to be annoyed by the treaury response to enquiry about fairness of child benefit removal?

[grumpypants]

I have now come to terms with higher income families losing CB. But this isn't what's happening - it is higher income earners so we all know the inequality of that. Basic maths etc.
So, anyway, my mum wrote to her MP to see how they could justify (in this new, fair world) letting two people keep it on £30 each but not one person on £50 say.
Two sides of political waffle about 'fairness' and the big mess left to them and the argument is essentially:

1. they don't want to set up a new means testing system (makes no sense - just add it to exisiting tax credits one?)
   
2. means testing CB would fundamentally chnage it's nature. (makes no sense - removing its universality is a fundamental change, no?)
   
3. 'higher rate tax payers are better off' - doesn't say than who.
   
   So anyway, not much logical reasoning there.

[TheCoalitionNeedsYou]

Fairness is effectively a meaningless term so any answer to a question about fairness is going to be meaningless.

[mollymole]

apart from the legal technicalities do you really need this money or do you just actually want it

[EricNorthmansMistress]

They can't legally enforce this anyway without making CB a joint benefit like every other, in which case they would have to make it a joint means test not a single one. If it's a single claim (to the main carer) they cannot legally oblige him/her to disclose details of their partner's income. You would think all the civil servants whose job it is to advise on the workability of policies would have pointed this out to them...

[grumpypants]

um, i need it. as it's been part of our income for several years and i have 4 dcs.

[DobieTheHouseElf]

First post - please be gentle!
Our family will be losing child benefit in 2013 - we don't need the money (I spend it on clothes and stuff for DCs), however, I do agree with OP that there are a hell of a lot of families better off than ours who will retain this benefit. I can't undertand why it's going to be based on household income.

[grumpypants]

that's interesting eric - i can cope with higer income families taking hits like evryone else, can't really get the 'easy option' this seems to be.

[DobieTheHouseElf]

Sorry - not going to be based on household income.

[MaisyMooCow]

Dobie...shouldn't all benefits be based on household income?

[MaisyMooCow]

Dobie ..oops, I got there before I saw your update!

[gallifrey]

My husband is a higher rate tax payer, his annual salary is over £50k and because he also has a company car he gets taxed so much that we are not that much better off than any one else!
I'm on maternity leave at the moment and we have 1 other child.

If we both had jobs of say £30k each we wouldn't pay as much tax as he does on his own and we would still get child benefit.

I know that if they did means test every household in the country it would cost them millions and they would have to set up a whole department etc, by doing it this way it makes it easier to administer.

[grumpypants]

but the system is there for tax credits, so why not have working tax element/ child care element/ child benefit/ childcare element etc?

[2cats2many]

Basing it on a single income threshold rather than means testing the household does make it easier and cheaper to administer, but it also makes it completely and obviously unfair.

I suspect this will come back to bite the Tories in the bottom as the deadline to implementation approaches.

[grumpypants]

it's just the political insistence that it is fair in this letter that annoys me - it's just if they say it enough it's true. I feel sorrier for people on the threshold who will lose CB and pay 40% for the first time...

[DobieTheHouseElf]

Me too Grumpypants.

[hermioneweasley]

it is self evidently unfair that a household with one £50K earner (so already paying tax within the 40% band) should also lose CB, when two £30K earners don't, and are already taking home more net because both basic rate payers.

[catsmother]

The withdrawal of CB on the basis currently proposed is clearly NOT fair and I find it fucking (excuse my French !) contemptuous to even try and claim that it is. Do they think we're all thick and will meekly accept a new definition of "fair", never mind a new version of basic mathematics where one household with a 40% tax payer, say, on £40K, is apparently "better off" than another household with 2 20% tax payers on £34,500 each ?

It's not just the loss of income .... I think it's the sheer contempt and arrogance about it all which gets me the most.

[HHLimbo]

I think the logic is that if only one parent is working, the other is available to look after kids. But if both work, they would need to pay childcare..

Im not sure how fair that is on single parent households, but no doubt they will start insulting single parents soon anyway, being tories.

[noeyedear]

But two 30K earners would both be working, probably full time, and therefore have childcare costs that a 1 50K income family would not, surely? Even if the children are at school, there would be after school childcare to pay for.

[noeyedear]

I think it is unfair for single parent households, as it wouldn't apply to them

[2cats2many]

@Limbo- I don't think that's their logic. I think the decision was based on the expense and rigmarole of means testing every household with a child in it (presumably every year as circumstances change). It was deemed easier just to fuck people over.

[catsmother]

Not all families where both work have to pay childcare .... though I admit they are in the minority. Some are very fortunate to have family help looking after kids, others have older children who no longer need childcare ... yet they still retain CB.

In any case .... if you have 2 x 34K = 68K, against a household on a single earner's £40K, you'd have to be going some to spend the difference in income all on childcare ... come on.

Conversely, it's quite possible for a family with a total household income of £50K - made up of 40% taxpayer on £38K and 20% taxpayer on £12K - to still have to pay childcare ..... and they would lose their CB.

I think to try and justify this by pointing to childcare is very misleading.

[DobieTheHouseElf]

Limbo - I don' think you can make that assumption. Until recently I worked full-time, therefore had childcare costs but was still a low rate taxpayer.

[NonnoMum]

Good post, catsmother.

If David Cameron would like to come round and tell me how to manage the family budget any better, he can.

Have applied for an evening job at McDonald's (no childcare) on top of the two days a week i do work. Guess the degree was worth it. Still, looks like my 3 won't be able to afford degrees so they might as well get used to our family being in the service industry.