To think some people have their heads in the sand about poverty in the UK?

[MrsFlannel]

On here we see a lot about "Don't have children you can't afford" etc.

this article in the Guardian really brings home the effects of poverty today and it's really breaking my heart.

By rights I should be among those who are struggling so badly...and in one way we are...but because I managed to get a degree and get my DC into a school which is good despite living in a very poor area, we're not quite in the trouble many people around us are.

We live in a council estate...all around me is quite terrible poverty. The upsetting thing is that whilst DH and I have decent work...it's not enough to be able to donate to food banks etc....we only scrape by. I'm sick of the people who deny that there's a problem...or shove blame onto "feckless parents"

That's why Scottish Student Loans are means tested is it not? Parental responsibility up to 25 I thought it was.

That's just wrong .... At 25 I was married with a child, the next generation will be even less capable and therefore more dependant than this. Some people are just fecking hopeless at any age though

OP did you read the report that was the basis of the article. The recommendations were:

Cheap school uniform
Cashless school dinner payment policy
Ensure parents know school trip payments are voluntary
Itemised costs of materials for a course should be made known up-front.

Mrs Flannel I totally agree with you!

That first bit in my post was a quote from earlier in the thread, but I can see the first quote mark has disappeared! How annoying.

To be totally clear, I was trying to argue with the idea that benefits are generous, and was using sanctions as an example. The quoted bit was IMO a perfect example of a poster demonstrating that they had their head in the sand about poverty in the UK.

Woman A Leading Authority On What Shouldn’t Be In Poor People’s Grocery Carts

If we cannot afford the current system then moving responsibility on to people and families which is how people look after those they love in many countries on the planet is not a bad way to go.

Bodingading the woman in the article is obviously familiar with the magic mumsnet chicken.

I would recommend a read of the book 'Unjust Rewards' by Polly Toynbee and David Walker. I stumbled across it and it was a real eye opener.

Basically the poor get scapegoated and victimised, while the rich, including bankers with ridiculously high bonuses (on top of extremely high basic salaries) and other wealthy people use ever loophole in the book to pay minimal taxes or contribute to society.

The interesting 2 part documentaries aired in January concluded what many have long suspected about super rich foreign investors in London- that contrary to making us all better off by the trickling of wealth downwards through society, research shows this doesn't really happen. All it's done is push London house prices through the roof.

Sure, there are a small minority of people who make benefits a lifestyle choice, but the financial consequences of that are a drop in the ocean compared to the billions that the super wealthy squirm out of paying.

Yes, there will always be exceptions but that's the general situation. Of course, ceaseless vilifying of benefit claimants is a useful distraction from the real problem...

www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/supermarket-workers-minimum-wage-pay-topped-up-by-11bn-in-benefits-says-charity-10170426.html

The more poor people who work out ways of scamming the system, the better. Rich people scam it, so why shouldn't the rest of us?

I know that for me when I was really on the bones of my arse the thing that would have really really helped the most was something I absolutely could not get and it was soul destroying.

For example, at one time we were living in a place with oil heating. When ExH left I had to give up work as I had no childcare, so couldn't afford to pay the rent as the HB we were awarded was £300 a month short. When the oil ran out I had no heating or hot water for over a year. When I asked for help the only solution they gave was to pay for a very small amount of oil that lasted about a month but then when it ran out, we were back to no heating/hot water. What I really needed was childcare for my children (inc one with a disability) to enable me to work again but I was told no.

Throwing money at the problem will not help unless you throw it in the right place. In my case buying the oil was totally pointless because it only helped temporarily, helping me with childcare would have enabled me to pay for my own oil (and everything else we needed).

The problem with saying families could help out is that you are assuming they want to.

I left home at 16. I had been neglected and abused by my superficially naice middle class family for years and couldn't wait to go. They couldn't wait to see the back of me.

I lived in poverty for years afterwards. My family didn't help at all but it wasn't because they couldn't afford to, it was because they didn't care about me. I fixed my own situation through lots of hard work and a fair bit of good luck, but it is not easy to get out of poverty and even harder for those who have never known anything else.

Exactly my mother who had been in my position herself actually refused to help, said no to putting up me and her grandchildren for a few days.
What would the do gooders at the benefit office have said to that I wonder.

It is huge issue. I think it was the FT today saying that the biggest cost the state faces is unfunded public sector pensions as people get older and older, not other welfare issues. Raising retirement age is not going to help as many of those pubilc sector jobs have relatively young retirement ages.

So we have a massive problem of the old unless we have a lot more babies and let a lot more people in to live here who will work hard - we could bus them in from Italy once they land from Africa.

So shifting responsibility from state to relatives could be part of the solution. I believe both Labour and the Tories are behind the plan to remove state benefits in England from most young people 25 or under. Start learning to tolerate your relatives now even if it's just an obscure ancient aunt or second cousin.

Lotus if everyone is out at work how can they do any caring. And lets face it when the word "families" is trotted out they and you......really mean women.

The state seemingly can't even require men to support their own children. We read countless times on here of women who receive absolutely no financial support or practical assistance from the fathers of their DCs, a situation which the government simply doesn't have the will to tackle.

To place more caring burdens on to women - and I agree, HelenaDove, it would indeed be mostly women - would not solve the problem of poverty.

Local authority public sector pension retirement ages have already been raised. And nearly all of the schemes are in surplus. Most low paid public sector workers, home helps, childcare workers, street cleaners, will be in this pension scheme. The average pension is very low, and yet their pension scheme has been the one that has had themost negative changes to it.

And lets face it when the word "families" is trotted out they and you......really mean women.

This, a thousand times.

OP I can understand your frustration at not being able to donate to your local food back. I wonder though is there a way that you could donate some of your time? Either to the food bank or a similar charity? Your time is worth thousands to a charity and much more valuable in cash terms then most of us would be able to donate. I do appreciate however that if you are in difficult circumstances that you probably wouldn't be able to do that.

On that note I think lack of time is something that is sometimes overlooked when considering poverty. Lots of cash poor people are very time poor as well. Also lots of people fail to appreciate just how time consuming and exhausting looking for work is, when you are looking in the low paid market.

One thing that bugs me about the general thinking on poverty is the insistence that we need to get more people going to University as if a degree were a magical thing that drives poverty away. A degree is useless if there is no one to employ you.

In my view we'd all be much better off if we focused on job creation and I mean everyday type jobs in say manufacturing, not finance.

I work in a school in one of the poorest council wards in the country and very rarely is it a matter of the feckless poor. Mainly it is parents who want the best for their children but are struggling against a background of huge rises in the cost of living, power etc and benefit cuts.
The breakfast club at the secondary school I work at is entirely funded by staff mainly through BOGOF donations.because I commute by train I deliver the Metro for their newspaper. Some of these pupils dread holidays because without breakfast club and FSM they know they will be hungry. The school site is open until quite late and the HT arranged that any wraps/ baguettes that were not fresh enough to be sold the next day be placed on a tray outside his office and the breakfast club children told they could collect one there. They all go every evening.
For some people a bald tyre or worn out shoes spell disaster, it is tragic and whilst it won't be simply stopped by more money cutting benefits doesn't help.

lucycant No public sector pension scheme is in surplus. Some of the unfunded schemes currently get more cash in from current workers than is paid out to current pensioners, but there is a hugh liability being built up that will be funded from general taxation.