To not give a damn if the Labour Party...

[slatternlymother]

Give away free flat screen TV's and a £500 Next gift card to everyone claiming benefits.

I don't care if they say 'fuck it, free immigration to everyone, we'll let anyone in'

I don't care if they spend 4 jillion pounds on a statue of Ghandi.

Just as long as the Conservatives don't get in again. They are fucking evil, aren't they?

bastards. Fucking bastards

I don't want to live in a country like this anymore

Sadly these people are usually the employers,so we have to convince people who despise us to give us a job.

It's like the second you are handed your p45 any good you may have done in the past is wiped out. Do people honestly believe it's easy losing your job?

ifnotnow - i don't think people are happy about anyone not paying their way. But individual scroungers tend to be people you know rather than read about in the papers, so you are closer to the situation and more familiar with it, eg my uncle in law with his supposed bad back that didn't stop him moonlighting or the cousins in law who suggested disability benefit because i didn't want to return to work after maternity leave.

Skittish- I've not read the whole thread. But the bit about being "being in a stable home before kids" has made me say this to you.

I was married 8 years. Both high payed jobs. Took over a year to conceive my son, we planned him. 8 months pregnant my exh decided it "wasn't for him" and left. No contact. Ds is now 9 months. I work p-t but could t go back to what I did before because I the hours. So what did I do worng then? The Benifits system helps me stay afloat. I need it to live. This winter at times I was down to heat or eat. I had to make those choices. I sincerely hope you never have to go through what I have just done. The stigma of being a single parent it support off benefits was a massive knock to my pride. But I am proud. And proud we live in a society where we are Compassionate and help people in need. It's not easy and it has made me re-evaluate my spending and what I did to help others. It is vital we support eachother for the greater good.
I hope you never have to experience the reason why we need a benefit system. It's far from easy

I would rather die than vote Tory.

Thanks Celtic [smile}. It's a good thing ds is poorly and only interested in lying on sofa watching cartoons, otherwise I wouldn't have time for all the ranting I am doing this weekend!

2wwmadness-your post exactly illustrates why nothing is ever black and white, and why we need to band together as a country and not try and knock each other.
Being a single parent can feel demeaning. I spent 1 year with ds as a baby on income support (my job pre-ds was totally undoable because of crazy hours) and it was a shock to suddenly realise that I had become, apparently, the scourge of the planet and the reason for the countries ills.
Amazingly (insert heavy sarcasm) I didn't immediately get given a "free" flat and a flatscreen TV on the birth of my bastard child. I am still waiting for those, and feel like ringing the Daily Mail to complain about raising my expectations!

fail!

YANBU
I am sick of the governments demonizing of the poor and vulnerable in this country.
In the last 2 years they have sent the UK back 10 years, i shudder to think what their plans are for the next 2 1/2 years.....

2Ww - but your situation is precisely what the welfare state is for - a short term safety net and a safety net I would fight to preserve. It is not and never should be a long term or permanent choice.

I do wish some people would realise that not all those who are vulnerable are poor and not all those poor are vulnerable.

shellyboob I never once said that it was a representative of the country, but it's certainly a representative of where I live, people want them out, even those in high paying stable jobs, as they are sensible enough to know that life is unpredictable and that they could very well need to lean on the state in the future. I will hold my hands up and say I'm being ignorant, I don't want to know if middle England or wherever are right behind the Tories, I need to believe they'll be out at the next election, and I honestly think they will, people will feel the full effects of the Tory government once UC kicks in, and I don't believe they have a hope in hell of getting in again after what's about to happen.

2wwmadness i'm so sorry for you situation, I've been there. Atleast under labour you'd have a safety net, we'll have to we if that's pulled from under us once UC kicks in...

So much naivety!

Labour would have made pretty much the same cuts. THERE IS NO MONEY LEFT. What distorted Utopia do some of you think we live in?

Labour had 13 years to close big business tax loopholes. They didn't. Why do you think that might be?

Labour had thirteen years to tax The Rich. They didn't. Again, why do you think that might be?

Labour had thirteen years to sort out the housing problem. They didn't. Why do you think that might be?

Labour had thirteen years to sort out minimum wages and ensure emplyers paid a minimum wage. They didn't. Now why do you think that might be?

The way some of you talk it's as if you have forgotten that the coalition has only just come to power.

Labour is the lesser of the evils, labour provide a safety net to those that fall on hard times, they are FAR from perfect but they seem to lend a hand to the most vulnerable.

Of course cuts need to be made, of course too much money was spent, but there must be other ways of getting this country out of the financial mess it is in, why must those who have nothing be made to suffer, because THAT'S WHAT WILL HAPPEN WHEN UC COMES IN.

It remains to be seen just how bad things will get under UC, but from some of the proposals I predict hard times.

Skittish I think the champagne socialists on here are a bit too obsessed with screaming about the eeevil tory scum to actually consider that

You know what it's been the best thing that has ever happened to me because I see things from a different viewpoint. And the kindness people have shown me has made me see that at heart, most people are good. I think everyone should do a turn on benefits. I cringe at the amount of money I used to spend and waste. It's done we good.
I think that's the main point. It's not black and white. You arnt going to get a one size fits all system. And maybe rather than blanket cuts there could be more in depth system where it is different rates re circumstances? God knows how that could be put into practice. But it would be beneficial I also don't understand why more isnt done to give young people talks on self respect, morals and community spirit. Teach them how it feels to be proud to own out own things, that you have worked for and develop good relationships because they value themselves. I guess that's the parents job. But somewhere along the line things have gone wrong when it's deemed "easier" to live a life on benefits than work. I'm waffling. I guess my point is rather than take and cut from society, I can't see what the government is doing to put back in an grow a better society.

Ps I know there is different rates. I mean eg left school able bodied doesn't want to work has a cap of how many years they can be fully supported compared to similar circumstances to mine (I havnt even touched the sides of what I have paid in taxes over the years) gets less caps because I paid all my taxes for 20odd years- sorta thing

Skittish, the New labour policies regarding banking regulation (or lack therof) we disgraceful, but they were only the exact same policies as the Tories, so had the Tories been in then nothing would have been different in that respect.

Having said that, this current government has CUT taxes for the rich and CUT corporation tax, and they have also made massive layoffs at HMRC, which is going to ultimately cost the country billions in the taxes they will not have the resources to claw back from avoiders.
So I guess they are notactually all that interested in narrowing the deficit..?

In 2008 there was a worldwide credit crash, which has affected nearly every country in the world. Every country needs to recover from this, but the Tories are going about it the wrong way.
When you cut this deep, and especially cut the extra spending potential of ordinary low income people you harm the economy further.
When you have people who have been made redundant working at Tesco for nothing you harm the prospects of people who would otherwise get real jobs there.

Aside from that, the VAST majority of unemployed benefit claimants are back in work within 1 year.
The number of long term out of work claimants is quite low actually.
Sorry to bother you with pesky facts, but fact it is.
This right wing bogeyman of the long term feckless unemployed is mostly myth and propaganda.

And... Champagne socialists! I fucking wish!

Exactly skittish there is no money left so what is to be gained by introducing systems that cost more to administer, create more poverty and damages an already fragile economy.

The cuts that Gidiot is making are going to end up costing us more, but that's ok as benefits and especially benefits for disabled people is privatised. What is being socialised is the debt and deficit.

To those who say there is no money left: do you know how money is created nowadays? Banks do it every day. If your loan application is successful they input the amount into an alphanumeric keyboard and hey presto! There is your new money.

Labour would have made pretty much the same cuts. THERE IS NO MONEY LEFT.
Labour had 13 years to close big business tax loopholes. They didn't.
Labour had thirteen years to tax The Rich. They didn't.
Labour had thirteen years to sort out the housing problem.
Labour had thirteen years to sort out minimum wages and ensure emplyers paid a minimum wage.

They didn't. Now why do you think that might be?

because of BLAIR, Blair was and still is proud to have carried on the neo-liberal project handed to him through Thatcher.

And why is there no money left?

because over the last 30 years productivity and profits rose, wages stagnated with the working class becoming increasingly impoverished, needing first two wages where once one would suffice and finally by taking out loans. AND why are they happy to allow us to become impoverished and indebted? because debt encumbered workers are docile.

Why are states in debt? because working people pay less in tax because they earn less and now rely on handouts to top up wages. Those who can pay do not pay because their money is off shore, or because corporations have no loyalty to nation states.

The neo-liberal agenda is bankrupting nation states, impoverishing workers, creating wars for resources, debt financed by states with the spoils going to the private sector.

The 50% tax rate was cynically introduce a few weeks before labour were thrown out of office, specifically so they could howl about the tories looking out for their chums when they bought it back down again. They didn't deem it necessary at any other point of their imbecilic 14 year reign.
Yes there was a worldwide credit crash, but we should have been in much better shape to deal with it and would have been but for that idiot, Brown.

NicholasTeakozy

Yep 97% of all money in the worldwide economy is debt.

Yeah, new labour were a bit shit. The tories are infinitly worse, because they are not only fucking us, they are enjoying fucking us.
Everything they are doing is absolutely calculated to destroy the welfare state and the NHS. I have lived in countries with no socialised medicine and no welfare state. It aint pretty.

And btw Mini, Tories abolished the minimum wage, New Labour brought it back in. Sorry, another fact again.

"Yes there was a worldwide credit crash, but we should have been in much better shape to deal with it and would have been but for that idiot, Brown."

really?? You reckon George Osbourne would have had it all sorted and we wouldn't have crashed anyway??
[incredulous face]

IfNotNowThenWhen

It was taken direct from the post that Skittish made.

I think she probably meant pay workers a living wage.

Labour brought in NMW.....that's not the same as a living wage though is it

Apologies, I did indeed mean a living wage!