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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

Benefit Bashing

823 replies

Kendodd · 18/02/2011 16:40

A mum I know and her DP with two children live in a two bed (nice) HA house. Neither of them work and have not worked for as long as I've known them (two years) I don't know about before then. She has told me they are trying for another baby, not to get a bigger house or anything, just because they want four children eventally. I would love four children but can't have that many because for one we just can't afford four.

AIBU to feel a bit pissed off that they can have more children and I can't or am I just a jealous benefit basher.

ps They are both nice and don't have a flatscreen TV.

OP posts:
Wook · 18/02/2011 22:15

Onedege the woman who takes takes takes, what do you know about here life? How do you know how much tax and NI she has paid in the past or will pay in the future?

Wook · 18/02/2011 22:16

her life even

popcrackle · 18/02/2011 22:16

Exactly Wook. What a cheek this poster has. Why doesn't she just go tackle the Philip Greens of this world.

StarlightPrincess · 18/02/2011 22:16

Wook- I don't want your life story. You just waded in with your post which has nothing to do with the OP. Therefore you said it, not me. I haven't said anything bad about single mothers, people fleeing DV.

Wook · 18/02/2011 22:17

No starlight, I'm afraid you said it. That's what happens when people stereotype first and think later.
My life story is relevant and so are the life stories of everyone else who has ever received a 'handout'

Wook · 18/02/2011 22:18

Because they are human stories and givereasons why theer should be a safety net

StarlightPrincess · 18/02/2011 22:18

Anyway, threads on here always end up like this. I'm not really bothered whether people want to flame me on here for my views (or in some cases my apparence Hmm). I won't change them.

The welfare state is for those who are in genuine need. Again, not for lazy, able bodied and minded people to stay at home and take, take, take.

BooyFuckingHoo · 18/02/2011 22:18

"I'm short on empathy with able bodied and minded people who don't want to work. They exist, regardless of what you say, they do"

we all know they exist, but tehre is nothing in the OP to suggest this is what they are doing. nothing. you have judged them based on 1 piece of information. you do not know their story.

TheSecondComing · 18/02/2011 22:18

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

CrispyCakeHead · 18/02/2011 22:19

totally shirleyknot.

I lived through the 70s and the 3-day week and the power cuts....it was shit. but it wasn't nearly as shit as the mass unemployment and the crippling interest rates of the mid to late 80s and the stock market crash in 1987.

what makes me really sad is that I can see that it's going to be a case of history repeating itself, and I for one can not afford for interest rates to creep back up beyond 10%....since unplanned child No3 has rendered it financially impossible for me to return to my previous job due to prohibitive childcare costs and leaving me resigned to a low paid evening job just so we can make ends meet; a job which may go up in a puff of smoke due to public sector cuts.

StarlightPrincess · 18/02/2011 22:20

Kendodd Fri 18-Feb-11 16:51:42

I don't know why they have a HA house. All four of them are well and healthy (as far as I know) thinking back, he did do some seasonal farm work a couple of years ago and he's now doing some (very) part time college course.

Is this not what the OP said? And in this circumstance, all you can go by is what the OP has said!

BooyFuckingHoo · 18/02/2011 22:23

exactly, she doesn't know why they have a house, she knows he did some work, doesn't mention why it ended, hasn't been informed of any disabiliies or illness that prevent them for working. the fact that she doesn't know, is not proof that they are abusing teh system. or is it in your eyes? should everyone know everyones business before tehy are entitled to support?

BooyFuckingHoo · 18/02/2011 22:24

does the fact that my neighbour across the way doesn't know my story mean that i am scrounging, that i am not trying to get work?

OnEdge · 18/02/2011 22:24

wook I just get a feeling, call it intuition - she isn't the working type.

curlymama · 18/02/2011 22:25

you are more than happy to brand them as lazy, benefit scroungers, wastrels.

on what grounds? based on nothing but the fact that they live in HA housing.

On the grounds that they are on living on benefits and are actively ttc.

If he does a very part time course, she doesn't work, and they live in HA property it is reasonable to assume that they live off benefit.

Whether they have a hidden disability or not is irrelevant. They can't afford to have another child without taxpayers funding their choice. If one of them does have a hidden disability, the other could be working. If they both have a hidden disability, but they are capable of looking after three children, they should be working.

There are no excuses for living like this, it's disgusting.

LegoStuckinmyhoover · 18/02/2011 22:26

onedge, i could say this; so you kind of get something out of your tennants misfortune don't you? your income?? your house all paid for from housing benefit? she gets a roof and you get your rent-thats ok isnt it?

but I shant say that, instead i will say that this woman is a real human being who lives in the UK in 2011 with a child to support and she is as much entitled to an opinion as a billionaire who has no need to work through his fortune of inheriting some wealth. she has as much a 'say' as someone who earns and thank god we can. simply incredulous to think she cannot.

BooyFuckingHoo · 18/02/2011 22:26

so curly should permanently disabled people not be allowed to have children?

BooyFuckingHoo · 18/02/2011 22:27

gosh imagine if the right to vote was awarded by income???? Shock

usualsuspect · 18/02/2011 22:27

BooyFuckingHoo... get a bloody job you scrounger Wink I've seen you in waitrose spending your milk vouchers

BooyFuckingHoo · 18/02/2011 22:28

Grin @ usual

(i've never been in a waitrose, is it really that good?)

CrispyCakeHead · 18/02/2011 22:28

perhaps he is doing the course as a means to an end to better himself? perhaps his industry was decimated and he can't get another job? perhaps he is doing the course very part time, as it's the only was he can afford to do it? perhaps it's no one's business but the subject of the OP?

your disgust is based on three lines of a bystanders opinion....can't you see how ridiculous that makes you?

ShirleyKnot · 18/02/2011 22:28

Crispy - it is utterly horrifying TBH.

I left school in 1989 - oh lucky me. We hit the recession running just about then. I had 4 jobs in 2 years and the fear of being unemployed was enormous. I remember going to the job centre after redundancy number three and being told that I wasn't able to claim any money at all because I hadn't paid enough into the NI system for the year before.

I was fucked.

Still, I'm not starved to death in the street so fuck it.

StarlightPrincess · 18/02/2011 22:29

"My uncle is a paranoid schizophrenic and it has ruined his life. He deserves every penny of his DLA as his meds leave him practically catatonic. "

Starlight - you better start crossing your fingers and praying to God that your uncle ain't net.

First they came... and all that.

The difference is Shirley, that my uncle along with millions of other people with MN issues is that he can't help having his mental illness.

The people who actively choose not to work can help that. They just don't.

OnEdge · 18/02/2011 22:29

Wook She complained that the the gadget that reads the oil tank was not working, I rang her back and said my DH would call by and take a look on Monday morning on his way to work. She moaned that Monday was her day when she had a lie in because her friend took her son to school. I find that disrespectful.

StarlightPrincess · 18/02/2011 22:30

*MH issues