No benefits if unemployed for more than a year and other ways Sunak wants ti tackle the Benefits system

[cakeorwine]

This are the headlines - I can see some massive issues here for people - it's easy to say there are job vacancies - but what if they aren't in the area people are and there is no transport to get there. How does that work? I can see a lot of exploitation here.

There's also the other rules here around PIP payments, part time workers etc.

I wonder how much personal experience Sunak has of such things?

This is an outline from the Daily Mail

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13330045/Benefits-axed-year-stop-lifestyle-choice-Prime-Minister.html

12-month rule for unemployed

Tory manifesto plans will see people on the dole have their benefit claims closed after a year unless they can convince Jobcentre staff they are actively looking for work and willing to accept any reasonable job offer.

Personal Independence Payments

Hundreds of thousands of people with anxiety and depression could lose access to payments worth up to £700 a month and instead be offered therapy to help them back to work.

PART-TIME WORKERS

New rules will require part-time workers on Universal Credit to look for more work. Anyone working for less than the equivalent of 18 hours a week on minimum wage will have to show they are actively seeking more hours.

Disability rules

The work capability assessment rules, which govern who is eligible for sickness benefits, will be tightened to require 424,000 with milder mental health conditions to start looking for work.

Sick notes

GPs could be stripped of their role in signing off people as sick and replaced by 'specialist work and health professionals' who will focus on what work people could do with support, such as flexibility to work from home.

Benefit Fraud

Investigators will be handed new powers to tackle benefit fraud, which hit £6.4 billion last year. In future they will have similar powers to those investigating tax fraud, including the ability to make seizures and arrests

I do agree in principle.
however things like childcare - or cost of, can make “any job” prohibitive. As can being available for interviews etc

Absolutely agree on every point. A year looking for work is more than enough time. Benefits are a safety net whilst people look for work, and shouldn’t be a lifestyle choice, which it is for some…….

No just apply for benefits. ......

Tory manifesto plans will see people on the dole have their benefit claims closed after a year unless they can convince Jobcentre staff they are actively looking for work and willing to accept any reasonable job offer.sounds fair as long as implemented fairly (which I doubt it will be)

if there was a reasonable job offer, which works for you based on your illness etc - why would that be a bad thing? I think people just complain all the time.
What do you propose they do about capable non disabled / well people who choose benefits over working?

I think they spend more on hunting down 'fraudsters' than they recover. And there's far more going unclaimed than is being fraudulently claimed.

Why is it that those with the least power, the least opportunities, the least influence to change anything and the least money in society are always the ones who carry the most blame when things go wrong?

People can have extremely complex societal problems. I volunteer with offenders / ex offenders and their lives are just so chaotic and complicated. Everything is difficult, housing, complying with probation when literacy skills are poor, organisational skills are very poor, no money for a phone top up (to be informed of appointments), no bus fare, absolutely no family support, no laundry facilities, mh problems, trauma. A job is a far away dream for the majority of them.

I honestly thought that was already the case. It’s called job seekers allowance isn’t it?

Surely that isn't the case. It often seems like higher taxpayers are frequently targeted - and that is acceptable. From some of the responses, there's an implication that it's acceptable to impose financial burdens on middle-class or wealthy individuals—for example, through VAT on private school fees. Conversely, there appears to be reluctance to expect others in the country to work and support themselves.
The reality is, if given the choice, many would prefer not to work.

By the way, the proposed VAT on education would apply universally, affecting universities, nurseries, and other educational institutions. This issue often gets tangled in what can be seen as class war politics, which is frankly unproductive. It's currently supported because it would affect wealthy people while we don't realise that a VAT on education would also affect nurseries and ability to go to work for many. . . . However this proposal is a no no due to its effect on those with the least money in society? Surely it would improve someone's quality of life if they could work and had more money?

Where are the the statistics that show how many people have been looking for over 12 months and are turning down jobs for spurious reasons

Or are we just supposed to accept that there must be loads because Rishi Sunak said its an issue

And the people I volunteer with are NOT having a lovely time. They're heartbreakingly sad, alone and poor.

@dimllaishebiaith and where are the statistics that show that majority of people not working and paying taxes are disabled or unwell and unable to work? Are we to accept that because someone on this board says they are then majority must be the same?

You can handily find those figures on the DWP website.

There is will show that the number of people claiming PIP are 2,774,000 and the number claiming jobseekers are 89,000

Of course it gets somewhat harder when you get to Universal credit because lots of people on UC are in fact in work

But the information is all freely available if you can be bothered to go and get it

That said:

where are the statistics that show that majority of people not working and paying taxes are disabled or unwell and unable to work? Are we to accept that because someone on this board says they are then majority must be the same?

You might have more luck asking the "someone" because it certainly wasn't me. But nevertheless I went and found the stats you couldn't be bothered to look for.

https://labour.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/Breaking-Down-Barriers.pdf

@dimllaishebiaith I would say the same. Look into it in the same way. There's absolutely nothing wrong with this policy if it means majority of those people end up in work and have a better quality of life.

What is it that you want? What's the alternative?

Knowing Labour they will come up with a similar policy.
I truly hope Labour won't get in. They are no better.

I already said the policy doesn't suit everyone and I wasn't talking about those with children. I said that in a previous post.

I want policies that encourage employers to employ people with disabilities and people who have employment gaps due to health problems, and help them have the tools in place for that employment

I want a health care service that is quick enough that people aren't waiting months for treatment or being left with worse conditions due to a lack of treatment

I want an education service that isn't leaving 200000 children a year aged 11 unable to read or write

I want a mental health service that is well funded and easy to access

I want plentiful childcare options at affordable prices

I want public transport that is better funded so allow easier travel for jobs

I want the government to stop complaining about WFH and instead allow businesses to encourage it for members of staff who might otherwise struggle to work

I want policies in place that mean that absent fathers actually pay for their children and preferably more than £7 per week in many cases and the loopholes around self employment and CMS to be closed

If all that was in place I would have far less of an issue with the proposals

There are 292 posts on this thread. Apologies if I didn't track all the user names through accordingly

The only way to resolve any of that is to employ more staff. Mass training and recruitment is needed and to do that we need to go back to apprentice/NVQ/Diploma/A level entry and stop this mad requirement for every single person in our workforce to have a degree.

I completely agree with that

Its at the point now where I have an excellent graduate at work stressing because he is the only graduate without a masters and he's worried it will hold him back. Meanwhile people 30 years older than him in the same profession don't even have a degree

They used to think that a 90 min commute was acceptable…. Is this still the case? Because 90 mins is not acceptable or in fact possible especially with childcare constraints. I’d only be about get to work at 9;00 at the very earliest, and then would have to leave at the very latest by 3 to pick up children by 5:00. What job would allow me to only work those hours?? I am a teacher, and I would never get those hours.

i am lucky to have a job and to have never really been out of work, but I couldn’t travel this far to work.

I agree that if you can work, you should work rather than claim benefits. But a lot of it depends on where the work is and how practical it is to work.

It's where the jobs are, the investment and the opportunities.

Why is it that the middle class and higher tax payers are 'targeted' yet for anyone else it's just what needs to happen for the good of society?

Shouldn't the middle class and higher tax brackets accept that it just needs to happen for the good of society as seemingly they expect others to do?

I agree that having more money would probably increase quality of life for many people and thus their mental health, unfortunately for many people that are in the jobs that don't pay well - but are wanted and needed in order for some of those higher tax payers to actually earn enough to be higher tax payers in the first place or be able to have a middle class income and lifestyle - that isn't the case.

Those roles barely, if at all, bring in more than benefits do, in fact some of them need the benefits still to survive.
And the issue isn't that benefits are too high, it's that these jobs are not valued although they are valuable to society, and paid the bare minimum. So you've got a job, but your finances don't improve, your quality of life doesn't improve, or in some cases is actually worse because of the costs associated with working.

People should work if they're able, but that work should have more in the way of 'reward' for want of a better term, than barely surviving so that the middle class and higher tax payers don't feel aggrieved.

Work and the associated stresses, combined with the financial stresses of being on a lower income - and working often unsociable and unhealthy hours, hard physical work, mentally and emotionally draining work for the privilege of being skint, are imo, huge contributers towards people becoming too worn out and/or ill to carry on doing so.

And then they're blamed for the state the country is in and some actively punished with policies like this while the 'squeezed middle' and higher tax payers complain they're being targeted.

Good in addition to encouraging people to go to work - those who can. I 100% agree with all you said. It's progress. Rome wasn't built in a day.
The additional tax raised will help fund some of these things.

*Work and the associated stresses, combined with the financial stresses of being on a lower income - and working often unsociable and unhealthy hours, hard physical work, mentally and emotionally draining work for the privilege of being skint, are imo, huge contributers towards people becoming too worn out and/or ill to carry on doing so.

And then they're blamed for the state the country is in and some actively punished with policies like this while the 'squeezed middle' and higher tax payers complain they're being targeted.*

As a higher rate tax payer I completely agree with this