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So David Cameron (we are in it together) really wants to fuck up our children then!

660 replies

belleMarie · 23/06/2012 23:14

How can anyone be taken in by this muppet? whilst him, Sam (and her £1000 pound frocks) and kiddies eat good, sleep good, shit good - we're basically screwed?

His hate for the poor/have-not is staggering and apart from a a couple of grunts here and there, this man is unstoppable.

Cameron to axe housing benefits for feckless under 25s as he declares war on welfare culture
Prime Minister gives exclusive interview to the MAIL ON SUNDAY
Reveals housing benefit will be scrapped for under 25s, who'll be forced to live with their parents
Dole money will be stopped for those who refuse to find work
Mr Cameron shares his views on Euro2012, Jimmy Carr, and what really happened when he left his daughter in the pub

Radical new welfare cuts targeting feckless couples who have children and expect to live on state handouts will be proposed by David Cameron tomorrow.
His bold reforms could also lead to 380,000 people under 25 being stripped of housing benefits and forced to join the growing number of young adults who still live with their parents.
In a keynote speech likely to inflame tensions with his deputy Nick Clegg, the Prime Minister will call for a debate on the welfare state, focusing on reforms to ?working-age benefits?.

Among the ideas being considered by Mr Cameron are:
Scrapping most of the £1.8 billion in housing benefits paid to 380,000 under-25s, worth an average £90 a week, forcing them to support themselves or live with their parents.
Stopping the £70-a-week dole money for the unemployed who refuse to try hard to find work or produce a CV.
Forcing a hardcore of workshy claimants to do community work after two years on the dole ? or lose all their benefits.
Well-placed sources say Ministers are also taking a fresh look at plans to limit child benefit to a couple?s first three children, although Mr Cameron is not expected to address this issue directly tomorrow.
Speaking exclusively to The Mail on Sunday, Mr Cameron said: ?We are sending out strange signals on working, housing and fa8milies.?

He argued that some young people lived with their parents, worked hard, planned ahead and got nothing from the State, while others left home, made little effort to seek work and got a home paid for by the benefits system.

?A couple will say, ?We are engaged, we are both living with our parents, we are trying to save before we get married and have children and be good parents. But how does it make us feel, Mr Cameron, when we see someone who goes ahead, has the child, gets the council home, gets the help that isn?t available to us???
?One is trapped in a welfare system that discourages them from working, the other is doing the right thing and getting no help.?
Asked if he would take action against large families who were paid large sums in benefits, he replied:
?This is a difficult area but it is right to pose questions about it. At the moment the system encourages people not to work and have children, but we should help people to work AND have children.?
His plan to axe housing benefit for the under-25s will have exemptions for special cases, such as domestic violence, but he said: ?We are spending nearly £2 billion on housing benefit for under-25s ? a fortune. We need a bigger debate about welfare and what we expect of people. The system currently sends the signal you are better off not working, or working less.?
He also favours new curbs on the Jobseeker?s Allowance, demanding the unemployed do more to find work. He said: ?We aren?t even asking them, ?Have you got a CV ready to go?? ? A small minority of hardcore workshy, an estimated 5,000 to 10,000, could be forced to take part in community work if they fail or refuse to find work or training after two years.
The Prime Minister wants to show he is committed to radical policies, but his speech could exacerbate strains with Coalition partner Mr Clegg, whose Lib Dems oppose drastic welfare cuts.
It follows the row over plans to revive O-levels and will fuel rumours the Coalition could end long before the 2015 Election. ?As leader of a political party as well as running a Coalition it?s right sometimes to make a more broad-ranging speech,? said Mr Cameron.
A Government official said: ?Decent folk are fed up with the increasing abuse of the welfare system. Responsible people who work damned hard, often on low incomes, to support themselves, are sick and tired of seeing others do nothing and live off the state.
?Labour threw ever greater sums of money at the problem and made it worse. If we want to encourage responsibility we have be bold enough to tackle these issues. We suspect some of those who refuse point-blank to seek work are working on the black market and claiming fraudulently.?
But a Labour source said: ?It is easy for rich Tories with big houses to have grown-up children at home while they find their feet. It?s different if you live in a tiny council flat and your daughter is a single mum.? Ministers said curbs on housing benefit for the under-25s, had helped slash the welfare bill in Germany and Holland

OP posts:
LST · 24/06/2012 11:17

happy are you talking child benefit and tax credits too?

Birdsgottafly · 24/06/2012 11:19

"Maybe our teen pregnancy rate would drop to that of other countries if no benefits were paid until over 25"

Teen parents won't be affected, only the working poor will be.

The 'feckless' families that people think will be clamped down on, won't be, they get catered for under other systems.

NunOnTheRun · 24/06/2012 11:19

The next United Kingdom general election will be the election to the 56th Parliament of the United Kingdom. The election will be held on 7 May 2015 en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Next_United_Kingdom_general_election .... Three more years of this lot? Dear God. Sad

handbagCrab · 24/06/2012 11:19

Arrgh! Instead of making things worse for the people at the bottom, why can't this government and our society focus on making things better for everyone?

Not paying Hb for under 25s is not going to magic into lower taxes or better services for everyone else.

Completely disenfranchising a whole generation of young people is not going to make for a better society for anyone in the long run.

There is a surplus of workers, not a surplus of jobs. Policy should be focussing on job creation, not ploughing as many people into poverty as possible to make a point.

Birdsgottafly · 24/06/2012 11:20

These 'other' systems will cost more than HB will.

YoYoYoItsTillyMinto · 24/06/2012 11:28

edam - £1kpm isnt for a shared house thought is it?

i live in london & everyone i know worked and shared for years with no top up benefits. i am only suggesting a level playing field.

AThingInYourLife · 24/06/2012 11:28

I presume there will also be a lower rate of tax (and NI) for the under 25s to compensate for their loss of entitlement.

YoYoYoItsTillyMinto · 24/06/2012 11:31

athing - i dont have a mortgage - can i get a discount on tax & ni as HB wont benefit me?

it doesnt work like that - i pay in! thats it.

YoYoYoItsTillyMinto · 24/06/2012 11:33

also any 25 yo earning less than £22k isnt paying for their own share of the services they use. e.g. the NHS.

FrothyOM · 24/06/2012 11:49

Is Cameron creating a shitstorm about HB to divert attention from this, I wonder:

www.guardian.co.uk/business/2012/jun/24/tory-donor-tax-avoidance

www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/top-tory-donor-michael-hintze-925387

Hmm....Grin

Same old Tories, a party run for the rich by the rich.

ErikNorseman · 24/06/2012 12:01

Happymumofone
if you cant afford to rent your own place then you live at home or share costs with a few friends. Why should the state pay for what, for the majority, is a lifestyle choice of wanting their own place

Under 35s already have benefit capped at a single room rate, ie for a shared house. What happens is that people are in shared houses but can't earn enough to pay the rent as wages are too low and rents too high. Dc is proposing doing away with any Hb at all for under 25s.

AThingInYourLife · 24/06/2012 12:17

"athing - i dont have a mortgage - can i get a discount on tax & ni as HB wont benefit me?"

No, and no more should you.

We all pay in regardless of what we need to take out.

But taking away an existing entitlement based entirely on age is different.

It's not being taken away because it's not needed or not appropriate.

It's pure age discrimination.

If young people have fewer entitlements, they should pay less tax/NI.

You have the same entitlement as someone without a mortgage. You just happen to have one, which is advantageous to you.

If you didn't have one, you could get HB if needed.

A person of 22 isn't different in terms of needs or circumstances from one of 26. They are just being made to wait until 25 before they are treated as adults by the state.

It's pretty hard to justify that if they are paying full tax.

"Thanks, youngsters, we'll take your money, but you can fuck off if you think you're getting anything back. We need that money to pay non-means rested winter fuel allowance to wealthy pensioners."

Figures I've seen for being a net contributor to the exchequer are slot higher than £22k. More like three times that.

ShellyBoobs · 24/06/2012 12:21

You have the same entitlement as someone without a mortgage. You just happen to have one, which is advantageous to you.

I think a lot of people would disagree. So many people are in negative equity that I don't think you can generalise and say that having a mortgage is advantageous.

ShellyBoobs · 24/06/2012 12:24

I presume there will also be a lower rate of tax (and NI) for the under 25s to compensate for their loss of entitlement.

In the same way that there's a lower rate for childless people?

Oh, wait a minute...

YoYoYoItsTillyMinto · 24/06/2012 12:28

athing - i dont have a mortgage, its paid off. so i cannot claim HB. i dont have any entitlement to HB.

i am in my thirties so not a baby boomer!

loads of people experience "Thanks, XXX, we'll take your money, but you can fuck off if you think you're getting anything back"

this is normal!

YoYoYoItsTillyMinto · 24/06/2012 12:30

we all benefit from the NHS, police etc. but the idea of paying into a pot so you get some money handed to you is over.

frothy i completely agreed with you. i dont like DC et al, just think we need to be realisitc about ecomonics.

prettyfly1 · 24/06/2012 12:34

I have very mixed feelings about this. When I was younger benefits for the under twenty fives were rare anyway so when I moved out due to family issues at seventeen I had to work and carry my own weight regardless, which was hard but ultimately beneficial. That said this was in the early noughties when work was frankly abundant. Young people today are leaving uni and a quick search through the job forums shows nothing but slave labour internships - how are they supposed to move out and work with that going on. The hospitality and leisure industry I worked in is in decline, there is huge competition from overseas workers thanks to EU legislation and the simple fact of the matter is there are too many people and not enough jobs. I just cant see how this can work from either side.

AThingInYourLife · 24/06/2012 12:40

Being childless, having your mortgage paid off, being rich, being healthy - they are not the same as not qualifying for the same benefits purely on the basis if your age.

This is the equivalent of saying that the children of the under-25s are not entitled to free schooling, or under 25s must pay for their own healthcare.

Young adults are full members of our society. There is no justification for withdrawing the welfare state from them based not on circumstance (children, wealth, mortgage) but based solely on age.

People who whinge about how they can't get benefits because they don't need them really are a special kind of cunt.

GoodPhariseeofDerby · 24/06/2012 12:41

The whole article is showing the failings that are being swept under the carpet. It isn't saying people don't have CVs, it's saying that the JobCentre isn't asking to see them. One of my friends on JobSeekers spent months asking for help with his CV, never got any.

Many of the people who have been on for two years+ are those with disabilities, and are often pushed on to ESA at that point by fear-mongering over very active volunteering opportunities (and if you start one and cannot finish, your benefits can be stopped). Seriously, I have two friends who were on JobSeekers, the disabled one who really wants to work was pushed on ESA by being told all the volunteer work was like cleaning parks and such. The non-disabled one, after a just a few months on it, was put on the same scheme - behind the counter as a CashConverters type shop - a job type which was never mentioned to the man with disabilities.

Also, it's a lot harder for those on JobSeekers to get any help with their disabilities so are also pushed onto ESA just to get what was once basic help. JobSeekers could once get Chronic Pain counselling, that's been taken away. It all massages the figures and makes it harder for many people to get into work.

Empusa · 24/06/2012 12:42

Why is it so difficult to grasp the idea that working people can get HB?
Why on earth should those on minimum wage be penalised for not earning enough?
Where has this idea that anyone under the age of 25 getting HB has never worked come from?
Do people honestly believe that under 25s can't have moved out while working only to lose their job, or been forced to take a paycut?

It isn't just going to penalise the "feckless", it's going to penalise those who;

  • are made redundant
  • are forced to take a paycut (not unheard of in the current climate)
  • lose a partner
  • have to flee a violent partner
  • have their LL put up rent
  • lose their parents

Or do people honestly believe that none of the above happens to under 25s?

Empusa · 24/06/2012 12:43

Forgot to mention, what about the under 25s who become disabled?

xDivAx · 24/06/2012 12:46

Yoyo, neither is any over 25 who earns less than £22k

YoYoYoItsTillyMinto · 24/06/2012 12:50

athing - lots of benefits are related to age. CB, pension, etc.

LST · 24/06/2012 12:51

yoyo that is purely clutching at straws.

MammaTJ · 24/06/2012 12:51

I know a young lady who has just turned 18. Her mum left her dad some years ago and for the most part, she has lived with him. Mum does not have room for her in her life.

More recently she was his carer as he was very ill.

When he died, she had to move out of their rented home as the bastard landlord did not want someone so young on their own in that place.

She now lives in a housing association flat. She has not yet got a job. She is looking but also intends to return to college in September to increase her qualifications and increase her job prospects.

She genuinely needs housing benefit. Not through choices she has made in any way!