To not understand why people hate David Cameron and the Conservative Party?

[SuperWifeANDMum]

Just that really.

I am a Conservative voter.

PM Cameron has disappointed me in some ways such as his lax approach to curbing immigration, deporting foreign criminals and addressing the alarming benefit culture but he has implemented a fair few positive changes.

For example:

Reducing our Debt.
Introducing Bedroom Tax.
Cutting corporation tax.
Frozen Council Tax.

Of you vote labour, why?

I am deeply concerned at the thought of another Labour government next election.

OP Sorry I meant lady muck

Bloody hell! you have lead an extremely sheltered political life haven't you?

P.S. I wonder if her party faithful husband knows that she's having intercourse with the lower orders (non tory voters)?

"redbinneo the educational background is worth examining? Why? my husband attended school with GO and DC. He had a brilliant education."

What, Eton and St Paul's? He must have been a busy boy..........

Finally someone (HeeHiles) has mentioned that there was a bit in government to amend the so called bedroom tax! That took ages considering that so many posters have complained about it on this thread.

In principle, the idea of only paying people enough in housing benefit for what they actually need is a good thing. It doesn't make sense for benefits to pay for people to have extra bedrooms that they don't need. In practice, scrapping the spare room subsidy for disabled people was incredibly unfair and damaging because more often than not they do need their extra rooms and arent in a position to be able to pay for them themselves, but as it's likely that that will now be reversed, it is right that the government tries to cut the HB bill that is currently going to people that could either move or pay for their extras themselves. It was always going to be a policy that had short term problems because of the lack of housing, but long term I think it will help sort out the problem of elderly people being in houses too big for their needs and families being over crowded, as well as being something that will encourage people to pay for their own housing as far as possible.

The pensions bill is big, but that's a good thing. Socially should properly care for it's older vulnerable people who aren't in a position to increase their own incomes. I don't understand why people talk about the big pensions bill as if it's a bad thing. If we are lucky enough to make it to old age, we will all benefit from it at some point.

Maggie Thatcher didn't come from humble beginnings, it was a myth she happily allowed. Her father was not just a 'corner shop grocer' from Grantham. She went to independent schools, too.

And her husband was a millionaire. That probably helped too.

The fact that she had a husband certainly helped, considering she was a woman in a very male dominated world.

"The fact that she had a husband certainly helped, "

No, the fact that she had a husband who was a millionaire certainly helped.....

Maybe it did, but she wasn't responsible for the way politics was when she wanted to enter it.

I'm not a fan of hers, but I think it a bit pathetic to scrape the bottom of the barrel to try and find ways to criticise her. Criticise her for the things she was responsible for and had a choice about, there's enough to choose from.

this

and this

For starters

'After reading some of the posts on this thread in regards to how our most vulnerable people in society are treated I am shocked and also embarrassed I have been so very naive.

I would like to see the current government reevaluate our current benefit system and make it fairer to the people that need it most while of course ensuring that it is not open to abuse.

I genuinely had no idea how aggressive the process is to get people back to work if they have previously been signed off sick with either mental health or a disability. It's disgusting. '

Well realised, OP.
That's why so many hate the conservatives and have done for decades since Thatcher. The lack of awareness, the disassociation from how millions of people live and struggle to manage basics.
The unwillingness to create and sustain policies and funding that benefit people who are of no use to the politicians and elite because they are powerless, poor and of no practical benefit to the party and the interests of business. They are seen as self-interested and lacking in humanitarianism.
Not all conservatives, not all those who don't vote for them or want to be under a conservatibve regime. Just a significant number.

• MyGastIsFlabbered

Love your name ^

Well, everyone's said it all really, but:

Immigration is good for economies.

Others have pointed out that there is no 'alarming benefit culture'; more benefits go unclaimed per year than the government pays out. More money is spent on pensions than on any other kind of benefits.

Also the 'fit for work' ATOS shite; I know people who have been found fit for work when it is laughably obvious they are not (although I can't top the outrageous experience of Becca's friend.

The Conservatives have members who say, and seem to genuinely believe, that people use food banks for the hell of it, just because they are there, rather than because they cannot otherwise feed themselves and their households.

They're despicable.

more benefits go unclaimed each year than the government pays out? Really?

Links to evidence?

I've read that many times on here DontDrink, although I haven't got evidence I can well believe it's true.

It will include people who could claim JSA but that don't need to do so straight away because they have a partner who can support them or other income and savings. I could have claimed it inbetween my current job starting and my old job ending despite not needing to because I work term time, and my old term finished early in the summer and the new one didn't start until mid autumn. There must be lots of people like that, so I don't think these things always give a true picture.

It will also include disability benefits that could be paid out to people who have other incomes or support from a partner.

People who really need benefits will claim them on the whole. I'd have thought that the number of people who don't claim what they need is small.

Yes OnlyLovers and the reason we need immigration is to fund the Ponzi scheme that is the Pensions bill. In a sense, every government since the beginning of the Welfare State has had a bit of the Robert Maxwell about them, and it can only get worse as people live longer.

I don't know if anybody has noticed, but for all the bluster the current administration hasn't done anything to make immigration stricter and nor can they.

I wonder if we will end up moving to a more American system of IRAs and 401Ks where people have the opportunity to manage their own pension fund. It would get government off the hook but the more volatile the markets become the more people could end up getting wiped out and having no pension at all.

God I hope some genius economist with a social conscience can come up with an answer and sharpish because I think this is one of the gravest problems facing the welfare state now and in the near future, and I can't see the Tories or Labour doing anything to really address it.

Nancy66 I was sent some links from my local Labour MP a couple of weeks ago - I have just tried to find them for you but they have been removed!!!

Sorry meant to add I have to work now but will try and search for more links later.

I am sorry but Labour has not helped the poor either.

A homeless man trying to sell the Big Issue in London, warning me of a circling Romanian pick pocket then proceeded to tell me, just how more SHIT his life has been since the gangs that sleep rough in London have made his life.

That guy was British, the British government ie the labour government had a duty to that man, a homeless man, the very bottom of our society and what did labour do? They wanted to "Rub the rights nose in it" and allowed more homeless and poor people to come here.

Whose noses are being rubbed in it?

Small charities are struggling with the volume of poor people here already and have not been able to cope with increased numbers.

The number of poor children grew under Labour, they failed to bridge the shameful gap and made it worse than ever.

Tories may not be helping the most vulnerable but they were already SHAT on by Labour and as a direct result of their policies, there is less than ever to go around at the bottom.

Immigration is good for economies

Whose economy and whose pocket and what about society as a whole?

How much immigration is the Key.

How much and how quickly.

And how are the countries loosing thousands of people coping, when the flow of immigration is one way?

www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/labours-record-on-poverty-in-tatters-1681047.html

The full scale of Labour's failure to help the poorest in Britain was laid bare yesterday with revelations that hundreds of thousands of people were being plunged into deprivation even before the recession hit, and that the Government had been unable to make any impression on the numbers of children and pensioners in poverty

The admission came as official figures blew apart the Government's credibility on helping those struggling the most. They painted a bleak picture of worsening poverty in Britain even before the recession took root. The number of people living in poverty had climbed to 11 million by March 2008, a rise of 300,000 since 2006..

dawndonna - that Maggie Thatcher didn't really come from humble beginnings is the myth. it's one perpetuated by labour to smear her but her background is easily documented and has been verified.

Yes, her husband was wealthy

I suppose it depends what you mean by "humble"

Owning two shops and being the Mayor isn't exactly "the boy that eats the dung" is it?

But it isn't Downton Abbey, obviously.

it's pretty ordinary though compared to the majority of MPs and PMs

I get tired of people trotting out the cost of state pensions in every benefits thread. When some voters and politicians worry about "benefit scroungers" they are not concerned about people who have lived in the country for 40 years as adults, and are now too old to work.

They are concerned (right or wrongly) about working-age adults who might be making choices that enable them to claim.

No-one chooses to be old, and it's relatively difficult to game one's NI contribution record to get an unfairly large pension.

Pension spending is really no different from health spending, or even defense spending, in the sense that yes some would pay less taxes if they were reduced, but, although we may not entirely agree with such spending, none of us gets significantly different benefit from this spending, compared to anyone else.

In this context it's really a dishonest argument to stick to the technical definition of benefits.

On the other hand, if you are going to treat pensions as benefits, then as a determined propogandist, you should double the total benefits bill by chucking in the cost of the NHS as well. To an accountant (or ONS statistician, I think) that is clearly benefits spending, even though not legally categorised as such.

"It was always going to be a policy that had short term problems because of the lack of housing, but long term I think it will help sort out the problem of elderly people being in houses too big for their needs and families being over crowded"

Um, it'll do nothing to solve that problem as pensioners are exempt.