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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

to envy/hate people on benefits to be as well off if not better than us

999 replies

chocaddict · 08/01/2012 16:08

I know that this post may have some mixed reviews and may even get me slated but I can,t help it.
Someone I know although she is a genuine case her and her husband have as much as me and dh coming in and with a brand new car thrown in for good measure.
I can only dream of a new car and I work my tripe off 5 days a week as well as dh whilst some people can sit at home and get the same income coming in it seems really unfair.

OP posts:
Peachy · 09/01/2012 09:25

Lesly of course some houses can be bought 'cheaply'- I live in S E Wales after all.. BUT mortgage availability is the killer now.

Peachy · 09/01/2012 09:26

'So people can genuinely be worse off if they take a low paid job.'
Financially- yes.

Dignity for me counts for a lot too.

ReindeerBollocks · 09/01/2012 09:27

Twoifbysea - there was an amazing thread about mobility cars less than six months ago, showing how much they actually cost. It's not as straight forward as just getting a free car. I suggest you look up that thread before you start sounding as ignorant as the OP.

DoesNotGiveAFig · 09/01/2012 09:29

I haven't read this whole thread, but I am very shocked by the OPs attitude. I just don't know what to say.

I also don't know why having a new car is the be all and end all of life for them, and having more money than joe next door. It's a bit Hyacincth Bucket.

The OP has the choice of advancing her career to earn more as she is able to work. Instead she wastes time writing nasty things on here.

Peachy · 09/01/2012 09:30

EXmrs, if I get a free cap can it be a purple one please, to match my coat?

I should probably assure my betters that my coat was purchased on Ebay AND did not come with a free goat.

lesley33 · 09/01/2012 09:30

peachy - Yes it is very difficult to get a mortgage now. But this couple have wealthy family so they may have acted as guarantetors.

Annd I agree that there are other reasons to work as well.

Peachy · 09/01/2012 09:31

Ah guarantors does narrow it a bit then. With the security etc probably makes win-win for them AND the state as well.

ReindeerBollocks · 09/01/2012 09:32

Lesley we were told five years ago that the 'income' we received from benefits would go towards a mortgage application alongside a full time wage. So benefits were taken into account in mortgage applications but you wouldn't get a mortgage on benefits alone (I think you may have said this though).

However they no longer take DLA/carers etc into account in mortgage applications (I believe they haven't since about 2008).

EXmrsmascarahead · 09/01/2012 09:33

I am sorry peachy but because I know you are not worthy, you will get what you are given and you will either like it or lump it, jeez this country is not a bottomless pit you know, feckin scroungers! Smile

MmeLindor. · 09/01/2012 09:34

Peachy
Jeez. Now you are asking for a particular colour of cap.

MrsEX.
Don't do it, before you know it she will be demanding a fecking flower for the cap.

Peachy · 09/01/2012 09:34

Hmph. You can stuff yer cap then and I will resort to forelock tugging. Mine own forelock n all.

MmeLindor. · 09/01/2012 09:37

Peachy
My FIL signed their (ancient and drafty) house over to SIL with MH issues, cause it gives her a (cold and dusty) bolthole. Even knowing that they have a house, helps keep her steady.

EXmrsmascarahead · 09/01/2012 09:37

She can have the flower but she'll have to pay for it, ALL successful DLA apllicants will be made to work in sweatshops producing said caps until they have paid, through labour, for all their benefits.

F*CK! I sound like a Tory.

herbietea · 09/01/2012 09:37

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn

TheLightPassenger · 09/01/2012 09:38

Yes, of course there are issue around low pay, childcare and work-related expenses. But why should the answer be to make genuine disabled people worse off, that's not going to make low paid workers life any easier, when fuel/public transport costs are rising dramatically?

Acumenoop · 09/01/2012 09:40

I have a low paid job. It costs me £3848 a year to work compared to my non working benefit entitlement. And I don't claim DLA for myself either so conceivably more but that's a whole other thread, haha.

I am so lucky to be able to work. Don't you understand? I am so lucky and so thrilled to get up in the morning and go for my walk by the lake and sit at my table and finally be allowed to do my maths that I love and draw my pictures and write my code and my music. It's a 70 hour week at the same time as my 24/7 caring (5 hours per week outside the house by my lake) and it's the best thing that's ever ever happened to me since I crashed out of mainstream school at 12.

Can't you see how lucky you are? I can't understand how you can't see it. I do feel a bit sorry for you guys in that way.

I'm away to write my killfille and then do my work!

MmeLindor. · 09/01/2012 09:48

Yes, Lightpassenger - that point just illustrates that the basic problem is (as ever in UK) high cost of housing/transport/childcare. Particularly in SE England.

For both those on benefits and those not on benefits.

KalSkirata · 09/01/2012 09:48

What is it about the cars? The jealousy over a fucking car. A car is just like a large wheelchair. Its a box on wheels. Yet 'he car' gets mentioned all he time along with whining about not being able to have a new one like a disabled person. Its a fucking box on wheels.
But Im sure dd will swap her short life expectancy, inability to walk and talk plus the hideous wheelchair accessible vehicle for the jealous person's child's ability to run and laugh and actually live to adulthood.
Bargain?

GreenMonkies · 09/01/2012 10:02

I can see both sides of this. I know a family that are totally dependant on benefits, never worked a day. They are both obese and both asthmatic. They have a mobility car as they can't get around (due to buggered joints thanks to their weight and breathlessness due to the asthma) and get DLA etc to supprt them. However, they eat crap, Maccy-D's etc and both smoke like chimneys. The severity of their health problems is self inflicted, they are only in the state they are in because of the life they lead. I think this is monstrously unfair.

However, I am now a lone parent, and work 19.5 hours a week, I get tax credits, some housing benefit and a little maintenance from my ex. We live well, but carefully, I am effectively earning a modest full-time salary for working part-time hours. However, my "days off" are spent doing the domestic admin that I would otherwise spend my evenings and weekends doing as I have no "partner" to share these chores with. (When I'm not mumsnetting obvs Biscuit). My car is old, we don't go on holiday, and I have to budget to make sure the important things are paid.

There are some who are taking the piss, and others who are geniuinely deserving.

Bloodymary · 09/01/2012 10:05

DawnDonna on page 9.

Can I just say that you deserve a medal Thanks

GreenMonkies · 09/01/2012 10:06

(oh, and I have Joint Hypermobility, which is slowly crumbling my joints. I am able to work now, partly because I take good care of myself and partly through sheer bloody mindedness of not wanting to "give in", but it is only a matter of time before I will be registered disabled too, and if I'm lucky, and the govt hasn't stripped them all away, get the benefits that go with not being able to live a "normal" life)

Bakelitebelle · 09/01/2012 10:08

herbietea if the OP could only read and really try to get her head around your post, the world would be a fractionally better place.

OhDoAdmitMrsDeVere · 09/01/2012 10:15

Can we pleeeeeeeease have sticky thread.
One that explains about Motorbility Cars.

The poster that sad
She who it was registered for never gets to use it.
They only have to pay for petrol.

Scuse me? Who pays their insurance then?
Where does the £70+ a week come from to pay the lease?
I use my OH's car. How would I get the shopping and take the kids out if I didnt?
Disabled people to not exist in a vacum. They have families who do 'normal' things. Without his car he couldnt work but because he works he cannot do all the other stuff that Dads/Ohs do. So I do it. All of it.

I should do that on the bus whilst the car sits outside our house should I?

MmeLindor. · 09/01/2012 10:18

MrsDV
I am going to do a blog post about mobility cars, so if anyone has links or info about them, could they PM me.

Bakelitebelle · 09/01/2012 10:18

Greenmonkies, you will be pleased to learn that Disability Living Allowance is one of the least fraudulently claimed benefits. The people you know are the exception to the rule. Why don't you point out examples of those who deserve their DLA - because you probably don't know many disabled people?

If I was a lone parent of a non-disabled child, I could still access childcare, I could still get a good night's sleep (bearing in mind my children are older) and I could still have the energy to get to work in the morning. As it is, i am often up several times in the night changing my 15-year-olds pooey nappies, or just trying to get him to stay in bed so we can sleep at least until 5am. There is very little childcare for severely disabled children so that makes work doubly difficult. My son is violent, so it is difficult to get someone to look after him anyway. We rely on respite. He has the needs of an 18-month old, in the body of a teenager. If I was just a single parent, believe me, life would be 10 times easier. I know, because I've been the single parent of a baby, while working full-time. It was a cakewalk compared to my life now.

Yet still, I manage to work part-time and not slob about on the dole, going on fun trips in my free mobility car.