To think that no one will ever vote conservative again

[rogersmellyonthetelly]

At least in anyone in living memory of the current government and their immoral targeting of the most vulnerable members of society.
I voted conservative at the last election to my eternal shame, I won't make the same mistake twice.

Under Labour, I was off work, then went back to work. We had two preschool kids and rented our home. We were LOADS better off when I worked - tax credits covered most of the childcare, housing benefit and council tax benefit was still there in a reduced amount and we got more working tax credit, as well as, of course, my wage, and we still got dla. So I never understand the 'unemployed people are richer than workers' view...

Now, I have been off again (long term health issues that relapse) and am going back to work, but the support that helped me last time just isn't there. I asked, but because I 'passed' my wca and so don't have t work, I'm no longer important. The classes I was going to take have stopped. There is a huge lack of jobs anyway, and half the jobs advertised seem to be unpaid 'work experience'.

I know which government made it easier to work...

Well said Twelveleggedwalk.

Dawndonna

A congregate community is a ghetto.

So an old people's home - which is a congregate community - is a ghetto.

Look, I hold my hands up and say that I'm no expert in this field, but I think that what you're reading in to it isn't there. If it was a Green Party policy, you wouldn't have made that assumption.

For crying out loud Flatpack, whenever there is one of these threads, you come on, put in your twopennorth and refuse to listen to anybody but yourself.

Gosh, how different that would make me to all the raving socialists who imagine that if someone wears a blue rosette they're a racist baby murderer.

It's in their manifesto.
As is the putting those on incapacity at the same rate as jobseekers.
Which bit of either of these, FROM THEIR MANIFESTO do you not comprehend?

Sorry, but their welfare policy says more than their 2010 manifesto and there's no indication that they're planning to lock up disabled people in camps.

"I know which government made it easier to work..."
well I know which government quietly set up all the closures so people have less places to work, so that the bad cop could swoop in and take the blame, but the closures and funding cuts I was aware of pre election were 100% set in stone under labour, they just weren't public yet!

flat pack they TRIED disablility communes in the not so distant past y'know!

As an aside, I'm sure the Camphill movement would just love to hear that getting on for 100 years of hard work in 21 countries has led their residents to "a ghetto" Just maybe their model is what the UKIP mainfesto is referring to...

I am a Scottish lone parent with 4dc and not working (college). And I will be voting for the Tories.

^A congregate community is a ghetto.

So an old people's home - which is a congregate community - is a ghetto.^

I must admit I thought of laughing my head off there as I'm sure all those gated communites in florida willed with retired jewish folks from the rest of the US don't think of themselves as living in a ghetto.

Godwin's law of the net is a winner every time.

As I said earlier, always a Labour voter, intend to vote Green, not for environmental issues but they seem to be the left now, although I will want to examine their manifesto etc.

For me (and DH) there are all the 5 key issues, we can't make head nor tail of half the party leaflets etc, they all seem conflicting and they change once in power anyway, but for us the problems are:

Healthcare- you should receive the best quality healthcare regardless of your wealth

Education- you should receive the best quality healthcare regardless of your wealth, back ground or ability and should then experience equal opportunities to try an achieve your career

Immigration- Dh is effectively an immigrant, my family are all descendants of immigrants. However immigration needs to be discussed, so many people are scared and unsettled by it. In a poor jobs market, it becomes an easy target but a discussion needs to be had without screams of racism. While I'm aware its not that simple, I see it as if you're redecorating your house and you've got offers of help from the neighbours. You don't dislike them but don't want them all round at once, drinking your milk and leaving tea bags everywhere. You want them to contribute not just hang about getting under your feet but you don't mind so and so from round the corner or the woman from up the road because they've got problems and its nice for them to be in company. Also when push comes to shove and they take a massive shit and block your toilet you ask them to leave. Most importantly you keep track of them and know whos where, for how long and when they leave. Over simplification I know but that how I feel.

Economy- I have zero suggestions. Cuts worry us, we don't want the poorest and most vulnerable to suffer and as we're in double dip it doesn't seem to be working but I want to know much more about the alternatives and how and if another party would implement them.

Benefits- When did it change, when did everyone become so resentful of benefits, when did their become such an increase in those on benefits which is what the tories claim. How can we get back to people feeling good about benefits.

If any party can resolve these then I will vote for them Tory, UKIP, Labour whoever but it just doesn't seem to be done. There are too many people never looking past the end of their own nose. Long post sorry

People became resentful of those on benefits when they started to see that people on benefits had more spare cash and access to better housing than they could afford from working.

There became an increase of people on benefits when labour created a system where you could be significantly better off on benefits and having children than you could be working.

I think we will feel better about benefits when we can see that they are only the safety net that they were intended to be, for people who are ill or disabled or who are temporarily out of work.

The point about Camphill, is there are choices.

People became resentful of those on benefits NOT when they appeared to have more spare cash, but when the government started feeding the likes of the Daily Mail the line that all people on benefits are idle, feckless scroungers, on the fiddle. Including those with disabilities. Disability hate crime has increased under the Tories but a significant amount.

I?m a swing voter. From 1997 to 2005 I voted Labour. Last election I voted Conservative. I couldn?t bear the idea of Gordon Brown being in charge, I thought he was a dreadful prime minister, incapable of acknowledging errors and that Labour would be a disaster. I wanted to give another party a go, and I agreed with a large part of their manifesto ? cuts and austerity were absolutely necessary. Plus I?ve moved areas, from Holloway to Nottingham, so I had a different MP, and I like our Tory MP (Ken Clarke).

I think the implementation of Tory policies has been an absolute shambles however. David Cameron has, it appears, no control over his back benchers, the party is ultimately divided and the simplistic banging on about getting out of Europe has been ridiculous, as if it was so simple. While I think welfare needs a total overhaul, I think it has been handled badly. Misinformation has been able to kill off sensible policies with ministers caught on the hop trying to explain things and there is an equally large amount of daft ones.

However, Ed Miliband is not to me a credible prime minister. I can?t imagine him at the G8 representing us, I?d just be a bit embarrassed frankly. He doesn?t come across as a leader of a country, and I don?t think he has demonstrated any talent in negotiation and diplomacy. Plus I think he?s a backstabbing little weasel, and that shines through everything he does. Labour has lost the people I did find competent as well, Alan Johnson, David Milliband, David Blunkett Robin Cook etc.

It would be a cold day in hell before I voted for any party which would give Ed Balls a sniff of power as well.

I don?t see the point in the Lib Dems.

So, who will I vote for next? I can?t see any appealing options really. I?m not prepared to give Labour another go until they have a fresh cabinet team or bring back some of the people who were doing some good (I?d have a good think about it if David Milliband was in charge). Lib Dems are pointless and whiny. Tories are disorganised and tearing themselves apart. None of the leaders are inspiring.

I?ll probably vote for Ken Clarke as it goes, because I think he is a good politician, so Tory by default.

I would always vote Conservative as a protest of being duped into supporting an illegal war by helping to vote the criminal tossers in.
How much has the illegal war cost? How many people could have benefitted from that money.
That money was used to kill people rather than help it's own people. i will never, ever forgive that and even if thatcher came back tomorrow, I wouold move Hell and high water to put in my vote.

Dawndonna

People became resentful of those on benefits NOT when they appeared to have more spare cash, but when the government started feeding the likes of the Daily Mail the line that all people on benefits are idle, feckless scroungers, on the fiddle. Including those with disabilities.

People have been resentful for years and years. However, when the economy's good people grumble and suck it up. When things turn bad, though, that's when the reaction comes. People who work can see their lives getting worse even though they're working hard and the resentment boils over.

Disability hate crime has increased under the Tories but a significant amount.

Puttinng aside the veracity of that claim, it could just be that the conservatives have been presiding over the spending cuts - correlation isn't causation.

Outraged - see my example up thread. Unless you are advocating ignoring the costs of children (which nobody is, surely?) give me an example where yo are better off not working. All I can think of is maybe people who have partners working over the tax credits level but childcare would cost more than they would earn if they worked too.

Go on... Same family either in or out of normal minimum wage work.

Do you know what, flatpack. My dh has just been turned down for his higher rate mobility. We're lucky in that we're not reliant on benefits. But I'm tired, I'm angry and I can't be arsed with being patronised anymore.
I'm not stupid, not by any stretch of a very limited imagination. What worries me in this world are the people who think they're clever, wandering around the internet, not discussing, but stating. Never shifting their point of view. You see, generally they're nowhere near as clever as they like to thing. Yes, they have a bit of vocabulary, and a prejudice against the left wing, whereby it can't be right by dint of the fact that it is left wing and then, there's nothing more to it than that.
Right, I'm off to sort out my Dh. That would be the chap that can't even go to the lavatory without help, but doesn't need a blue badge according to the authorities. Nothing to do with the fact that he can't walk, everything to do with cuts.

think

Dawndonna- disability aside as I don't consider disability benefits under the same banner, I only became resentful when I realised just how much was being handed out. I do however think that definition of disability is now drawn too widely amend that it needs to be narrowed.

YABU - of course people will vote Conservative. Labour messed things up big time. They left the country with no money. And don't look like a viable alternative right now.

flatpackhamster

Actually, I think I would like to vote for you please

To answer the OP, sorry but YABU. I will be voting Tory as I have in the last 2 elections after a period of Labour/CND/feminist activism whilst a skint student. I am a firm beilever of "(S)He who is not a socialist at 18 has no heart, (s)he who is still a socialist at 30 has no brain...."

Of course people will vote Tory again. People have very short memories. They've forgotten that Thatcher did all sorts of things that have repercussions further down the line - selling off council housing stock (rise in homelessness), changing the rules to allow school playing fields being sold off (with the result, according to this week's Private Eye, that 5,000 school playing fields were sold off in the 1980s), deregulation of the financial industry (we all know where that led), privatisation of utilities (remember that next time you complain about your gas bill), and introduction of "parental choice" in the school admissions process (which has caused loads of anguish and misery, but which people have almost entirely forgotten was the result of Tory policy and generally blame the Labour government again).

That's just for starters. I could go on, but you probably don't want me to.

Really Beagle? Because I see it the other way - at 18 you are entirely self-obsessed, it's the nature of a teenager, so Tory survival of the fittest policies make sense.
But as you get older, as you see your parents age, your friends' financial circumstances change, your family affected by health concerns, you travel, you come across a wider cross section of society, you grow, you learn, and you develop empathy and a social conscience. Hopefully.

I would never vote Tory. I think the Liberal Democrats had an opportunity to hold the balance of power in the coalition government and greatly change/influence policies, because the Conservatives owed them for their help in forming the government, but they have frittered it away.

This thread has moved on a lot, but I'd like to comment on Gatorade's opinion - everyone has the same opportunities in life to do well for themselves.

That's not true; abilities, talents, job availability and, yes, background, make a huge difference.

Plus, if everyone had a highly paid, high-flying job, who would do the essential and sadly undervalued and underpaid jobs such as cleaning, looking after children, working in supermarkets and emptying bins to name just a few? The current system means that most if not all people doing these kinds of jobs are forced to claim benefits such as housing benefit, tax credits and the like, even if they work full time, because employers pay salaries that are below a living wage. Who will pay a woman working part time cleaning loos £50,000 a year, for example? And what would society do without her?

I work as a company administrator but I'm only paid pennies above the minimum hourly rate, so I have to claim benefits for myself and my 11 week old daughter (I had to go back to work when she was only 3 weeks old because I wasn't entitled to SMP - the last company I worked for folded when I was 15 weeks' pregnant). It's easy to trot out the rhetoric that people on benefits are all workshy but that's not the truth at all. It's a simpistic and naive view. Everyone needs to remember that they are lucky to have a job and that it could change at any moment. Unemployment is the highest it's been since the last Tory governent.

I would also like to comment that of course someone earning £50k a year conributes more money to the benefits system and the NHS than I do - of course they should because they earn more money and should therefore pay more tax! At the very least, tax should be proportional. However, figures have shown that the top 10% of earners collectively earn 12 times what the lowest 10% of earners do (including people on full benefits who don't pay tax at all), but only pay 9 times the total amount of tax (and I can't find the link! Drat!). That's not proportional at all.

Totally agree hackmum. Which is why blaming Brown for the financial crisis and government deficit is so pointless. No government starts with a clean slate, so for Cameron to be blaming Labour he needs to look at what Labour inherited.