by their own admission/tradition) make things worse? They want university charges like those in the US where it can cost e.g. £30k to go to university. They really don't give a flyer about helping people out of poverty, mainly because it's alien to most of their supporters. As for being toffs - well need i say more? Seriously interested in why these particular failings of labour make you like the tories more.

EMEC - yes I am for real, I was illustrating a point, not making a judgement. As I have said twice now including right next to the text you copied and pasted, ST has a total right to do whatever she likes with her money and I really don't give a flyer about it thanks.

"The history of the Tory party is one of privelige, wealth and utter disregard for anyone outside that terrain." Totally agree CapabilityGold, and I don't see how anyone can argue against that really.

otter, as i understand it dorset get the lowest (or one of the lowest) levels of money per student in the country. that is because the government sees our level of need as low. and because its a grammar the funding is even worse.

I'm sorry you're finding things hard, but perhaps you need to look at your spending. I'm really not sure why you feel you're entitled to benefits to pay your nursery fees. It is not up to the general population to pay for your children so you can earn enough for a holiday in the Maldives.

In general:
We are a single-income family living in a modest flat, driving a modest car, modest holidays and running a horse. But then I don't have any 700 quid handbags or Ocado deliveries!

Skihorse we will be just over the 50k threshold so no longer get tax credits.

We do not need the general tax credits - what we need is short term support with nursery fees. With two DC's in nursery our bills are around £1300 a month which is equivalent to a 20k salary. Take away our mortgage, bills and food and we have very very little left. We have not been on a holiday in 5 years. We do not go out and socialise. We do not buy expensive clothes or have any sort of expensive lifestyle.

We are supported in that we get around £400 a month to pay towards our nursery fees - we would get less if our nursery fees are less (and in fact if we just had one DC in nursery at £700 a month we would get nothing).

If they withdraw it one of us will end up working less or not working at all. It is stupid because between us we pay nearly £1000 in tax each month - so the government are simply supporting us for a short term period. By enabling us to work in a few years we will have earned more money (touch wood) and be paid more tax. By withdrawing this they will have less money from us in the short and long term - its stupid.

When our DC's are in school we will not need that money - simple. I agree with the 50k cut off but think they need to take into account childcare fees when they do this.

But why should I (as a low earner) be penalised because people bought houses beyond their financial limitations without taking in to consideration the possibility of interest rates returning to long-term aaverages?

50k may well be "poverty" in the South East, but it is not representative of an enormous slice of the population.

It is very easy to vote Labour if your household income is 150k I'm sure... of which there are many mn'ers!

The schools in our old (Tory area) town were no moredesperate (ieless than when I was a child) than here in our Labour area.

Look at the council in charge not the one that isn't!.

I don't see how one can vote Tory based on niow,if their response to queries is 'we don't know', tbh.

A bit of a gamble for me.

I graduated 2 years ago with student debt, I don't have to pay it until my income hits £15k PA (as my CA is £53 pw someway off....) and then I will view it as a tax on the priveledge of HE, as someone very sensible advised me (Prof at RG Uni and G&T guru btw, no random dumb downer)

Scaryteacher for PM!

dreamingofsun - I bet your council (Tory led perchance?) have some bearing on the state of your son's school buildings.

CapabilityGold - good post.

£50k is not poverty by any means! But a household income of £50k isn't that enormous, particularly when housing is so expensive.

Not voting Tory because of what a former party did 13-14 years ago is ridiculous.

Yes labour have put lots of money into education but what they've also done is massively dumb it down so that kids stay in further education longer and keep unemployment figures down.

Nothing wrong with kids continuing education, except you now have record numbers with useless Mickey Mouse degrees.

Capability - they have just moved the problems to non-labour voting areas - my son's school has just spent years fundraising to replace a decrepid old maths block. I think this is because its a grammar. If my children want to go to uni i know they will come out with overdrafts of over 20k. What i would like to see is a fairer society for all - not a system that screws every last penny out of the middle classes, especially if i see the money being wasted and am told that social mobility has decreased.

Am I the only person on mumsnet who doesn't think 50k is "poverty"? Fuck me, I'm a right church mouse if 50k is considered "poverty"!

manfrom that's hilarious!

CG what a fantastic user name you have

I am a London teacher and I remember well the bad old days pre 1997 when parents would hold jumble sales yes jumble sales to raise money for books. There were never enough reading books to go round either and tired old texts that had been used for years were all we could use - nowadays the budgets allow new literature to be bought in. That would be unthinkable now. What is more since 1997 there has been a real shift in thinking so that education is truly seen as the way out for people and parents are in general very supportive of schools - I work in an inner city school so have seen these changes first hand. Labour not only provided much needed funds but also caused this chift in the way the population thought. I fully agree that it will be the "small" things that will go first - from the "poor" people who "don't matter". Cameron is an Eton boy and sees the world through Eton eyes and his politics reflect that absolutely. All the good that has been done since 1997 - and there has been a lot - will be undone by a party who has never shown regard for the poor, the disadvantaged, the lowly. The history of the Tory party is one of privelige, wealth and utter disregard for anyone outside that terrain.

I don't think £50k household income is that much tbh. Only takes two low/middle management adults both bringing in £25k, or one on £20k and t'other on £30k (and so on).

We're not far off that, and we aren't rolling in money. We don't qualify for any state help of course, nor should we imo. Having said that, the reason we only have one dc is that we cannot afford for one of us to have to give up work or to spend £800 a month in nursery fees. Heavily subsidised childcare would mean we'd have another baby basically. So we can't afford dc2 because we're too rich

Still, there are winners and losers I guess in all situations.

Just how exactly did they get those demographic figures anyway? I would refuse to give any more of my personnal data to the labour party. They would only lose it!

Seriously. We have been failed by our government. It doesnt matter who they are they have still failed us all.

GB refuses to take responsibility for anything.
He insists on using class as a weapon. Does it really matter where somebody went to school, surely it is whether they can do the job that is important?

The main problem that I can see is that most politicians all studied PPE at a top university, then jumped straight into a job in the westminster village. They know nothing of what it is like to live in mining village or on the south coast.
It is all about London and what is important to the fashionable ones!!!!
Our state employs more people than the private sector. My maths is shocking but even I can see that is an unworkable situtation to get a countries economy into. Who pays the wages of the state workers? And the benefit claimants?
An increasingly smaller army of private sector workers!

2 cars dont always mean higfher carbon footprint you know

We needa bigger car (disabled children yad yada) and as Dh has top commute we run a secondcar, a SMARt thereby reducing carbon foorprint, fuel usage etc massively/

The 'blimey' was at 50% of us having that much (and it is a great deal more than the national average). I was looking at a graphic in the Guardian last night that said that people earning 50k were in the top 5% of earners. Obv. the MN result is a household figure, but still shows that we are an affluent lot.

@ Policywonk - you say "blimey" at the >50k income, but if you look at this lifestyles outlined in this graphic:

www.ft.com/cms/85ced73e-06db-11df-b058-00144feabdc0.jpg

that figure doesn't seem like so much.

On a total tangent, what strikes me is the massive carbon footprint that a family lifestyle like that would entail - 2 cars, multiple foreign holidays, high mileage etc etc. No wonder that green taxes are not getting much traction in the election campaign...

41% London and the South East
75% educated to grad or post-grad level
27% household income under 35,000, 50% household income over 50,000 (blimey!)

Here are the MN census results - an unscientific sample probably, but more accurate than what's said on LabourList!

I really don't think the demographics quoted on LabourList are correct - well the ethicity one is probably right, but the rest are exaggerations i think. Will try to find the thread...

Yes but I think the poster was suggesting that they pay an additional 10%.

People earning over £50k per annum (well, £37k, actually) already effectively pay over 50% tax - i.e 40% income tax, plus 11% NI contributions.