To ask if you have had any contact with benefit 'scroungers'

[JumpRope]

I utterly believe that we need to protect the poor, vulnerable and those unable to work and they should have help to live.

I grew up in a very rural area, fairly poor, very hard work for non land owners - workers werefarm labourers mainly. And there were many people leaving school in the 80s and 90s and then abusing the system - picking up the dole, laughing about it, straight to the pub until it ran out; I remember a dog called Giro. People just sold a bit of marijuana for extra work. After moving to a bigger town, I came across families like this, where the dad would start it off, and the children would just grow up and do the same.

There were jobs around. As students homes for holidays, we picked up work without trouble, and could have stayed on, got promotions etc.

How do you deal with these situations? How can we make sure we are not making cuts to those who desperately need it, whilst absolutely changing the mind sets of able bodied men (and women) who have grown up believing they are entitled to money for nothing.

So, you think that any company/establishment is lilly white? Ok then. That's a rather naive view.

I have known some. People who have claimed JSA and also worked. I went to school with someone who was decked out in designer gear head to toe but got free school meals and school trips. She always had more cash than the rest of us. I think her mum was in a relationship but claiming as a single mother. In fact the majority of people I knew growing up who were on benefits were not claiming honestly.

Unless you are disabled benefits should only be paid out if you've contributed to the system and be time limited. This may account for why the rest of Europe has a far lower teenage pregnancy rate than UK. I know a mum through school who has 3 children all born 7 years apart which is the maximum length of time parents can remain on benefits without being sanctioned and she's happy to let us all know that.

I grew up in an area that was very similar to that described by the OP. Many of my friends were young men that had never worked and never intended to, their benefits were topped up by theft and drug dealing.

I know a lot of MNers deny that benefit scroungers exist, but they do. Sad but true.

However, the vast majority of people on benefits are working people on low wages or those who are genuinely unable to work. I would definitely prefer to live in a society that puts up with a small minority of freeloaders than one which fails to provide adequate welfare to those who need it.

God no we can't have those scroungers living in that London now can we.

Send them up North.

I know someone who tries to get money from anywhere except work. She has an encyclopaedic knowledge of the benefits system, 'borrows' money and calls in favours whenever possible, pleading poverty and ripping off anyone she can.

But I don't care.
If her life exists because we are supposed to care for those struggling I don't care.
I know her and I know a dozen people who are in genuine need. If she is the price we pay for a welfare state that's fine.

moomin, good luck with the new job.
I can understand the hate , I really can, but its just going to divide us all - nobody in parliament has the answers - they will be too busy fighting over Europe to worry about it anyway. Even with deep cuts, there will always be stories of people who get this and that. always has been and always will. I am just glad we're not like India and have hordes of people living in slums - but it could get that way. maybe that's their agenda, who knows?

I know someone who got her pgce, did a few weeks supply teaching and then went on the dole because teaching was "too hard work" and hasn't worked since. Got a London council flat too.

I live in a rural area and know 3 families who don't work and use their benefits to support their hobby of keeping several horses each.

It is as stupid to pretend that skivvers like this don't exist, as it is too pretend that all benefit claimants are some sort of scum.

Yes I know people who are like this. I am related to them. One has six children by six different fathers, has never worked, everything is someone else's fault.

I know people who are lazy in terms of applying for jobs, yes. Not any that make a life of the dole a career.

Even though there absolutely are those that don't try all that hard to get jobs, it doesn't change the fact that many, many other people ARE trying and still not getting jobs because there simply aren't enough.
People say jsa should be a temporary thing. Why? There aren't enough jobs to go around - for some it won't be temporary so it doesn't make it fair to make it so hard to live on and make people feel like scum for doing so.

Crustsaway - so you are saying that you yourself do this? Your argument about disposable income doesn't stand up since all money that is spent helps the economy, including money paid in benefits.

crustsaway how does the average person evade tax? You say everyone does it...I know nobody who does this. Everyone I know is an employee, wages paid into the bank, tax etc deducted beforehand. You don't mind people who avoid paying tax?

The biggest portion goes on old age pensions, but people don't tend to label them scroungers do they?

For two obvious reasons, I think. First, you have to work for 30 or 40 years to earn it. Second, there is much less opportunity to game the system to get something that more honest people do not. You can't increase your pension entitlement by pretending to be unemployable, ill or by living apart from your partner.

In the benefits discussion, the fact that state pensions are legally defined as benefits is an irrelevant technicality. No-one talking about "benefits" on an internet forum includes the state pension in that term, other than those who want to obfuscate.

(I would also exclude child benefit from the discussion of "benefits", on the grounds of near-universality, and that I can't believe a significant number of people have children in order to gain it.)

Don't put words in my mouth Bursary. Thinking about it logically it probably does.

Well crustaway - you obviously have inside knowledge as you say everyone does it. How do you know everyone does it then?

Neffi - the system has changed thankfully, so the days of being able to claim enough to live happily on without any checks are going. There are still a few who manage it, but it's significantly less than it was under labour. If this thread were posted six years ago, I'd have been able to think of plenty of families that were scrounging instead of only two that I know of now.

The new systems of making sure that people really are unable to work or that they really are too ill to work has had some unintended consequences, and that is awful for the genuine claimants that have been affected, but hopefully that is teething problems and long term, we won't have a welfare system that is a free for all and it will return to being a genuine safety net.

Yep! and i was told i was stupid for working, if i wanted to spend more time with my children benefits are there to be claimed.

This was during a period when i had to sign on due to being pressurised out of my city job just after returning from maternity leave. The 'scroungers' in question were ladies i met at the 'literacy' course i was attending. Both had been unemployed for up to 12 yrs.

I was too shocked to reply.

I had a conversation about this the other day. The person I was talking to volunteers with the homeless and needy, and said he comes in contact regularly with people who could work (ie physically and mentally capable) but don't. He also comes in contact with others who would like to work but are physically or mentally unable.

But do you have to work 30 or 40 years to get an old age pension? Surely people who ahve never worked still get a basic pension and/ or pension credits/ Housing benefit etc?

I'd like to think I'm rather knowledgeable at my age Bursary. Im also very lucky to have diversity in my life which includes a range of friends from different social groups.

I actually try not to judge and walk in other shoes before I get all high and mighty about things.

There are always going to be people who game the system - whether you're talking about benefits OR taxes - there are as many people gaming the tax system as are gaming the benefits system, and often doing rather well out of it. Most of us will know small business people who claim a personal meal out as expenses, or a wealthy friend who channels his employment income through a limited company because tax on dividends is lower than tax on income. In fact, I move professionally in circles where the latter would not even be considered gaming the system :-/

That's not to say that gaming the benefits system is right - of course it's not, and we should stop it. But in practice, it's a lot easier to take benefits from vulnerable people, like the learning disabled unable to jump through job centre hoops. It's a heck of a lot easier to catch out a dyslexic person who struggles to apply for enough jobs than someone who has extensive experience of gaming the system. This is why sanctions tend to be applied to easy and often vulnerable targets, and why HMRC pursue the little tax payer and not the big company.

None of this is confined to the UK of course, as I know a few british people happily gaming the french system (one is my tenant and I suspect she did this in the UK for years too).

Oh, I'm sorry to get 'high and mighty' but it's you who said benefit fraud is unacceptable but tax evasion is ok. Whereas in my book, cheating is cheating.

However, I'm quite happy to suspend my judgment if you have an argument which proves that tax evasion is ok under some circumstances. And that some forms of stealing from the government are more acceptable than others...

All Im saying is people in glass houses shouldnt throw stones.

Yes, friends teanage Dd dropped out of college, she was too lazy to get out of bed and find a job, so she decided to have a baby.Nine mouths later out pops a baby, the government provided her with a five hundred pound grant to buy essential baby items, months later a starting out grant from the government provided furnishings for a rented house, housing benefit pays the rent. Boyfriend works but he is not down as living there, apparently her payments will stop when the baby reaches school age and I will bet my bottom dollar she will pop another one out. She is one of many where I live and iam fighting like mad to ensure my daughter does not aspire to be one of these girls.