Bloody W**NKing Tax credits! Or Government should I say

[Hai1988]

Just had my new tax credits award and have just found out that my DH's Working tax credits are being stopped as he has already had his lot for this year, £800!!!

My DH does not have a very well payed job at all and after rent and bills we have f**K all left and the weekly income of £140 really helped that is now just over £50.

So angry We need that extra £80 a week, I know it may not sound much to some but it did make a big difference to out life's.

Who ever voted Tory I hope your happy with yourselves that now so many family's are probably gonna struggle now.

Sorry not really an aibu but really needed to vent and wondered if anyone else is suffering with tax credits this year because of the dam government.

There's NOTHING wrong with wanting to take your child to school......if you can afford it. But expecting someone else to give you money so you can do it is indeed wrong.

It IS a choice for you prettymeerkat. It is a choice.

I hate the last govt for warping benefits so that so many people actually believe its their right to not work just so they can do the school run whilst other people like myself work each day, forsake family time to bring home the bacon and pay taxes but somehow that's fair and if we dare point out the hypocrisy then we're all right wing daily mail reading capitalists.

niceguy2 No actually it's not a choice. Either take my dcs to school and try desperately to build a happy family, or don't and watch my children suffer as the gap between us widens. THAT is not a choice. When you know for definate that your children will suffer it is not a choice. If your children are happy enough with the childminder then you have a choice.

BTW, I do work, at night when my children sleep, I don't claim benefits and get only the family element of tax credits.

Oh and also, I CAN'T afford it. I have made the choice to get horribly in debt (20k so far) so that I can be there for my children. I will be the one who pays it off in a few years time when things are more settled with my children, not the government (before you jump on that one). THAT is how important it is to my childrens happiness, that I am willing to put myself into that much debt for it.

PrettyMeerkat 'Either take my dcs to school and try desperately to build a happy family, or don't and watch my children suffer as the gap between us widens.'
That is a choice...and you choose to take your DC's to school. The alternative may not be particularly palatable to you, but it is still a choice.

Sorry, but I hear of many many people who say 'I don't have a choice' when they bloody well do, they just choose what suits them and their families more.
I don't see what's wrong with that, but we all make choices.

Of course not only rich people should have children but if you make a decision to have children then you should be aware of things you have to give up and that you will probably be skint!
There's no point complaining it's the states fault that you are poor. It might be the fault of the education a person received or the up bringing a person had but it not right to blame the government.
Life is tough, that's the way it is, I am NOT referring to the OP but I have seen many friends complaining about the tax credits and the fact they are skint but they have regular holidays or kids are in designer wear etc.
I think the whole easy credit decades and Labour government has wrongly given the impression that everyone should have a good life including travel and throw away mentality. It's time we stopped expecting so much and blaming others for our tough lives.

thirstforknowledge May not be particilarly palatable to me?!?!?! Would it be palatable to you if you knew for certain that your children would suffer if you didn't do something? I am protecting my children and trying to build them happy lives finally after suffering from mental illness which has affected us all and our bond. The NEED it! It is best for their welfare! To me that leaves no choice and is no harder a choice then not allowing them to cross the road by themselves as they will get run over, or not giving them drugs. Yes it may be a choice of sorts but is as simple as the only way to ensure my childrens future happiness.

It might be the fault of the education a person received

Any who is responsible for that? Oh thats right, the Government!

PrettyMeerkat Everyone makes choices. Some are easy, some are difficult, but we make choices nonetheless.
The consequences of the choices we make can be devastating, or they can be beneficial to us, our families and society as a whole, but we are still responsible for making those choices.
You have made your choice, and you are happy with the choice you have made. I don't understand why you feel you need to defend your choice so much, but more than that, I don't understand why you feel you need to absolve yourself of responsibility for the choice you have made by saying you don't have a choice.

You do have a choice, and you have chosen to take your DC to school. No one on here has any problem with that, least of all me, but to say you didn't choose to take your children to school is clearly not true.

I could choose to spend all my shopping money on chocolate and wine today and leave my DC hungry all week, but I wont choose to do that. Nevertheless, I still have a choice.

You do not need to defend your choice so vehemently, no one is arguing with you over the choices you have made, but to have no choice would mean you didn't have the right or the power to make the choices you feel are the most beneficial to your family, when clearly no one is physically forcing you to go to work during the day and putting you in shackles to prevent you from doing the school run.

If you are physically prevented from walking your DC to school or are dragged kicking and screaming to work at 8 am and physically locked in work until 4pm, then I apologise, because in that case, you clearly don't have a choice, but I'm quite confident that is not the case.

I hear of many people who defend their choices needlessly by saying 'I don't have a choice' when they clearly do and have exercised that right. I shall mark you down as one who fits quite nicely into that category.

thirstforknowledge . . . also, if I don't sort out the problems within my family now, then the problems will be deeply set and will last forever. My children would be left with emotional problems forever! Is that palatable to you? If my children are that messed up that they can't work as adults and need support who will be paying for them? If they need years and years of therapy on the NHS who will be paying for that?

You have to think long term not just what is best for now, for your children and for the economy of the country. Leaving my children emotionally crippled is not best for the country.

Why are you still defending your choices PrettyMeerkat. Not a single person has criticised your choice.
Is it my use of the word 'palatable'?

I don't have a choice because it is not a choice to bring children up to the best of your ability. To do otherwise would be neglect. It's not a choice not to go around murdering people for example, it's just the right thing to do.

The reason for me arguing about this is that so many people on here have made it out to black and white when in fact peoples circumstances are more complicated then that, like mine.

I think we have a different definition of what the word 'choice' means.

Choice imo means having the right/power or opportunity to do something, not necessarily all those things at the same time.

If it is 'not a choice to bring children up to the best of your ability and not a choice not to go around murdering people' then surely it's not a choice to do these things either???

If you cannot choose not to murder someone, then similarly, you cannot choose to murder someone can you?
If it is not a choice we make to bring our children up to the best of our ability, then clearly it's not a choice to neglest our children either.

Maybe murders and neglect just happen???

Well. I did try and warn people about this months ago.

Prettymeerkat - another one here who doesn't understand why you are so vehemently defending your choice. No one is attacking you. You are prepared to borrow money, or get significantly in debt because you feel on balance that it is better for your family for you to not work. Other people might make a different choice- they might desperately want to take their children to school but feel that the emotional impact on their family of getting into massive debt would be more negative than the impact of working. No problem with either choice

The problem with the OP is that she wants the choice to not work and do the school run -but she wants it funded by the tax payer to the tune of £560 a month!! Can you really not see the difference in the two situations?
At the end of the day, all of us with children have to make difficult choices, and often they involve compromise. I would have liked to have year at home with my babies instead of returning to work after 6 months- but at the end of the day we all have to operate within the practical constraints of our particular circumstances and do the best we can.

I agree OP Cameron is taking money from lots of places NHS, childrens centres, schools etc and its only going to get worse it will be the elderly and disabled next.
Its ok for him in his Ivory tower he wont be retiring at 67 I know that much!

TSC had it right when she said that private companies should be forced to pay proper living wages, so people wouldn't need to be topped up by tax credits.

Also our tax money shouldn't be used to bail out private companies (banks), but should be spent on the NHS/education/proper public transport/subsidised child care/respite care and all the other things that the public need. This would give people more choice because they would be able to get to work (not always easy if you live outside a city and can't afford to run a car) and would have an affordable place to leave their DC. As things stand, if child care costs more than you can earn it is not a real choice to work/not work is it?

The op could earn more than child care for her school age child costs. She doesn't want to work though- she told us.

Well, I do think that so long as either she or her DH are working hard, they should be able to make the choice for one parent to stay home. It's not their fault that wages are artificially low and have to be topped up by the state in order to make a decent income. It should be that the DH's employer should pay enough that the state doesn't need to top it up.

When I look at the money being wasted by this and previous governments, I'd rather they gave it to someone like the OP and stopped funding the banks/ wars.

OP Are your children at nursery? or school? Do you work?
I work a few hours each day straight after nursery drop off. Mine is only there 3 hours but I go straight to work for 2.5 hours and then go straight to pick up. It gives us that bit extra to help with finances?

Not having children until we could afford them would not be a choice in our case but a gamble.

We are receiving tc and hb and have done for almost a year now, nothing I'm proud over but the only other option for us would be to wait until I am in my thirties to have kids and gamble with fertility. In that case we might not ever be able to have kids.

I am studying at the moment and will have my degree in June next year and hopefully find myself a full time job. Right now I would not be able to get a job that pays enough for us to get off benefits anyway (but I am trying).

My husband is working full time and believe me, if he had a chance to get a better paid job he would take it.

Right- so you think parents should be able to choose to not work, for however long they choose, whether its until their youngest child is 4, 11, 18... Whatever those parents feel they want?

So are YOU prepared to go out to work to enable other people that choice?!

Thats the rub, isn't it?!

Mario and Luigi
It might not be the governments fault if the education received was not good. It might be poor parenting, it is a known fact that failing schools often have the least parental support. You cannot blame the government for everything. We need to take responsibility for ourselves more.

In areas of deprivation and where parents are not supporting their children education is often failing. It is the parents responsibility to get their children to school and give them the help and support through a secure home life to enable them to learn at school. Very often parents do not give this to their children. Although the government can try and introduce policies to facilitate change and progression it not solely their fault some schools have children who leave with no qualifications.