To think that a 23k benefits cap will drive some families in the SE

[Minifingers9]

... Into destitution?

I live in a pretty unappealing and comparatively cheap part of greater London but you can't get a 3 bedroom rental for under £1400 a month.
If we lost our jobs we wouldn't be able to live on 23k a year as a family of 5. Not when 15k of it was going on rent.
Why don't they have regional benefit caps?

Thankfully most people up here in Scotland do not think That. And a good proportion elsewhere too.

And I hardly think everyone is fab
Just prefer not to assume everyone is feckless and lazy. Unlike some.

Eatupnow, thousands of people were found "fit for work" ...actually many went into the "work related activity" group...not the same thing.

Some were genuinely now fit for work, my friend for example who after 20 years of alcoholism and several serious suicide attempts has made a goid recovery over the past few years and is now working. That had nothing to do with ATOS and everything to do with his recovery.

Some found fit for work were not actually for for work (but hey who cares as long as the Govt can push its peopoganda). My friend died three weeks after being found "fit for work"....and she had a serious underlying heart disease. She wasn't for fit for work, she knew that, her family knew that, her GP knew that, her Consultant knew that but the non medically qualified ATOS decision maker didn't agree with all these medically qualified people and said she was "fit for work". She was found dead by her partner three weeks later having succumbed to her illness.

DLA is different, you can get it in work or out and it's not means tested either. David Cameron rightly claimed it for his child who needed it.

The DLA form is 30+ pages and is not easy to complete...you don't just sign a form and get the benefit.

Yes there are right ways to do things, I had the partner (who became husband), I had the house, we had jobs, we had savings and we had a child.

Doesn't change the fact that life can throw the odd curve ball at you. My husband walked out, our son was diagnosed with autism, his needs became bigger and bigger and eventually I had to move nearly 200 miles to be closer to family and a support network. I am now on benefits and in social housing...hey ho, life goes on. I did manage 30 years of work prior to being on benefits though and I resent being called a scrounger by the media because my child needs DLA and I need Carers Allowance. And it's happening all the time now.....it's subtle but it's there.

All these benefit porn programmes....and disability benefits are brought into the picture, that Born Naughty programme which had Katie Hopkins in a tizz, a child with severe ADHD beig deemed the product of a "useless parent".

All there in an undercurrent of chatter so light that you coukd almost miss it...but you don't because you are not meant to. Those subliminal messages add up and soon even the disabled are fair game.

I can only add RIP to my friend Julie, truly and genuinely sick but not believed. I wonder if she is part of those "fit for work" statistics? Or did they said "fuuuuuck, we messed that one up, let's take it off"?

I know which answer I am going for.

Thank you, Grateful.
Eatup to add to that, many people with mental health problems were taken off DLA because the forms and the process were not fit for purpose and therefore not compatible with assessing a mental illness. These people were put on JSA. Some have, through helpful agency got their DLA reinstated, some are on the streets, unaccounted for, some are dead. Some are in the figures some weeks, and not in the figures other weeks due to the godawful sanctions regime.

Grateful

Tobysmum you said people are entitled to their opinions and don't have to change them. I didn't say they had to change them
I said I didn't have anything to say to them as the views just made me shudder. It's sort of agreeing to differ. Saying I find someone's views repellent doesn't mean I am saying they have to change them just for me. I am not some sort of egotist.

Iona has made the first good point against the benefit cap that I've read on this thread. A lack of affordable housing is the biggest problem, and that just shows how separate issues are interlinked when it comes to real people's lives.

The thing is that a lack of affordable housing is something that affects working people just as much as it affects those living completely on benefits. I don't think the problem is only down to not enough housing being built, the pressure on housing has also come from there being so many separated families, people having large families who grow up and need housing, the massive amount of low skilled immigration, the fact that some councils decided that it was unacceptable to house families with children in tower blocks, as well as a lack of building under the labour years. Obviously as demand increases and supply decreases, prices will go up, but that affects both working families and non working families equally, so how do we find a system that doesn't effectively penalise people for working without having a benefit cap? Just how?

It's got to be a very difficult line to draw for those that have the power to make a difference.

I don't get these explanations of 'To get that much you need to have lots of kids and live in an expensive area and you would not see most of it because the rent would go directly to a landlord'.

It totally misses the point. People who work and don't claim benefits get paid for doing their job, not more because they choose to live in an expensive area and have lots of kids'. Working people restrict their lifestyle according to their income. People on benefits expect their income from the state to reflect their choices and pay them for how many children they have and where they choose to live.

It is not fair.

Well if the taxpayer shouted no to housing homeless people then I despair for this country.

Housing people is one thing, housing them in the area they demand to be housed regardless of the cost to the taxpayer, is quite another.

I didn't throw autism / ADHD into the list of spurious over-diagnosed conditions Fanjo, I asked the poster if that was her opinion. My own son has severe autism so I know exactly what it's like.

Housing came up a while back. I, for one, did my usual tirade about HB going to private landlords.

www.theguardian.com/cities/2014/sep/01/enfield-experiment-housing-problem-radical-solution

This is an interesting article.

People on benefits expect their income from the state to reflect their choices and pay them for how many children they have and where they choose to live.

It is not fair.

Are you ten?
I have four children, I am on benefits, I worked for thirty odd years and now work harder than I ever did as a carer for the disabled people in my family. Now, go away and sort your facts out and stop tarring all on benefits with the same brush.

Completely agree with the point about lack of social and affordable housing. But this affects people who aren't on any benefits too. Many people are paying a massive chunk out of their earned income directly to a private LL so they never 'see' that money.

That's an interesting article Stitch. I do think that RTB and the '89 housing act were two of the worst things to happen to LA housing.

OK cadie. I agree, that it probably was her opinion too. Sadly.

Hi everyone,

I am sure I have misunderstood, but the way the cap is being written about, it will move children into poverty under that figure (without all the caveats given here) - so I thought, well, that means that are living in poverty then , which we surely aren't.

I have no wish to really get into an argument into it; I was genuinely confused. Even if most of the money is going to a landlord in the examples given, I need to pay my mortgage, house insurance etc so the money I have is really not 'disposable' income in that sense.

I am honestly happy in my situation as I have a job (albeit one which I work really long hours for) and would rather than be in that position that not; I was just curious. I do feel quite strapped for cash, we are living in a house which is too small and I drive a car which is over a decade old, and I have a long list of repairs which need done - so I have been thinking, how do people manage? So, it does make sense to me if objectively what we have, compared to costs, is not actually that much - and looking at these caps and how (relative) poverty is defined, it does make sense.

My DD has said to me we are poor mum, and I have always said no, we are not because we know where the money is coming from (as long as I have a job) and a roof over our heads, food on the table etc - and I hold to that view. The figures just surprised me, that is all.

If housing was more affordable more people would be able to live without benefits including working top ups.

I think that it is highly complex and that there are lots of shades of grey involved. Probably most people broadly want the same outcome, but just sees different ways of tackling the problems. The big issue I have personally is that benefits are part of the solution and will be, but also cause problems.

relative poverty is something like household income of under 60% of the median.

As a single parent who was technically "below the breadline" for over a decade, i can tell you "the breadline" is set very very high!

Dawndonna If you read my posts you would see I have said repeatedly I am not including elderly, disabled or ill people in this - I am happy to pay higher taxes to support those people. I a talking about the culture of worklessness that exists amngst some groups in our society who have never worked by choice even though they can. So please don't be so rude. Not everything is about you.

The bottom line is most people in the country have voted for ensuring work pays. Yes we are happy to have exclusions for the disabled but the benefits cap which is just a start coming down to £23k sends out a clear signal that this is the end of the road. full time working women who pay a lot of tax and cannot afford to live in areas benefits claimants can have had enough and we voted in the election and most of us are pleased with the proposed new benefits cap even though yes it does not apply to most voters. We are also grateful to the Scots and the even more people who voted UKIP for helping the Tories get in.

Relative poverty is a silly calculation. It meant when we had the recession as most full time workers were much worse off those below them came out of poverty even though they had less money. Only absolute poverty is worth tracking.

The new cap will lead people into work which will be very good for them or else enable them to make choices workers make - to move where they can afford and to have the children they can afford. One proposal is that all those who receive housing benefit pay 10% of their rent. That might be another way to push more part time workers into full time work. And yes it's Saturday and I was at my desk at 7 and I am 4 hours into work (with just a couple of posts on here).

In London, ed's old school. Husband, wife, 4 children, three bed local authority flat KandC, all children at secondary, all fsm, subsidised everything. Family constantly complain about lack of space and funds, only one bathroom etc. The father does not work and there are rumours of disability but if so it is invisible, he is sociable, fit and helps with manual stuff. The mother is as fit as a fiddle. The mother has said it doesn't suit them to work, they prefer to invest all their time in the family.

I just can't support that. They didn't have to have four children. One of them at least should be working. This is London and there is plenty of work out there.

Dd's old school

Lotus, if it is an early start competition, I started at four - that is the only way I can get work done before DC wake up, I have just done another couple of hours and now DC get my attention. That is the reality of life as a working mother with small children, and yes, I know that I will be better off longer term if I keep my job.

I think arguments about people being in work rely on jobs being available, and any measures to cut welfare should be accompanied by proper job creation schemes and investment in education. Otherwise, it is a race to the bottom.

I do agree with you to some extent eatup. I used to work in a school and you do see the impact the lifestyle in the blog has on the students, often the dad would then go off and have another family because they were in social housing and the tax payer would fund it.