AIBU about Tax Credits cuts,

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Commons back Osborne plan for tax credit cuts
www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-34260902

I don't claim anymore because I now earn enough to support myself - because I could work and progress my career as well as my life while being a single parent.

AIBU to think this is a total travesty and so many single parents are going to have their life's devastated by this - and what about people in domestic abuse situations who will now be more unable to leave?

Maybe I some benefits scrounger - but the tax credits enabled me to be a good parent and role model to my kids - without their feckless father affecting that .... AIBU?!

There is no 'need' for people to live in central London. Most people have to live where they can afford to live. Other taxpayers should not be subsidising these huge rents. Rents which they couldn't even hope to afford themselves. All this poor folk forced out of expensive areas. Most people buy or rent a house where they can afford. If they can't afford it then they move to a cheaper area which they can afford.

of course not. but of course spending in central london is higher

If you are talking benefit spending and individual claiment spend in most cases it won't be, as I have tried to explain to you the benefit cap will prevent this in most cases.

The rent in central London could be 1k a week and they still won't get more total benefit than the cap.

If you are talking benefit spending and individual claiment spend in most cases it won't be, as I have tried to explain to you the benefit cap will prevent this in most cases.

so, how do those people live in central London if the entitlement is the same as a cheaper area, but the entitlement in the cheaper area is supposed to be the bare minimum.

you may have explained it, but the explanation didn't make sense. if people in south kensington are getting the same as some in a cheaper area, than the people in the cheaper area must be getting too much, in which case there benefit should be lower.

what am I missing here.

"other tax payers should not be subsidising these huge rents"

Agreed, now lets get people paying council tax to the value of their houses rather than the 1992 rate yeah? Now lets get BTL landlords paying a good rate of CGT yeah, and the appropirate level of tax on profit from rent? Till that happens you can't claim that people are supported.. The fecking Sultan of Brunei claims a discount on his Kensignaton Palce Garden home because its his second home.

Stop the bollocks.

Agreed, now lets get people paying council tax to the value of their houses rather than the 1992 rate yeah? Now lets get BTL landlords paying a good rate of CGT yeah, and the appropirate level of tax on profit from rent? Till that happens you can't claim that people are supported.. The fecking Sultan of Brunei claims a discount on his Kensignaton Palce Garden home because its his second home.

with the possible exception of your CGT statement (i am on the fence), yes, let's do all that. In spades.

not sure how that is at all opposing fixing the other problem.

I agree people should be paying more council tax. I think landlords will already be paying capital gains tax when they come to sell if they already have another property they live in. A lot of cities now do not give discount for second homes or if they do it's a very small discount, smaller than the single person's discount. I don't know about London. I don't expect the Sultan of Brunei uses many Council services if he's not there very often and probably spends loads in the local shops when he is.

I'd be happy for the sultan to pay more, and if the charges discourage his purchase, so be it.

there is a move to make landlords pay council tax even if the property is empty, or charge them double if the property is empty. in the US, the landlord pays the council tax by default.

V landlords pay capital gains tax even if they only have one property (if they do not live in it). The relief for private residence is exactly that - a relief from capital gains tax for your principal private residence, not for your one property which is let out.

Council tax is far too high. We should be looking at reducing the tax burden and having a smaller state with much more personal responsibility for your own circumstances as that makes people happier and is better for them.

I think CGT should actually be higher for properties, second homes, rented properties etc. Not massively higher though.

Ah the personal responsibility card, yet again, which simply goes back to blaming those in need of help for their own predicament, victim blaming as it were. It's only ever played by those who fail to recognise their own privilege.

What services are people going to take responsibility for? Waste collection, public parks, libraries? Sweeping the streets, policing, fire? You know all of those things that council tax pays for..

Yes in leafy areas people may be able to pay for them privately, and there may be some philanthropy in others, but private charity is never enough.

Council tax is based on the 1992 values of houses, which is rather silly as most properties have been bought and sold at least once since then, areas in London that were once quite poor, like my area of Kilburn, are now occupied by people who can afford to pay £750,000 for a two bed flat ( we were here in the 1990s, it was fun) CT rates should be revised up.

CGT used to be 40% and top rate income tax 40% and there was huge merit in that as no incentive for people to take income as capital as it was the same rate (although when it was 40% you could index for inflation which was fair but indexation went).

the top rate of income tax pre Thatcher was something like 86%, taken down to 60 %, tax on unearned income was something like 95% in the 1960's hence the Beatles song tax man: "should 5% appear to small, be thankful I don't take it all."

CGT is fine at the current level for "investing" purposes, I'm stating that actually investing in property is not the same as investing in business or being entrepreneurial. It simply isn't, if we increased taxes on second homes and BTL properties they would seem less attractive and increase supply on the market, lowering prices, which would lead to lower rents etc etc. It would certainly make things like buy to leave less attractive too.

I think raising tax on BTLs may backfire, and they are certainly being scapegoated. not that they aren't part of the problem, just that the problem is all over.

it'll backfire because the hope is that BTLs leave the market, and prices tumble far enough that people can buy property to live in. And keep in mind when the market isn't crazy, more taxes on the BTLs will just raise prices for renters (of course, we could cross that bridge when we come to it).

Then you bring in rent controls too!

I don't think rent controls work when there is such a severe shortage of housing in London. All it means is that people never move from their property so new people moving in to that area and younger people haven't a chance as people will more or less become sitting tenants.

But when combined with higher CTG on second properties and BTL homes, it would Vivienne, a combination of interventions to a failing market always works better.

so, how do those people live in central London if the entitlement is the same as a cheaper area, but the entitlement in the cheaper area is supposed to be the bare minimum

Why on earth do you think the rent everywhere outside of London is bare minimum?

you may have explained it, but the explanation didn't make sense. if people in south kensington are getting the same as some in a cheaper area, than the people in the cheaper area must be getting too much, in which case there benefit should be lower

The thing called the benefit cap prevents people from getting more than x amount per week no matter how much their rent is, it is 'policed' via HB so your total benefit award plus your rent in Kensington would put you shit loads over the cap so HB won't pay any sum that puts you over the cap this means you have to find the rent money elsewhere (from your income) so for arguements sake the total amount obtained by the claiment or on behalf of the claiment will be £500 and they will have quite a bit to find to pay rent because there rent will be very high they cannot obtain this from a benefit source and obviously benefits will reduce if you get money elsewhere.

Same situation in say salisbury where rents are fairly normal but not eye wateringly so there in hand benefit will be the same assuming same circumstances but because the rents are not eye wateringly high when you add the rent amount to the in hand benefits they are more likely than not to work out at say (random figures for illustration) 490/500/510 the cap will cut them off at 500 but only if their award takes them that high.

There are not going to be a huge amount of areas in the UK where the private rents are so cheap that they will not put a family with 2/3 kids very near or on the cap.

If they are under the cap they don't get extra to bump it up.

Granted there is the DHF but that is a limited budget with a time limit,done on a first come first served and the LA is allowed to prioritise whoever they want and quite rightly that is usually disabled people or those actively trying to secure more affordable housing.

what am I missing here

You are missing that.

In the UK we do not say to low income families your housing options are the financial equivalent of a cardboard box or a caravan the LHA is designed to reflect the areas normal cost for a typical affordable family home,granted its intended to reflect the lower end of the scale but it is not designed to only enable slum use or to encourage homelessness by making housing not achievable. But the cap in many areas is going along way towards promoting that result

You are missing that.

so, don't you see the missing piece of information? How do poor people on HB live in south kensington? The cap will kick in. So, they somehow must make the shortfall. How?

Owing to high cost of childcare I never have any real money. Although I have a £36 mortgage I am always totally skint. No foreign holiday for ten years and all I ever do is work work work and get through my neverending list of tasks as a hardworking single parent with no family support. There are no grandparents so ds would have no gifts at all if I did not work to buy essential Xmas and birthday presents. I never go out in the evening and have no social friends and only one friend where I live (the two other best friends left the area although we do keep in touch).

Access is minimal as the ex has been violent to ds in the past so isn't allowed to see our ds often.

Those short of money in South Kensington can do what the rest of people do who aren't on state benefits - move in with friends, sleep on sofas, two single mothers with a baby could share one property. They move out to where I live in the depths of zone 5 - yes I haven't been killed out here yet and yes you can even cycle into London from here if you need to or cannot afford the bus fare.

But not everyone has that possibility Grazia. You may cycle in from Zone 5 but is it as safe or possible at 5 am in the Winter? All the things you offer are merely platitudes that do not solve the issue.

I firmly believe the welfare state is a good thing. Supporting the poor costs far less as part of the budget than it does pensioners, actually we pay more out in corporate subsidy and tax breaks a year. Shall we just axe them instead?

redstrawberry, if it seemed like I was making out that you want people thrown on the street, then I apologise, but I did say that I know that's not what you want.

It would, however, be the consequence of getting rid of housing benefit and tax credits completely, which was proposed on here just before my post. And that's what I was talking about when I said what would people do in the short term - in the time between getting rid of those benefits and the market adjusting.

Housing benefit and tax credits actually often are a short term option, though. Child tax credits have a natural time limit and, unless you have a long-term serious disability, then you will have to look for work (as you should, of course). An awful lot of people claim HB for just a few months before they get another job.

To be honest, on my central London social housing estate the vast majority of the tenants are in vulnerable groups. Because it's an old estate about 70% of the tenants are pensioners, to start with; most London estates are at least 40 years old, so this is not unusual. Disabled people make up a lot of the rest of the tenants. There are working-age people but they're often the children or partners of the actual tenants (and their income affects the tenants' right to HB).

They're really not the right people to jealous of unless you think being old or disabled is great. They also depend on local support structures more than someone who's not actually a long-term London resident because their support structures are more likely to be here. They're not to be compared with someone able-bodied, on a decent wage, and not from the area, because they do have needs that those people don't.

And the thing is all of London is very expensive, not just Central London. Realistically, if you move people out of South Ken to sell their homes, within a year or two you'll be moving people out of Newham and Richmond and Enfield and anywhere that is commutable to London without paying more than minimum wage just to get there and back.

Yes, people should be open to the idea of commuting into the city, but that's really not what we're talking about here - those commutable homes would be taken away too.

When London councils rehouse people away from their borough it's always in other towns - because the other London boroughs don't have enough spare capacity to allow non-residents to apply too - and it just is not realistic to expect someone to commute from Milton Keynes or Southend unless their pay is really pretty good. Like I said, I know people who commute from that far, but their wages allow for it. If they were on minimum wage they'd be left out of pocket after commuting costs. However much they might be willing to commute, they simply wouldn't have the money to do it.

The trouble is this country has become too London centric. (If I've got the term correct.) More and more people want to live there and companies seem to want to stay in London. That's fine. But I certainly don't agree with taxpayer subsidies to allow people to live in those areas. No, no and no again.

All the things you offer are merely platitudes that do not solve the issue.

how are they platitudes? at least one (living and commuting from zone 5) she does herself, along (I assume) with all her friends.

As to your comments about taxing corporations, yes, let's do it.

When London councils rehouse people away from their borough it's always in other towns - because the other London boroughs don't have enough spare capacity to allow non-residents to apply too - and it just is not realistic to expect someone to commute from Milton Keynes or Southend unless their pay is really pretty good. Like I said, I know people who commute from that far, but their wages allow for it.

it's much cheaper to live in Milton Keynes and commute from there. That's why people do it. it's certainly not for the love of being in a crowded train. So if that's the cheaper option, that's the way we should do it as well.

They're really not the right people to jealous of unless you think being old or disabled is great.

one of the other reasons I disagree with HB is it helps the one group that seems to get no end of help: the old. We all know the tories love older voters, so the axe has come down on pretty much everyone else, in particular the young, who work and want to go to post secondary but can't because the cost is too high. Tuition is sky high. They can't just apply to live in south kensington, or central London where many of the educational opportunities are. They will not get pensions. Winter fuel allowance must sound like something from another planet to them.

I never proposed to get rid of HB entirely, as it should be there as a temporary measure (and don't kid yourself. HB isn't meant to be temporary. Some people have collected it all their lives). Also, I wouldn't propose to shock the system by simply yanking HB. It would have to be done with a proper, multi-faceted and honest approach to bring rents and prices down (discourage foreign buying, raising interest rates, discouraging BTL, protecting private tenants, but most of all building homes). I fully and completely acknowledge that the problem isn't people with low wages. it's the high price of housing. The problem is that HB, especially in London, exacerbates the problem for everyone else, most of whom are also not on high wages.

Again, what I hear is that people want to live in central London. I am still not seeing a need.

The trouble is this country has become too London centric.

if you compare London's role to the rest of the country, it is completely out of line with other European countries. No other country has one city that makes up so much of the economic activity. Even France (where Paris is also relatively big) isn't nearly as lopsided as we are.

we should encourage more growth outside London. We actually have low prices and spare housing there.

The trouble is this country has become too London centric.

Yes. It's a tough slog, living in London. I don't know why anyone would want to do it. You have to make a lot of money to enjoy a reasonable standard of living.