To think 'in your face Osborne?'

[Littlefluffyclouds81]

I'm not. I know I'm not. I'm personally going to have a glass of wine and celebrate there being a significant amount of egg on the Tories' faces.

PS ladies and gents, if you get a chance, DO have a look at nice Lord Lloyd Webber's Facebook page

As a junior doctor in training im a high tax payer but I'm not in favour of cuts like these as mum and dad used things like to make ends meet

I'm on a low income and claim tax credits so I'm breathing a huge sigh of relief at this!

Out of interest, I've just worked out my maximum earnings potential in the job I'm in - £13,939 per year before tax (based on 40hrs at £6.70ph). My basic living costs for the year are as follows:

Rent £6000 (don't pay this anymore but did until a year ago when my dad bought me a house. Have included it as not many people are lucky enough not to have this)

Gas/electric/water/tv licence £1560

Council tax £780

Childcare £4630 (based on before and after school care for 39 weeks, 5 weeks holiday that I can take, then the remaining 8 weeks with a full time childminder)

Insurances £600 (house/car/life)

Phone £420

Car running costs £1145 (my car costs £30 a year to tax and I put £15 a week in diesel, so that's being economical!)

All of that totals £14715, leaving a deficit of £779 per year. And I haven't included food, toiletries etc in that! I live fairly frugally and couldn't make ends meet on 40 hours at NMW without tax credits help. I fail to see how that makes me the great unwashed, or whatever phrase was used early in this thread!

Yes I could get a better paid job. Because it's that easy! Why didn't I think of that??! Maybe get rid of the phone? Lose the car? Then I'd have bus fares to pay. I could eBay the child! Now there's a money saving idea! Unless a better paying, full time, permanent job (with no undociable hours as I'm a single parent) comes along, I'm basically screwed, as are many in the same situation.

I think those on here who are calling for tax credits to be cut need to think about this.

If we are really in the business of deficit reduction why has the inheritance tax threshold been increased at a cost of £1.1 billion to the exchequer per year. Why are is corporation tax being lowered, when it is already the lowest in the G8, at a cost of £4-5 bn per year.

There already are your savings for your working tax credits.

Then ask yourself this question, why are the very poorest being asked to pay for things which benefit the most wealthy? Cuts to inheritance tax and corporation tax, not to mention cuts to the top rate of taxation all benefit the wealthiest, but are being paid for by the poor.

Do your calculation on what you can afford without sponging on others. Obviously people fall on hard times...that is what hand outs are for but don't make life decisions on the assumption that someone else will pay for them. DH & I are only on £65k between us so in no position to have children.

JustBeingJuliet - if your dad can afford to buy you a house outright and yet you still enlist your in comings and outgoings as a sign of all that is wrong with the country - fuck me. Fuck me.

Do your calculation on what you can afford without sponging on others.
So you don't think there should be
Nurses, Teachers, Care workers, office cleaners, checkout girls, petrol pump attendants
and many other essential low paid staff in London?

You think that all of those people should stay on the dole rather than provide essential services?

You and your DH are on 65k.
How much do the support staff in your workplaces earn?
How about the waiting staff at a restaurant?
Or the assistants on Public transport?

Guess what, most of them can only afford to survive in our crassly unequal society with the assistance of tax credits

They can make their decisions how they like. Just don't expect strangers to top up their lack of funds.

angelos
So you are happy to pay MUCH more for everything to bring wages up to affordable levels?

Starting with the NHS
Then Public services
Then food
And cinema tickets
And train tickets
And schools
and nurseries
and care homes

Having to have a combined income of at least 65K before you have any children is going to put an unfortunate dent in the birth rate. That could cause a few issues trying to staff essential services in the future.

Poor farage is going to spontaneously combust at the number of immigrants we're going to have to let in to make that work.

angelos, did you really just type this?

DH & I are only on £65k between us so in no position to have children.

is this a typo?

^angelos, did you really just type this?

DH & I are only on £65k between us so in no position to have children.

is this a typo?^

It's a word beginning with T, but it's not a typo ;)

Don't bite.

Bloody hell, I've just read Helena's link about having DWP advisers in foodbanks.

She said the meeting happened about three months ago and the DWP advisers started coming in about three weeks ago. They are able to help clients who are having benefits problems, for example, if they have been sanctioned, she said. “I think it’s a brilliant, brilliant thing that the government’s doing [this].”

How about addressing the prime cause of foodbank use instead which is, er, Iain Duncan Smith and DWP advisers

angelos02 65k and no position to have children? Excuse me but my reply may take a while because I'm laughing at you.

"Do your calculation on what you can afford without sponging on others"

From the above sounds like you shouldn't be calculating anything to me.

Personal responsibility is fine to preach if EVERYONE does it. In a country where firms evade taxes, where the richest are afforded massive intagible benefits and pay a smaller % of their income in tax than the poor, where corporate subsidy and tax breaks stem to a conservative estimate of £98 billion. Where the richest 9% are given a tax break on unearned wealth...

When all of that is redressed, then I'd start taking it from the weakest, not first, until then your argument is rubbish.

Darvany.......imagine a claimant going to a food bank and being face to face with the very advisor that sanctioned them!!!

That's what I was thinking as well. Do you have to be seeking work during a sanction period? They could add another few weeks for skiving off at the foodbank.

Or just sanction all the people on JSA or UC who are not meeting their conditionality while they were at it.

Thatcher was bad but even she didnt entertain this. Its getting really out of hand.

65k so in no position to have children, what a bloody joke

Darkbehindthecurtain
JustBeingJuliet - if your dad can afford to buy you a house outright and yet you still enlist your in comings and outgoings as a sign of all that is wrong with the country - fuck me. Fuck me.

Do you want to elaborate? You've lost me! My dads ability to buy me a house was due to a relative dying and leaving him some money, so he helped me out instead of watching me struggle. I wasn't trying to say I'm struggling, just pointing out that my outgoings are average and earning potential in a minimum wage job is limited.

Talkinpease, this is only from memory - but I'm sure I remember a Spitting Image sketch during the 87 election.

Andrew Lloyd Webber puppet : "If Labour win the election I will be forced to leave the country"

Voiceover : "That was a Party Political Broadcast for the Labour Party"

I think the unofficial purpose of a jobcentre official at the food bank is to check what the person is saying is true I.e if a person tells the foodbank that their claim for benefit has been delayed or have been sanctioned I imagine the jobcentre official will check there and then before any food is handed over.

I also imagine somewhere down the line if IDS has his way that the jobcentre advisor will have some say over how much food the person deserves.

I am not personally affected by this but couldn't believe what I heard last night when the news came in. The peers always seem to have stopped leftwing motions and always seemed to support rightwing policy. I am not one way or the other but was seriously overjoyed when I heard this news. Just v dismayed and lacking in understanding when all of a sudden there was talk of getting rid of peers rights to vote and it being quite easy to do this. If this is the case, why didn't labour do it years ago?
Sorry, probably come across as very stupid lol

Fantasyland that might cost them more in that case because i should imagine that if they do that they will also have the same security guards at the food banks as they do at the Job Centres.

Got a feeling this is going to be another way of making money out of poorer people.

How long do you think it will be before ALW's management can use his FB page properly again?