UK officially in recession...

[Startingagainandagain]

Latest stats released show the UK is now officially in recession (Office for national statistic data).

Gaslighting has started in the media by ministers to try to minimise that fact.

Isn't it time to face the facts instead and call a general election?

I know the picture is bleak and any new party in power will need years to try to sort out this mess but something needs to be done...

The UK's decline in the past few decade or so has really been dramatic.

@DillyD0007854 the problem is twofold, lack of funding but also the frighteningly high level of need the public are now in. Such a high number of people need support of some kind and we can’t keep up with it.

There is a high level of need because this government does nothing. It doesn’t care and it’s inept. It has let CAMHs disintegrate into a completely broken state.They are so stupid they didn’t even realise that untreated teens don’t go away, they turn into ill adults who will get sicker the longer they aren’t treated. Their carers will then get ill because of the stress and trauma from looking after them whilst trying to hold down jobs. And so the rock keeps on gathering moss. …

People with independent means and recipients of private pensions pay tax on their income.

Students will go on to earn, pay taxes and be the future councillors, health workers, road workers, service personnel and paramedics of the future.

Many of those with long term ill health could get back to work if they could access the medical care they need. Those who can't work due to ill health - well they surely are the people society is here to protect?

Also, it's not true to say 'all without paying a penny'. VAT, council tax, stamp duty, road tax etc.....it all goes into the system.

''@IClaudine · Today 15:40

@Dapbag · Today 15:27

@StarDolphins All the ‘tories fault’ folk are in for a shock!

Whose fault is it then?
Now let's see...

The EU
Covid
Ukraine
Asylum seekers
The sick and disabled who are swinging the lead
Benefit claimants in general

I think that's it for Tory Blame Bingo, but I might have missed a couple?''

😁

I think we can add to the Tory Blame Bingo:

• Lefty lawyers
• Lefty judges
• woke lefties in general
• single mothers
• Junior doctors, nurses and consultants
• Teachers
• Unions, especially the transport ones
• People who work from home
• young people who spend too much money on avocados and coffees
• Carol Vorderman and Gary Lineker
• Jeremy Corbyn
• Labour in general
• The French president.

But we must never, ever blame the government who has actually been in charge for 14 years...

People with independent means will be paying tax. Students will be paying tax when they begin employment. Everyone with a private pension pays tax. We shouldn’t be looking at whether someone is employed or on benefits but whether or not they contribute through taxation. Of course everyone pays VAT and the majority of us pay council tax.

Not sure about the students. Quite a few people round here ‘study’ with no intention of finding a related job, it’s just a way of killing time while claiming the funding and related benefits. They know they won’t have to pay it back. Only a quarter of students pay back their loan in full, but this will hopefully rise due to the new repayment threshold.

As for those in ill health, there’s ill health and ‘ill health’. There’s a contingent of people who are desperate to get back to work and with timely treatment they could. There’s another contingent who, even with treatment, likely wouldn’t. The profile of people needing benefits due to ill health has changed from those who are physically incapable of working due to a clear disability, to people with mental health issues or conditions with no pathology or hard evidence such as fibromyalgia. That isn’t to say they’re making it up, but awarding benefits to people where the evidence is them saying they need them is clearly a system open to abuse. The massive rise in such claims would support this.

Honestly don’t know. They are probably concerned about the just shy of 3 million who are long term ill and the rise in NEETS. Not much you can do about financially independent people who don’t want to work anymore.

https://researchbriefings.files.parliament.uk/documents/CBP-9366/CBP-9366.pdf

Someone may find that interesting.

It’s very worrying for the long term, the tax burden is very high yet it will be very difficult to meet the needs of an expanding pool of people who aren’t in work. My worry is eventually the system really starts collapsing.

''@sleepyscientist

We need to cut benefit spending to the bare minimum and introduce a minimum work requirement. We are living in a fantasy where we can be a world power house without a manufacturing sector or a working class doing those jobs. Immigrants aren't the problem, local to use they work on farms, in take away etc it the British born that are the problem.''

The reality is that many people who claim benefits are already in employment...They are simply not paid enough by their employers and/or can't make ends meet with the wages only because of the ridiculously high cost of housing and childcare.

No, only 40% of people who claim universal credit work any hours at all.

It’s incredibly hard to get PIP without a shed load of evidence.

''@Naptrappedmummy · Today 19:04

''@Startingagainandagain Startingagainandagain · Today 19:03

The reality is that many people who claim benefits are already in employment...They are simply not paid enough by their employers and/or can't make ends meet with the wages only because of the ridiculously high cost of housing and childcare.

''No, only 40% of people who claim universal credit work any hours at all.'

And you think 40% is a negligible figure?

It is appalling that so many working people have to top up their wages with benefits...

It didn't take long for the benefit bashing and ableism to appear did it.

The sooner we get rid of this bunch of incompetents in government, the sooner we can begin to turn this country around.

It’s not negligible but it’s far from the majority or most. And that also includes people who work zero hour contracts, or just under the 16 hour threshold. I don’t know what proportion of that 40% work full time, I’ll see if I can find out. I suspect it’ll be a low figure though.

What evidence can you give if you have, for example, fibromyalgia or depression? I’m not being facetious I’m interested to know.

PIP is an in work benefit. You don't have to be unemployed. But you are right
Same goes for ESA.

A lot of those people are those under pension age who have taken early retirement and are not reliant on benefits. The number shot up during and after covid. How will you force them back into work?

I thought the issue with the ”silver exodus” was this wasn’t the case?

https://www.managementtoday.co.uk/rise-silver-exodus/indepth/article/1788331

health is a big issue.

It is isn't it? That along with the "don't look at what's happening here, look at some foreign country instead".

Nope. Certain posters are always all over it like a rash.

I don’t think that’s fair. If there’s an obvious cause/reason/contributing factor it will inevitably come up. It’s taboo to discuss benefits but the country is in crisis and we have to face up to the reasons for that, which I agree are unpalatable. We have to, otherwise we continue as we are, or worse.

It’s taboo to discuss benefits

It really isn't, certain sectors of the press routinely discuss benefit claimants and I'm not sure if you are old enough to remember the TV series Bread @Naptrappedmummy ? At the end of the day, the human race has a long and enduring history of a few of its members being workshy, but as a general rule they are outliers and tended to be in the upper echelons of society

@Dymaxion but Bread is from a time when such benefits weren’t really there. There has been an enormous shift and to deny is just to sleepwalk into… well, what we are already sleepwalking into.

There are benefit bashing threads every other week on MN. Also the Mail had a fixation on "free cars" and other benefits for a long time.

There’s NHS bashing threads every week, and Tory bashing, and Labour bashing, and teacher bashing. Benefits aren’t unfairly targeted.

You just said it was taboo to discuss benefits! Now you are saying the issue is "discussed" as much as others.🤷‍♀️