to think immigrants should work before being entitled to benefits?

[judgejudithjudy]

EU immigrants will only be allowed to claim benefits 12 weeks after entering the UK but surely EU immigrants should only be entering the UK to work - not claim? I can understand if they enter the country to work & then lose their jobs - more than entitled to benefits but surely you should pay into the system first?

ready to be flamed so wearing my flame coated coat :-)

Gordy

Fair enough, I agree it doesn't separate costs for production of the materials against face to face translation.

I am not trying to back up the figures I was trying to point out that a few people jumped upon moody for unreliable sources when the bbc and bmj both reported on the foi also, but without backup or reasoning of what the figures represented.

Should UK residents have to work before claiming benefits?

school leavers?
care leavers?
divorcees?
widows?

they have never paid tax yet are a drain on the system

There's another thread on this going, with a link which made interesting reading

I've not seen the figures for translation costs, but why would you need to separate costs for production of the materials from face to face translation costs?

If the point was that we spend money on it it hardly matters at what stage we spend it.

Also if all immigrants work (which seems to be the claim) and therefore they all speak good enough english to do so (and many speak 3 languages) then who is using the translation service?

Anyway this is a storm in a teacup because if immigrants come here to work and pay their own way then they won't even know about the benefit restriction will they.

speaking and understanding the spoken word and reading medical information in another language are completely different

I bet many of us can order food in Spain but probably couldn't understand a medical consent form

On the point about whether British-born claim benefits...

I think the idea is that a given size of population has a given distribution of people in work, in education, on benefits and in retirement.

If immigration increases the numbers of people in work in proportion to the increases that it also causes in the other groups, then as a whole, the system works financially, though there are still potentially problems with capacity, ie running out of housing stock, school places, etc.

If it's out of balance, if more immigrants work than we would expect, the country gets wealthier, and if fewer work, the opposite applies.

I guess the problem with a contributions based system is that, if we refuse to fund a given person who has moved here, they can be sent back to their country of birth. We won't see if they or their children live in poverty over there. But if we withhold funding from teenage mothers, as one poster has suggested, we can't deport them, as this is where they were born, so we would have to get used to seeing that level of poverty in our own streets.

the link up there states that the income from 'immigrants' is £25bn - over and above what 'they' claim in benefits - so I just think the whole argument is daft

As regards to the op, I think this is generally a non issue, it's a vote grabbing headline.

If this is not currently an issue then it will tie us in with the rest of the eu.

If it is an issue then it will save pence in the grand scheme of things that is currently fucked up with the uk economy

So just another shiny, shiny diversion.
Labour would be doing the same.....

Translation services are largely provided for non-EU immigrants - who make up two thirds of the total in the UK on a flow basis (don't know the stat on stock). Hard to connect to the EU, but hey ho one Johnny Foreigner is much like another.

As has already been posted up thread, EU nationals don't have rights to benefits unless they're workers - for three months. Current EU rules also allow deportation of "beggars" and the "homeless". So Cameron is proposing to align on minimum Eu standards - perhaps why Clegg could agree? - but without explaining what the current EU rules require.

On the other hand, the current UK discriminatory practices in relation to EU nationals do the country's good name no good. For example refusing to pay maternity leave to a French national who'd worked in the UK in a state school as a teacher for more than years. Judgment of the European Court of Justice expected soon. Who'd like to defend this "pro-UK" policy?

23million pounds a year in interpretation quite cleatly states thats they cant speak english? so how do they work/live? benefits!

no it's LEAFLETS so it clearly states they can't read complex medical information in English

talking a language and reading it are completely different

you want to read it again if that's what you think it 'clearly states' to be honest

It's very strange that this issue is the top story on the BBC the week before Ian Duncan Smith is to be held to account for lying using misleading statistics about benefits...

Havent read all the thread,

But to be able to work, they have to apply for alot of jobs. They need an address too, they need to be clean etc too. If the government didnt allow them to claim, then they wouldnt be able to afford to live whilst they tried to get a job.

Judge judith, medical information is not part of basic competence in English and there is a safety issue if people don't understand it properly. I have a first class degree from Oxford in French and German and have worked in both those countries, but I still wouldn't want to sign a complex medical consent form in either of those languages.

I lived and worked in Germany for over a year and I spoke decent German after the first couple of months but I still can't read more than basic signs

Musz? wyj?? ?ledzion? - I need to remove your spleen - in Polish - simple

I read that if they are found to be sleeping rough or begging then they would be deported. Answered my own question

The proposed benefit changes won't make a jot of difference.
Poor people from eastern Europe are unlikely even to have heard of the changes. They will continue to come here because they have heard that it's a better place to live. In their place I would probably be doing just the same.
What the answer to this is I really don't know.

my mum shut her finger in the car door in rural Spain - it took her a while to realise the Doctor who stitched her finger was not suggesting she was 10 year old but asking her if she had had a tetanus

Apologies if this has already been mentioned. I lived in Spain for a few years. The system there was you could not claim anything unless you had contributed for at least a year. After that, you got 80% of what you were earning previously for about 12 months. It then went down the longer you were out off work. Seems like a fair way to do things imo

Of, not off

Just 12 weeks? That is ridiculous. Here in Australia it is two years after gaining PR and if you want your parents to come, you have to commit to fully supporting them for at least ten years. The largest group of welfare bludgers (ie those who move straight into benefits and who have no intention of working) are Anglo-Celtic nationals though, not immigrants.

How can a system like possibly be fair if it leads people to poverty?

The whole point of the welfare state is to help people who need it, not just those that some deem deserving because they're 'local' or whatever.

And OP - you're now doing what every other non-bigoted poster who starts these kind of lazy threads is doing - being deliberately obtuse about things.

If you'd actually bothered to read the link, you'd know full well that it wasn't about individual interpreters needed by non-English speaking EU immigrants. This has also been pointed out and explained in further detail by people further up. To then come back with a childish retort such as the one you have above is just showing that you have no intention of a serious debate, just a light spot of immigrant bashing. Otherwise, why are you bothered about whether they speak English or not?

I have yet to meet an EU immigrant who isn't working or who doesn't speak English as well as their native tongue and quite often another European language too.

But yeah, you just wanted to discuss 'the news' didn't you

Having recently been on JSA I can confirm that they are tightening up on being 'long term unemployed'

It's not an option for anyone anymore

RedLondonBus - me too. Still on it, been on it a whole two months now and the grief they're giving me is giving me anxiety. First it was, you can work around your kids because of their ages, then it was 'you have to apply for anything you can physically do' (the hours are astronomical) and within a week it's 'you have to go on workfare' (but they're calling it work experience).

The fact that I'm applying for jobs all over and trying to arrange voluntary work myself in school, while also trying to get a TA course sorted is all irrelevant because they just want me off their books. Ta da! Another unemployed person off the books