BENEFIT STREET

[TeamSouthfields]

Just wow!

I agree with the government, if people are able to work and are not even.trying then they should have there benefits stopped.

But there were families on.there not being able to.afford to feed there kids makes me so sad........

but, the parents have a can in there hand and a fag in there mouth, aibu to think you would give up everything to make sure your children are well feed and warm?

www.rts.org.uk/rts-huw-wheldon-memorial-lecture ~Owen Jones' Totally Shameless – How TV Portrays the Working Class Royal television society

Custardo agree re: well-off TV producers. Contemptible. We had a , horrible programme in Scotland called the Scheme , it was so badly done.

TV Channels and other media are not allowed to have an obvious bias, they have to remain impartial, even the Daily Fail (yes, really)

D00in

Not true. There is an obligation on the BBC and ITN to offer balance in their coverage, but there is no such obligation for commercial newspapers and their associated websites.

MissPixie - here's the Birmingham Mail story again - "Benefits Street TV show lied to us".

Also in the Mirror.

Thankyou exexpat oh and OP it's a can In their hand not there. .

I'm absolutely sick of all these propaganda bullshit programmes that everyone seems to take at face value!! Don't believe everything you see!
The vast majority of benefit claimants are genuine

custardo very well put. We are not all benefit hater/ immigrant hater bigots. I am actually HAPPY to pay tax to help the less fortunate

And it's so nice to see lots of people aren't falling for this discriminatory Tory vileness. Well done Mumsnet!

I agree with all the posters saying it's edited propaganda.

But that said, I really liked the 50p man and thought his business was genius.

These shows are basically the Daily Mail for television. They take the worst examples they can find, edit the footage to make it look even more shocking, and then extrapolate to imply that everyone on benefits is the exact same.

I try to avoid such programs for my health and sanity...

I avoid the programmes too callani but the unfortunate thing is most of the country seem to watch em and believe every word

I wasn't going to comment as I know majority of people on benefits don't live like this BUT unfortunately there are ones who do!
I don't know if anyone has grew up on a rough scheme but if any you have you will know this does go on!
Although they shows baffle me as people that I know of who live like this certainly wouldn't go on national tv to show the country how they live and make ends meat!!

WeeLady I live in what is termed a 'rough' area. Funnily enough the ones I know that are cheating the system are working but tell the Taxman they are single to get the + in work benefits despite the fact the 'absent' Father is still very much residing there. I wonder if Ch 4 will start doing a programme on those sort of people? Probably wouldn't make as good a tv show eh? I agree re going on tv. Going on such tv shows to me is akin to airing your dirty laundry on the Jeremy Kyle show. No one should do either.

I totally agree misspixietrix, and I do believe if people haven't lived in the "scheme/estate" they have no idea what really goes on

I just don't get it. I've decided not to wind myself up over the whole thing and just stop watching such programmes all together. People either get irate over the things they've managed to afford whilst scraping by or get equally irate about the inaccuracy of them. Better for your blood pressure levels alround to do / watch something else instead :) If the Tax Man alone did an audit on this Estate alone they would find more people with Facebook 'Businesses' that haven't declared and 'Single' Working Parents than they would Fraudelant Scroungers. Would save themselves a fortune.

Callani, sorry but that's rubbish. The show showed different people living different lives whilst on benefits. From people who are thieving, drug taking and clearly on the scrap heap for life to those like the 50p man who was trying to better himself. And I think it showed that life on benefits is pretty crap...at least it looked crap to me.

Someone else mentioned the couple who had been sanctioned and their benefits stopped and how they felt sorry for them. But their benefits were only stopped because they were caught committing benefit fraud and bringing in £1500 a month. So who have they got to blame for the situation they found themselves in? No one but themselves.

It's the real harsh reality of life for some people and if you haven't lived round it you wouldn't know! But one things for sure 80% of the people are good hearted people and would give you there last and are so non judgemental

But where were all the huge flatscreen TVs, the XBox 1 consoles, ipads, luxury holidays?????????
just shows what crap so many people come out with in regarding what a life on benefits provides you....

I don't think anyone is particularly envious of them it is simply a resentment that the taxpayer is subsidising their lifestyles i.e. mulling around on a street all day, smoking, drinking, petty crime, they don't have to get up and go to work like the majority do! I appreciate that some peoples circumstances require benefits in order to get by however I cannot fathom why people believe it is ok for people to live on benefits purely because they are entitled to do so. The claimants on benefit street were moaning no end about having little money etc etc yet had been on benefits for years for no real reason...just go and look for a job! why does that never seem to be an option for them? I was on JSA for a period of 3 months between being made redundant and starting University. What happened? I got sanctioned for not applying for a job that would have taken me 2 hours to get there via public transport. I was also volunteering for a vets and applying for near enough anything I could find but this wasn't good enough! I have no idea how they manage to keep it up for so long!

Unfortunately, thanks to the government's insidious little narrative, amicissimma there are rather more than a minority of the public who believe this crap. That is part of the reason disability hate crime has increased so significantly. It's part of the reason The Trussell Trust put their food bank donations in supermarket carrier bags, because it is now more than a significant minority that believe most on benefits are scroungers.

All that programme proved to me was that a life on benefits is not something people aspire to.I felt for each and every person on it.Its not a life you'd choose is it?

Your right haveyourselfashandy and some of these people it's all they have ever known there parents were like this too not all but majority!!

Mollypup There were at least 2 people on that programme who were unemployable. They would never get a job. It would be unrealistic to think that they ever would. It doesn't excuse their life of crime though. Presumably you were "picked on" because it appeared to the benefits staff that you would engage with them - some people are probably not worth chasing up.