to think that 20 grand on benefits a year is loads

[MrsBucketxx]

considering they dont pay any income tax.

just watching we pay your benefits program and worked out that this is over 30 grand if it was a normal tax paying salary.

why was this not mentioned.

jessica

I'm sorry but I don't see that mousey has done anything wrong at all.
My dh has always worked and I haven't, because the tax credits he is entitled to have enabled me to be a sahm. I could have worked but I chose not to.
The tax credits would have stopped this year as ds2 has just left ft education. However, I fell pregnant with dd she is 9 now and the tax credit continues. We didn't plan this to get more money, I was on an early change. The thought that life is so sterile as people planning dc to me is ridiculous. My parents generation had a saying. "If you waited until you could afford dc before having them, you'd never have any". I can sort of agree with this and think too many people use it as an excuse to benefit bash tbh.
Babies hardly cost anything and come complete with free childcare.

Don't know enough about benefits to comment (although I do think the rumour I have heard that benefits staff have targets for sanctions is pretty awful) but I think decisions need to be made about degree courses available.

For subjects such as media where there are currently a lot more well qualified candidates than jobs available there should be a reduction in the number of university places available so that (allowing for people failing, dropping out, changing their minds etc) the number of new graduates each year roughly matches the number of jobs available.

If you are going to discover you can't do the job of your dreams you should make that discovery at 18 not after 4 years work and £50k of debt.

I think in some cases, benefits are more than enough to live a decent life.
I am working in a low paid job, yet all of the benefits I receive combined total more than £27K per year.
I have 1 DD btw and I receive more than enough for DD and I.
I'm not complaining at all and not everyone on benefits is poor.

"Babies hardly cost anything and come complete with free childcare"

That is so incorrect I don't know where to start! Even if you breastfed and used newspaper for nappies the babies will grow into children, and then adults.

In mouseys case she will need childcare for 2 children to enable her to even get on an access to uni course... what free childcare?

"Are there no prisons?" asked Scrooge.

"Plenty of prisons," said the gentleman, laying down the pen again.

"And the Union workhouses?" demanded Scrooge. "Are they still in operation?"

"They are. Still," returned the gentleman, "I wish I could say they were not."

"The Treadmill and the Poor Law are in full vigour, then?" said Scrooge.

"Both very busy, sir."

"Oh! I was afraid, from what you said at first, that something had occurred to stop them in their useful course," said Scrooge. "I'm very glad to hear it."

hello to mouseymummy. I work at a University, so am interested that you see going to Uni as the solution to your problems. You may well be right, but I hope you have had some good advice on what Uni to go to and what course to pick? This access the HE course might be great or a total rip off. Do you mind sharing the kind of subject area you might study at Uni and what kind of job you are aiming for?

It's just that hearing your story, I found myself thinking that the Open University might suit you really well and be cheaper. You dont need any A levels for that.

^I'm sorry but I don't see that mousey has done anything wrong at all.
My dh has always worked and I haven't, because the tax credits he is entitled to have enabled me to be a sahm. I could have worked but I chose not to. ^

Your really don't see anything wrong with that?

It's absolutely crazy that we have people that can say things like this with no shame at all.

GoodTouch

A parent is free childcare, surely.
My babies didn't cost much at all and cb paid for nappies etc, we all had this. i'm sorry but you didn't see the rich giving it back. There is only who ha about it now because the rich have lost it.
The same with tax credits, they have only been a big deal since the gov decided to lump them in with benefit. Nobody mentioned them nor complained about them before gov and media conquer and divide.

I think if you live in a low rent property perhaps. For us, it would just to say cover rent and bills leaving very little for food. We wouldn't be able to pay for any insurances, cars, clothes, shoes. So no it wouldn't be much here when rent for a 2 bed property is £1k pcm and council tax is £170 pcm. If rent were £500 it would be dramatically different. Families round here on benefits live in one bed flats unless they're lucky enough to get housing association properties. I wouldn't call that a good life.

clouds

Why should I be ashamed, if I had made the choice to work it would have been disastrous for my family. I would have needed childcare for 2 dc and would have been working for minus money.
When the oldest was little there was no childcare and we had no family within a 250 mile radius so then it wasn't a choice. When child care provision became widespread there wasn't a need for me to work.

^I'm sorry but I don't see that mousey has done anything wrong at all.
My dh has always worked and I haven't, because the tax credits he is entitled to have enabled me to be a sahm. I could have worked but I chose not to. ^

on the up side this is changing and I imagine that by the time of the next boom, it will be hard for anyone who needs state support to choose not to work FT.

Faster

Where are the jobs going to come from?
Who with any intelligence at all will work, when childcare equates to or exceeds what they are earning? Irrespective of benefit or TCs

Madam

Do you not believe that people deserve an education? You know very little of mousys situation and yet you judge.

Maybe there's the odd person who gets that much-some of which will depend on where they live etc however 90% of folk in benefits struggle, really struggle-many are living on one meal a day, waiting for a knock on the door from the bloody doorstep lender that they had to use when they were desperate, constantly being 'sanctioned' by dwp, having benefits chopped and changed, having to fill in paperwork and work through a system that requires a fairy high degree of capability to manage that many people can't cope with it.
Yes we should have a discussion about benefits, but look at the bigger picture, for most the benefits system is a hugely inadequate and shaming experience rather than one that allows people to live in the lap of luxury.

The personal attacks on Mousey on this thread are out of order.

morethan - I said 'by the time of the next boom...'

the economy is picking up.

morethan - Of course everyone deserves an education. Mousy had hers, now she is supposed to be a contributing member of society.

Mousy is complaining that her benefits which support 2 adults and 3 children are time consuming to claim.

You don't think there are lots of people in low paid jobs who would love to start all over from GCSEs and get their dream job?

Funding mousy to live the dream is NOT the point of the welfare system

morethan - "the thought that life is so sterile as people planning dc to me is ridiculous".

I'm sorry, but YES, people SHOULD plan their DCs. Why should those people who can't or don't want children pay for you to keep popping out as many kids as you want regardless of whether you can afford them? I don't mind paying my bit, but there is a limit. We are a species capable of rational thought.

The world population was 2 billion in 1927. In 1960 it as 3 billion. In 2012 it reached 7 billion. In other words it more than doubled in the last 52 years. We can't keep doing that. Look at the state of the world in terms of pollution, the species we are killing off etc. All because man thinks it can just keep on popping out as many as they want. Millions of people starving, children being born literally to die, and you think people should just do what they want and not plan to have children?

its important that people do have more than one chance at education. but it needs to be done in a cost efficient manner which means not when childcare is required - because someone can continue their education when their dcs are a school.

IMO if you have children, you should do everything you can to provide for them. and being a student is not doing that.

we also need to be careful about encouraging people to do degrees when there many not be the right job for them at the end to merit both their personal sacrifices and cost to the nation.

How do you know mousy had an education. My own education didn't start until I was in my 30's.
Some benefits aren't only time consuming but so difficult for vulnerable people to claim, have you filled many forms in?
I haven't but have seen many.
I was funded in education for several years, I had a grant and fees paid up to and including undergrad level, then a 6k bursary and fees paid for PgCE.
many thanks to Tony Blair.
Mousy isn't out of order, it was provided for at one time.
People have to remember that society and gov changes.
It isn't so long ago that if you were a working mum you were a bad parent, even when my oldest was a baby 22 years ago, many I knew sneered at working mums.
When it comes round again, working mums or at least both parents working will find the need to justify their choices, and so it continues.

My own education didn't start until I was in my 30's

You didn't go to school?

I don't understand the outrage behind tax credits enabling SAHPs to be SAHPs. Fact is that children require care. If the SAHP becomes a WOHP instead then he/she will end up paying for childcare. If they're in the pay bracket where they would have qualified for tax credits to enable being a SAHP, they would probably get more money in the childcare element of WTC to help pay for childcare. So we're basically paying the parents to pay for someone else to look after their children. Now that IS bonkers!

if mousy is improving her qualifications and job chances surely that could only be a good thing?

I think maybe people complaing about peope popping out children should bear in mind that they are the taxpayers of the future. Thus these children will be putting into the pot that your pension comes out of. Although I suspect they may argue that they won' t work either.
Also others who say I don't claim benefits maaybe should consider whether they have ever claimed child benefit, tax credits or maternity allowance smp.
Mousey situation is temporary. She wants to work and has worked previously. Give her a break.
Even hrt payers used to be able to get chb and tax credits..