To ask you to object to this? Pre-paid benefits cards

[LuisSuarezTeeth]

a step too far

We're talking about human beings.

Thanks Arsenic and those that have already signed.

I live somewhere there are shops that will not accept cards. Small shops generally won't go to the expense. It is a case of going to an ATM to get the money. The more 'popular' (depending on your points of view) supermarkets are so far away I can't get home deliveries where I live.

The government has already set how much people should spend on food, when I applied for a lower rate of payment on a loan a few years ago the answer was no as I spent too much on food for one person. I don't know what the limit is, we mere mortals aren't allowed to know that apparently, I just know that £30 a week which it roughly was (for my weekly shop not just food) was too much for a single person. That's how the DWP arrive at the money a claimant 'needs to live on each week' (as they put it).

I'd also like to raise a point I don't think anyone else has, what about those who are in recovery from their addictions but are ill/disabled as a result of them? Once the label of addict has been applied to someone it doesn't go away. Even if they are sober and especially not if they have done long term damage to their bodies.

(Sorry for bold bit!!)

But Becca, there is nothing to prevent a pre-paid system being part of treatment. There is nothing to say there can't be exceptions.

But I have to say that I did not expect someone to say that they had no access to a shop that accepts cards. However, like Lottery machines, the government would have to provide them. If Camelot can do it....

You are looking at the negative side, for objections, based on previous experience. An experience this change could ameliorate. Think about how it could actively help manage such situations. You personally may get a higher level of food money simply because you live away from the cheaper sources of food - according to your measurable need.

You personally may get a higher level of food money simply because you live away from the cheaper sources of food - according to your measurable need. - Well, current experience shows that this is unlikely to happen

But still misses the main point: what exactly is the supposed advantage for claimants??

If the government want to know how we spend our money, why not offer us £10 a week extra for a few months, to take part in a detailed spending study? (Guess who used to work in market research.)

Meanwhile, I am not seeing a solitary advantage for me or the rest of the unwaged majority.

To be pokey...

Why should the advantage be for you as an individual? Why should it not be for the wider society?

And current experience is what is driving the proposed changes... I just wonder why, even when everyone accepts that the current system is unsustainable and does not address the needs of everyone, is extremely wasteful and leaves many people out in the cold, do people leap on a DM style bandwagon and decry any proposed change?

It may benefit you, even if it does discommode you a little.

?? Unwaged majority??

You are assuming there is a possibility of treatment for addictions where I live. There isn't - the funding was withdrawn (and no there is no possibility of help from mental health services as they refuse to see addicts). There are meetings e.g. AA but no formal treatment, and no AA are not allowed to be termed treatment for anyone formally.

Honestly I do not see a government who expect me to pay privately for physiotherapy, amongst other previously funded treatment, due to other government cuts e.g. NHS/Social services, from benefits to pay for village shops or farmers market to have card readers installed. Seriously, I doubt they could afford to do that, and if they did frankly I would be very very very about it. There are other things needed much more vital in the county I live in than card readers in all shops.

I'm not being deliberately negative or having a go at you. I'm just mentioning how it would impact were it to be bought in where I live.

Just my opinion based on living somewhere rural where other, more vital services have been taken away and online shopping isn't an option.

I assumed nothing, Becca. I said it could... might... etc.

I am not assuming it will be a good change, a change that will be popular etc. But it might be better than the current system. It might make a positive change for you. The current system doesn't meet your needs, does it?

I understand fear of change, you have learned how to manage the current system. But, and I live extremely rurally, no cable, no speedy internet, no mains gas, no mains sewerage, no shop, very few online deliveries, it just might be a beneficial change.

I just don't agree with the apparently knee jerk 'it will be shite' reaction.

That seems like a very good idea to me, MaryZ, I would be quite happy if war-time rationing were re-introduced. It would solve the obesity crisis at a stroke. Not many fat people to be seen in newsreels from the rationing era.

Fair enough. Sorry. I misread what you said and then didn't say exactly what I intended either.

The current system doesn't meet my needs no, but then further cuts to my income or restrictions won't either and I don't see how it can be funded without further cuts (in my opinion).

I haven't signed the petition, as I want more information on the scheme first.

Me too, Becca. A lot more information.

I doubt it would work but, imagine your benefits don't get changed, but a lot of people who don't have the need it was thought they had. Then the money they got could be used elsewhere - maybe even returning some NHS services.

Maybe...

Nomama, the actual current system, since the reforms of 2008, does not meet my needs.

The system before 2008 did meet my needs. It wasn't generous, but it did OK.

HTH.

I meant the majority of unwaged people, sorry.

Of course any radical changes ought to be advantageous to us! We're the beneficiaries.

Say your contents insurance is 'new replacement' and 'accidental damage'. Then your insurance company says, well, we've changed the benefits we will pay out on your existing policy. Now you'll get second-hand replacements and we don't accept that accidents happen. We're doing this in response to our shareholders, who say we're too generous.

Do you just go, oh, all right then?

No, but if I had heard on the grapevine they were making changes I would reserve judgement until I knew what they were.

pausing so you would welcome a new change then?

the actual current system, since the reforms of 2008, does not meet my needs. The system before 2008 did meet my needs. It wasn't generous, but it did OK.

Yes, this too.

And I said 'to you as an individual'. I have no idea, but you could be one of those that have benefits at a level that is too high. Some people do, some people don't claim all they are entitled to.

There is going to have to be a change. The current system is unsustainable. What would you suggest? Other than making the changes happen to someone else?

It's very very hard to deem 'need' though isn't it?

My experience as a disabled person of applying for benefits and proving 'need' isn't a positive one. I've mentioned on here before about a friend who had her benefits removed after not being able to prove she had a need for them after surviving longer than the six months she was given to live with terminal cancer. She was reassessed by ATOS as being fit for work. She died two weeks later. And I learnt after she was far from an isolated case

I think it's because needs fluctuate an awful lot, and one size doesn't always fit all.

Sometimes what looks great on paper, really doesn't work in real life, and if the government want to use 'pilot areas' then they need to take notice of any problems and fix them before rolling something out across the country (which doesn't seem to be done - there have been various example of that in recent years e.g. Disability benefit changes).

The comment about about making everyone go on rationing did make me , I'd love to see that implemented for everyone!! Can we start with my MP?!

It would depend on the change, Nomama.

Sorry, I'm just rational like that.

And abandoning for a moment your patronising shite about "you're just scared of change", would you care to address the actual issues listed on this thread, which have arisen each of the very many times such a scheme has been implemented or partially implemented in many countries?

a) If cards are not transferrable, efficient, essential family shopping and shopping for neighbours ceases.

b) If cards are transferrable, a black market immediately arises. And actually this arises anyway with people trading purchases.

c) The cards always, inevitably, limit purchasing to participating vendors for limited services. It doesn't matter how much you sit there hoping that lots of vendors will decide to participate, this will still be true.

I could add more, like the very common problems described above of the participating vendors being shit at correctly policing what cards are used for. But let's stop there.

Because at the moment you sound like someone whining that people must be psychologically inadequate if they don't take your design for square wheels seriously.

"The current system is unsustainable."

According to... who?

It's certainly not sustainable alongside the continuing tax cuts - of which there were more this week - I'll give you that.

I'd get rid of ATOS as a matter of urgency. Well, the targets they have, anyway. It doesn't work in schools or healthcare, stupid idea badly executed!

My point was that if there is more information on spending patterns there could be better focus, better apportioning of the available cash.

As I have said, a lot, there needs to be a change, I am not one who will sign a petition 'just because' I want more detail.

I don't know why I am getting the flack here... I made my position quite clear really early on... I am not IDS, I am not against benefits, we live in a Social State, we should have a benefits system. But we have to be able to afford it, we have to be able to send money where it is most needed, to meet the most urgent of needs.

It is not impossible that this change could achieve some of that.

Oh do piss off. I have said nothing of the sort.

The current system is evidently unsustainable, reported as such with facts and figures and a national debt to prove it. It is unwieldy, wasteful and everything else I called it earlier.

Go be angry with people who actually do espouse the crap you object to!

So, basically Nomama our disabled children really should have been left on the side of the mountain, I mean taking into consideration benefits are given by the grace of society.

The current system is not unsustainable, that is what a particularly nasty government would want you to believe and you've swallowed it hook, line and sinker. More is spent on pensions that unemployment. More is spent on Trident.

So no attempt to actually address the list of actual issues then?

Just "I understand fear of change" and accusing anyone who says this is a bad idea of a mere "knee-jerk reaction".

Right-ho.