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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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to think that when there is a schools place crisis perhaps the government should think of ways to reduce birth rates?

647 replies

jellysandwich · 04/09/2013 10:27

In my area (London) there is already a huge shortfall in places because there has been a baby boom. They are constantly opening new schools or creating bulge classes but this is often at the expense of other children who lose their playing fields and there is just not enough room in London to keep opening new schools and there is already a housing crisis because the country is so overcrowded.

I think perhaps it is time the government thought about limiting child related benefits to 2 children (which is the replacement rate) and those that want to have more can do so but not with taxpayers money. It would go some way to stopping some of the problems that rising birthrates create such as the school places crisis, overcrowding, pollution, increasing struggles for resources such as food and water and in an already overpopulated world I think the government is being negligent in not putting some sort of limit on child related benefits, especially when it seems to be counter-intuitive (if you work you don't get more money each time you have another child).

OP posts:
Dawndonnaagain · 06/09/2013 09:09

Alemci
I'm a history lecturer.

JakeBullet · 06/09/2013 09:18

Yes it was DN who mentioned "subsidised electricity", the thing is that if you are going to post such comments at least make sure they are correct.

People on benefits do NOT get subsidised fuel......SOME can ask for a grant towards their winter fuel bill from the fuel companies but you have to fulfil certain criteria.."...not everyone can have it....and certainly "I am on income support" isn't enough for most companies. You need to have an additional thing like a disability as well.

I DO fulfil the criteria but have never applied as I manage my payments monthly so don't feel the need for it and would rather someone in greater need got it.

I can't comment on fostering or adopting as I have never gone down that route but am sad that DN might potentially alienate her adopted child by referring to his/her birth mother as "a selfish breeder" in his/her hearing. It is a horrible horrible term and has no place in a civilised debate. Children DO listen and they DO pick things up, it must be awful to think your caregiver is so dismissive and snotty about your origins.

filee777 · 06/09/2013 09:22

I worked at a care home in my home city for children who could not be placed into foster care, they were not disabled.

It's not rare, care homes for children. That's why we need more foster carers.

MrsDeVere · 06/09/2013 09:30

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MrsDeVere · 06/09/2013 09:31

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filee777 · 06/09/2013 09:34

The care home I worked in had a number of children younger than 14, many if them had been to a number if foster homes which had not worked out. One girl was there, on and off, from the age of 8 when her grandfather had died. I am still in touch with her. 10% is not rare when the objective should be that all children are in a home environment and also considering those children who are disabled and not included in the figures.

MrsDeVere · 06/09/2013 09:37

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Dawndonnaagain · 06/09/2013 09:41

Mrs De Vere
Nah, she was only mucking about when she joined the Eugenics Society at its very first meeting. Same when she said she wanted unfit parents (the poor and the jewish in her delightful mind) to be compusorily sterilised.
If I recall, she left her money to the Eugenics Society.

filee777 · 06/09/2013 09:47

I'm not trying to convince anyone of anything. I'm just having a conversation.

It's like saying one in 10 women getting breast cancer make it a rare disease. Which it doesn't, of course.

MrsDeVere · 06/09/2013 09:53

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filee777 · 06/09/2013 10:00

Rare is not a mathematical term.

MrsDeVere · 06/09/2013 10:10

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Dawndonnaagain · 06/09/2013 10:12

filee You still haven't actually answered any of the questions put to you. Your figures with regard to benefits are inaccurate and you haven't clearly stated how to resolve the problems created with your punishment regime.

filee777 · 06/09/2013 10:55

I have broken down the figures regarding benefits. I have suggested people look up the online calculator 'entitled too'

So that they can have a look for themselves.

I have explained that £160 a week is enough money to feed more than 2 children.

I've answered all your questions actually.

MrsD once again you are putting words in my mouth, I said nothing about children spending their whole childhoods in care homes. I have not used any emotive language you are just struggling to read, again.

It's tedious.

Dawndonnaagain · 06/09/2013 11:05

No you haven't. I looked up your figures and queried them. You haven't acknowledged that child benefit is removed from your figures. You haven't worked out how to feed, for example four children and one adult on the monies you suggest and then how to budget for utilities and other essentials on said monies. It simply is not enough to include the price of food alone.
You have not answered how to police your financial neglect plans, or even what would constitute financial neglect. You haven't discussed the possibility of children with disabilities and how they should be financed.
You haven't addressed the moral question regarding children being punished for being born outside of rules that you have decreed.
Bugger all, in fact.

alemci · 06/09/2013 11:37

yes I see (I only looked briefly on wiki)Dawn Donna, I agree the eugenics side is horrible and I don't agree with that.

OOH the things I talked about were good for women in the early 20th century not wanting to have children every year do you not think? Especially in the 30's depression.

MrsDeVere · 06/09/2013 11:37

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MrsDeVere · 06/09/2013 11:39

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alemci · 06/09/2013 11:50

Mrs De Vere you are right that is how she is portrayed. The Jewish and the disabled element is horrible and she was probably quite snobbish and classist I should imagine as alot of people were then.

I think though if I was a poor mother in that era I would have welcomed some form of contraception. It must have been very hard on your body to keep on being pregnant and then naturally wanting to have a relationship with your DH but dreading the result if you knew that you could hardly make ends meet etc. Plus the day to day grind of washing, feeling nauseous, housework etc.

I know my grandfather was one of 12 born in the Great war era.

morethanpotatoprints · 06/09/2013 11:52

Filee

Are you ready to admit you are spouting utter rubbish yet or are you going to continue, because it would be good to see this thread progress to reasonable suggestions and ideas about the shortage of school places and over population, 2 different subjects really.

last night I read that one suggestion would be to stagger school attendance including evenings, this seemed like a Gove suggestion but not entirely sure. Perhaps this sounds as stupid as some of the suggestions so far Grin

Dawndonnaagain · 06/09/2013 12:28

alemci Taken within the context of the times, initially Stopes looks good. Yes, contraception for all women, regardless of income would have been good. However, Stopes a) concentrated on the poor and in her magazine Birth Control news, ranted about sterilisation for those too poor to have children. One of my biggest problems is that she didn't die until 1958, a point at which eugenics had long since gone out of fashion due to having seen the obvious consequences of it, and yet she still left her money to the Eugenics Society. Her views did not change despite having witnessed and comprehended the full effects of the holocaust. Her admiration for Hitler did not wane.

BellaTheGooseIsDead · 06/09/2013 12:28

Flowers Jake.

That was just my experience of being adopted in 1970.

I am very glad that social workers do not get to write such things about the child and that checks are more vigorous r.e prospective parents.

alemci · 06/09/2013 12:33

Dawn Donna that is totally scary. I don't understand how someone would support Hitler afterwards in GB when everyone was aware of the atrocities.

Interested in your history lecturer position. Do you specialise in modern history? love anything to do with history :)

Dawndonnaagain · 06/09/2013 12:39

Actually no, that just happens to be a pet peave. Grin
Specialise in English Civil War also cover the demise of the Native American. Two totally different but equally fascinating strands.

alemci · 06/09/2013 12:41

sounds great Dawn Donna and it would fascinate me:)

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