AIBU to think some people's sense of entitlement is unbelieveable!

[Starbuck999]

Was at a friends' house for coffee arlier today. One of her friends was also there who I have met before but only on a few occasions.

Normal gossip; home, partners, kids, work etc. Friends' friend (let's call her X) says she can't believe income support is changing so that those with kids aged 7+ will no longer be excluded from having to look for work. (I know it's been lowered to the age of 10, but she's heard it's going down to the age of 7). She has a son who is 8 at the moment and she was genuinely disgusted at the thought of having to now look for work. She was saying how difficult it is to raise a child alone, clean, cook and work(she is a single parent) and how there aren't many well paid jobs at the moment, not many that fit in perfectly with school hours etc.

It annoyed me. I too am a single parent with a 6 yr old dd. I work full time and have done so since dd was 2. It IS hard work, I AM shattered, I have HAD to arrange childcare, JUGGLE my working hours and homelife etc - but I feel glad that I am working to provide for my daughter. I explained to her that it isn't easy but it is very much possible for almost everyone, exceptional circumstances omitted of course. I told her she wouldn't have to work full time, would get tax credits and help with childcare costs etc if she works just 16 hrs a week. "Well then what's the point" X then said "I'd be no better off" I didn't have the patience or the time to explain to her that the point is she would be working and not relying on benefits to pay for her and her child. That working shouldn't be an option, benefits should be there as a last resort, not an easy one.

This isn't a bash at those on benefits (been there before) or single parents (I am one) more a little whinge about the rubbish attitude of some people.

So, AIBU to think that she (with one school age child) has no reason not to work?

YANBU

OTT - the gravy boat is what goes on the dining table, do you mean the gravy train?

Our household income is around £25k and we get a whopping £2 per wk towards our childcare costs (DH full time, me 16hrs).

Hardly worth the paperwork.

My husband is self-employed and anything he uses solely for the purpose of work is tax-deductible. Why not childcare then? Why do people have to pay it out of taxed income and then the provision pays tax too. Makes me very angry.

at "Gravy Boat"

Of course not polly, but if you were a single parent working 16 hrs a week on minimum wage you'd get almost all of it paid - (if you needed any.

The reason i do not think those with children under school age should be forced to go to work is because it would in fact be counter productive.

Full tiem childcare for a baby is very expensive, if the parent claims 70% of this through tax credits the amound being paid out in childcare may well be more than the parent is earning. So it is in fact cheaper for them to be given benefits rather than have their childcare paid for. Better for everyone. Plus I think if you've always worked then some time on benefits whilst your kids are babies 9especially if you have more than 1) isn't too much to ask for.

5 years is reasonable, thats when i'd want to start working again anyway so free courses / childcare & help from the jobcentre will be great! Especially as all transport costs / interview clothes costs are covered by the jobcentre too :D

Won't this policy just encourage people to have more children? It seems obvious that it is more beneficial to have another child than to lose your benefits and have to work in some dead-end job.

I still think benefits should be for two children only.

I wanna go on benefits. I am fed up of working, hard,and having little disposable income. for the last 15 years, or so. want to go to the blokes 2 million pound house in the paper yesterday.
bugger the government for changing all of this, before i'd managed to become ...an illegal immigrant , or whatever you need to be.

Thanks for clarifying the childcare bit.

80% paid is pretty good then.

That's what really needs changing. Stop giving people money to not work and give them incentives to work.

Government cash should go on much more help with childcare and lump sum emergency help. Sometimes giving people enough to see them through a short period of potential crisis would save money in the long run. A huge percentage of people are two pay cheques from insolvency, and it would be a lot better to help them when things start to wobble- eg to step in for a couple of months to keep their rent/mortgage paid if they lose their job- than to only be there when everything collapses.

YANBU

I agree with NarkyPuffin

5 is tough though. i have always worked p/t post birth ds1. and holidays - kidsclubs are tricky sometimes.

I think that if you get benefits you should be able to do some voluntary work.

Everyone else has to earn their money, so surely if people had to give something back, it would shift alot of people into working?

I am a single working mum, and even with childcare payment for 2 children my income is about double what it would be if I didn't work. I don't see how somone can have more money by not working.

Not talking about a full time job, but contributing a few hours a weeks towards say a charity or something.

YAB abit U
I agree with
'Also, bringing up your own children, I believe, is a valid choice and I do think that women should have the option of doing it themselves.'
Part time work should be encouraged with children say over 7/8 but not forced. It costs just as much to pay for a lone parents childcare and many don't pay tax if on very low income. Seems abit silly to pay someone to watch their child when they would be happy to do it themselves..
I think offering training could be a good idea though rather than any old job. That was they could have a chnace of eventually being self sufficiant.

I think that we need to recognize that there is a vast difference between people who get into debt in order to buy that flat screen tv/laptop/foreign holiday, and those who are in debt because their income simply does not match up to their (essential) outgoings.

I have a friend who has recently had to declare bankrupcy because his dw has become disabled following a serious asthma attack, and who was working in a low-paid job (they worked alternate shifts because they couldn't afford childcare), she had to give up her job so he was the only one bringing in an income, and they simply couldn't afford to survive.

He's now had to give up his job because ss threatened to take their child into care because she was alone in the house with her mum in the mornings before school, she is 8.

He is the most hard-working bloke I have ever known and yet he has been left with no choice. they have lost their house, everything, and will most likely have to live on benefits for the rest of their lives.

Equally I know people who believe that if they have a £10k limit on their credit card then that is how much they have to spend...

I don't think that benefits should be a lifestyle choice for anyone. If it wasn't for the fact that dh earns a decent salary then I would be back at work.

Having said that, I do also think that there is a need to recognize that it is almost impossible to find work that fits in with school hours/holidays, and the additional cost that that incurs if you have to work full-time and pay for your children to go into childcare after school/in the holidays.

jellybeans - why should those of us that work have to pay for other people to be able to stay at home and look after their children? Children are not a right, and if you cannot afford to look after them with your own money then you shouldn't have them!

YANBU. I agree with Narky.
There's always exceptions of course, but I don't see why I should slave my @rse off in jobs which I don't always enjoy just so that someone else can sit at home and watch Judge Judy.

think it is fear of the unknown and panicking that you will not be able to cope. So much easier if you are at home and dealing with kids than working and dealing with kids.

Friend of mine who was on benefits with 1 ds aged 8 was in a major panic when she was sent on a work scheme. It wasn't easy because it was not a matter of more money, up till then she'd been taking her d to school, whilst working she could not because of the times, school wasn't close enough to walk to. Then he got home before she got back etc. So it was definitely a mixture of worrying about her dc coping and worrying about how to juggle things herself/get adjusted to the change.

School holidays are tricky. My parents used to share them and just about worked it out.

It's the same with a lot of jobs. Many are shifts. How the hell is a lone parent supposed to manage in that situation? My parents worked opposite ones. Then again my Dad used to drive to pick my Mum up at midnight leaving me and my sister in bed home alone when we were both under three so it wasn't exactly ideal even with two of them...

Narky - IMO there is huge incentive to work just from the working tax credit, which can almost double your income and pays most of childcare costs.

Where are all these 16 hour a week jobs I wonder?

I am a carer so have no option but only to look for a job that fits around school and weekends, and you know what, I can't find one. Gosh, I can't even get anyone to reply to my application for said jobs!

And i'm a Graduate with previous childcare experiecne and experince of working in an LA admin post (so school secretary type work- goodness only know how anyone without those things is going to find anything!

And yes OP your friend does have a poor attitude but I can't help but feel that these sorts of threads enable people to label the genuines too.

I do feel a certain amount of pity for x, in that having been on benefits all those years she will find it far harder to get back into the workplace. This will have a knock on effect for the rest of her life.

But if she's too short sighted to bother herself with details like this, then it's her lookout. As long as she doesn't whinge about being broke in 10 years time.

I'm sure a lot of mothers would love to be paid to stay at home with their children. But they understand that it's not everybody else's job to pay for them to do it.