if you voted for the Tories, you should feel personally responsible when you see homeless people on the streets ...

[aufaniae]

...once their policies start to bite.

They want to removing housing benefit for under 25s, many of whom have children. Just one of their policies which will drive people into homelessness.

I thought this was meant to be a civilised country. If the safety net is removed, many people including children will fall through it, some of them ending up on the streets.

How can anyone support that?

[theodorakis]

Sookie is right about the banks.

[EnjoyVampirebloodResponsibly]

Labour supporters: nice, decent, hard-working, inclusive citizens who care about everyone and want to help anyone less fortunate.

Tory supporters: evil, wicked, money counting, unsympathetic, smug cunts only out for themselves and fuck anyone else.

anyone else want to jump on the sweeping generalisation bandwagon?

[financialwizard]

Not being funny but there is not much between the top 3 political party policies saythatthreetimeswhenyouaredrunk so how can you blame this on any voters?

England is up the creek without a paddle financially. We may not be as bad as many other countries but we are still in a deep recession.

What we need is a breath of fresh air, a party/person that is going to have the balls to stand up and say 'We are skint, we are going to need to tighten our belts considerably. We are definately going to have to cut down on welfare payments, other hand outs blah blah blah'.

Wwyd if you lost your job/something else happened and you could not claim benefit? Would you whinge or look at your budget and tighten it?

I have been made redundant five times. None of those times was I able to claim JSA because I was receiving CSA and at the time they took all but £10 per week CSA off of you if you claimed JSA. That would have seen me down £100 per month so I couldn't afford it, but I also had a mortgage to pay and all other bills relating to that as a single parent. What did I do? Tightened my belt.

This is a proposed idea. The chances of anything happening other than tightening the criteria to claim is slim to none.

Every government that takes over from the last is going to have a difficult job. The Tories more so because they took over from the ever generous Mr Brown. Who threw money at problems like he had a money tree in the back of 10 Downing Street. Everyone of us now knows he didn't.

Sorry, rant over.

[WhoWhatWhereWhen]

Under 25's with children will still get HB, just as under 25's with children get tax credits when normally they can't get TC not matter how low their income.

[domesticgodless]

EnjoyVampire, I don't agree with the generalisation about Labour supporters - but I think you just summed the Tories up beautifully...

[BitOutOfPractice]

sookie the government never sunk millions into banks before the banking crisis to allow them to make millions. They made millions, BILLIONS in fact, all by themselves as private businesses

The government only stepped in AFTER the crisis, to bail them out.

Which the government of every developed economy in the world had to do, regardless of political ideaology

What I find odd now about this government now is that, despite all the help we gave the banks (including almost woning one outright!) this government seems very reluctant to tell them what to do

[pumpkinsweetie]

EnjoyTheVampires You summed it up correctly

[theodorakis]

I personally don't like the Guardian but I am not saying it isn't an intelligent paper.
You misunderstood. I said that trying to reason with hardline socialists is as pointless as arguing with a Sun reader. May as well just live and let live. I hate Blair with a passion as a man, didn't mind him apart from Iraq. Surely there must be some good about both eras of leaders, why do we have to be either a labour or conservative voter? So it matches our newspaper stereotype?

[londonone]

No one I know had children aged under 25 because no one could afford it. No one I know lived alone in their own place until late twenties, because they couldn't afford it. No one I know is planning a large family as in general they don't think they can afford it.

I can think of few under 25 who are able to support kids in reality. Perhaps people need to think about that before they have them. Contraception is freely available. Use it

[aufaniae]

Where is it reported that Under 25s will still get HB? The detail is yet to be announced, but there have been no assurances for families AFAIK.

I have heard exactly the opposite reported.

Centrepoint (the homelessness charity) say:

"It is mostly families with young children that would be affected - more than half of the young people who receive housing benefit have young families. This makes it even more difficult for young people to move home and risks penalising children for their parents' financial circumstances."

Shelter also said the same, reported here in the Guardian:

"Shelter said that according to the latest Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) figures from June, cutting under-25s' housing benefit altogether would affect 385,000 households, 53% of whom are couples or single parents with children. "

[Ilovecoffeeandchocolate]

What a ridiculous OP. So therefore everyone who voted Labour in previous elections should feel guilty for:
All the service personal and civilians who died in Iraq and Afghanistan!!
Scraping the 10p rate of tax harming the less well paid
Spending more than we could afford taking us into one of the worse recessions
Failure to keep control of the banks
Selling our gold reserves for less than they were worth

The reason the country have to make cuts is that we have no money left. All the people here suggesting we should keep handing out generous benefits are deluded, where is the money going to come from. The stock answer always seems to be tax the rich more but is horribly counter productive as so many will leave the country and will not be paying any tax. Close tax loopholes, yes but Labour failed to do this in all the time they were in office.

We need to live within our means.
P.S I did not vote for any of them last time as all of them seemed to be as bad as each other

[Ephiny]

DH and I are in our 30s and can't afford to have children at the moment. So we're not having any until we can afford it.

[aufaniae]

CentrePoint reports that "Mr Cameron has suggested that some vulnerable groups, such as "those leaving foster care" might still be able to receive housing benefit"

No mention of families having an exemption.

[Chandon]

agree with Ilovecoffeeandchoc

[BoulevardOfBrokenSleep]

This sounds like a great idea - presumably no under-25's in employment will have to pay tax or NI then, right?

Because it would be ridiculous to ask them to pay for a safety net they can't actually use.

[pumpkinsweetie]

london-contraception is not %100 reliable though and people do not know their future in advance.
Someone under 25 might have a fairly decent job, rent/mortgage but that can all change in a heartbeat!
I had my pfb at 19 in a stable relationship, dp at time had excellent job, the rent was affordable and i also worked pt.
But a year later we broke up, he became controlling. We lost the house, he didn't bother to see his daughter again, i lost my job and ended up back with mum as the factory went bust and had to apply for income support and chase him through CSA.
Likewise many years later 3 more children down the line with new hardworking dh and now 11years later he has been made redundant!

Sorry i didn't have a crystal ball, but im glad i have my children they are my life

[londonone]

Lol. If you are under "25 and on housing benefit it is highly unlikely that you have even come close to paying in what you get out!

[autumnlights12]

sitting government in 'going back on their word' shocker. Cos that's never happened before, has it?
They've all done it.
The Labour Party were a load of useless fuckers who got into power by giving away free money to all then selling us down the river whilst taking us into an illegal war. Don't pretend they were better. They were worse.

[aufaniae]

"I can think of few under 25 who are able to support kids in reality. Perhaps people need to think about that before they have them. Contraception is freely available"

The problem with this argument is that we are talking about real children, who will be kicked out of their homes, and some of them ultimately forced onto the streets. Many more will end up in insecure conditions, which will have a seriously affect on their health, well-being and life-chances (see this article to learn more about the effects of bad housing on children)

If you think it's a good idea, then you are saying you are comfortable with children living on the streets in this country, or having their health, well-being and life chances adversely affected. Real, living breathing children, not hypothetical ones.

Are you confortable with that?

[pumpkinsweetie]

But why should under 25s be punished, especially if they are in work?
Why should they pay taxes or NI if they are not to use the services once available to them?

[pumpkinsweetie]

At the end of the day, real children will suffer and do you really want that?

[ppeatfruit]

This may have been said on this thread but there are a lot of people who believe that labour created todays' economic problems .THEY BELIEVE THE LIES PUT OUT BY THE TORIES, BECAUSE IT WAS THATCHER THAT DEREGULATED THE BANKS.

She brown nosed Reagan when he did the same and a good number of people could see the bubble was going to burst; Major and Blair and Brown refused to see it. But it was the TORIES who began it all!!!!!!

[Viviennemary]

I'm sure I read a while ago that under 25's with children won't be affected by the new rules regarding HB and the under 25's. And also I think under 25's without children will still get some sort of housing benefit but only for a house share or bedsit and not to have their own house or flat.

[londonone]

Pumpkin - 4 children later you start wittering about contraception not being reliable. It is in fact very very reliable and we also have the choice to terminate pregnancies. I presume that all the time you were having these children you weren't,t receiving any sort of benefit, is that correct? No one I know thinks that they cold afford 4 kids. It sounds from your posts like you claimed tax credits, if so you couldn't afford th kids you have