To ask a question about conservative policy

[Moremoneynow]

Okay. Here goes - this is not a bunfight.

I earn just above minimum wage at present. This, as you all know, will go up to £7.20 in April. This will make a significant difference to my weekly pay packet. I will also be much better off because of the 30 hours childcare and there's a law come in relating to travel which means I will be on more money still.

AIBU to think maybe the conservatives do value low paid people?

I'm not a politician, I just know I'm going to be better off. And that's not a bad thing ...

The problem is that because it is being labeled the national living wage, it avoids and hides the fact that a wage you can live on-the living wage(even then only just existing) is more like £8.25 an hour.

Though individuals have been paid off, and companies can wring their hands about how difficult it is, and perhaps individuals can also pretend it will make a huge difference, all this is doing is aiming to delay the anger and stress people are feeling so that they delay going to their employers and insisting on a wage they can at least live on, or even participate in society on.

If you look at the profits the care providers make from public funds, you will see that they can easily afford to pay better wages, but they don't because people are just held in enough dependency and gratitude to not either collectively refuse to pay, or to collectively negotiate for better wages.

The conservative voters in that pike are the ones taking spare money out of those businesses.

Better all carers get together and revise to help until they are paid enough to actually live on. Let's see how quickly the conservatives become anti-poor then!

The last time I worked (2 years ago) it was very easy to see the negative consequences of some policies.

I was a carer for people with learning disabilities.

The day services ,which were the only outside socialisation some of our clients got on a regular basis have all been shut down.

Now they have less money, have to pay more out of it for care (we had to cover the hours usually spent at day care) and when I left they hadn't had a holiday in two years.

These are people who were non-verbal, often immobile and have no chance of supporting themselves.

They can't even go once a year for a weekend at the seaside anymore. They are cut off from friends they made at the community centres and generally have a much poorer quality of life.

Now I'm disabled too, it sucks under a conservative government no doubt. But they will be after low earners next.

Good luck.

Also you are an obvious Tory plant.

It's great you are doing better - but many, many aren't. Loads of people are going to be hit by the tax credits cuts coming.

They have also just cut Employment and Support Allowance for disabled people by £30 a week, which is a huge, huge amount.

So god forbid if you get ill, or have an accident, you will struggle big time financially. On top of that when you apply to social services for help - for care, or for aids, you will find you're either turned away, or given a fraction of the help you need.

Then when you go to your local hospital for medical help, you'll find they just sold a huge chunk of it to a company that's gone bankrupt repeatedly, and they're no longer offering on-going care (physiotherapy, orthotics, hydrotherapy, prosthetics, etc) to those with long-term health conditions, and the waiting list has jumped to 18 months to two years for everyone else.

You'll also find it incredibly hard to get Personal Independence Payments to help pay for the costs that have suddenly shot up in every regard. The extra heating you need, the additional washing, the fact you need to drive everywhere, the special clothes you need, all the little things the NHS don't cover (and many big things too).

And if you are lucky enough to get PIP after repeated tribunals that you have to wait over a year for with no money, where they cross-examine you like a criminal, they will keep reassessing you. Even if you'll never get better. Because god forbid the unqualified, non-medical personnel decides to actually read your stack of medical evidence while they're assessing you, and so based on no evidence at all accuse you of lying, you'll find your adapted car - the only thing that allows you go anywhere - whipped away within days. You're now left housebound.

That's my life, anyway. Living in fear of the brown envelope dropping through the door cutting a bit more of the support that keeps me alive. Causing more stress and anxiety, which just adds more pain to my incurable condition.

So, again - I'm glad some people are doing better. I really am, no sarcasm, but others are being absolutely screwed over at each and every turn.

Yay Lanark there's other threads in a similar vein. Single mothers and benefit fraud, they're out in force today.

Our Tory council just allowed most of our hospital to be privatised, amicissimma, so it's still going on.

New claiming disabled people will see their disability benefit cut by £30 a week. This apparently is to "provide them with an incentive to look for work". This from MPs taking an inflation busting pay rise....including mine who will be getting a stiff letter.

YABU

Amen GlitterNails.

Dp has had to give up work to care for me full time recently as my previous carer (mum) had to return to work for her own financial reasons.

I require 24 hr care, not a hope in hells chance of getting some social care to help out when do was working. We tried.

So now we are down two wages and living off pip ( where I have to go through filling out 60 pages full of information every three years and a fucking humiliating interview where someone who hasn't had a sniff of medical training will try for an hour to catch me out on a non existent lie) income support and carers allowance.

Also a disabled daughter I'm not even sure I can attempt to start claiming dla for, despite the crippling costs, because every time I look at the book size claim pack I break down and just know it will be the same all over again.

Barrel of laughs!

Lanark if you want to pm me I can prove to you I am who and what I say I am. Definitely no Tory plant.

Also you are an obvious Tory plant.

Just because postars hold a view about something that is different to yours, or maybe asking questions as they don't understand it doesn't make them a Tory plant!

True. I still call plant. Irrespective of the offer to go outside.

Peppa . Sorry you're in that position 🌺

Because you're wrong

Op rather than picking fights any chance you could read the thread you started and respond

OP. I am pleased that you will be better off. I was very pleased when I heard that the minimum wage was going to go up this year and by a significant amount again over the next few years (I forget the exact details).

When the minimum wage was first established in the 1990s (again, sorry if my dates are wrong) many doomsayers said this would lead to increased unemployment. As far as I know, didn't come true.

I'd rather companies paid a decent wage rather than tax payers (i.e. normal people working) having to top it up in the form of tax credits.

OP, unfortunately, despite the fact that you know what you experience, it is an unwritten rule on MN that you can't say that the Conservative Party has done something beneficial to the lower paid, and if you insist on doing so, you will be called a Tory plant - as may I after this post!

Whats sad is that they will go through this whole scrutiny to check individuals like peppatina, but happily pay ludicrous charge rates for private care companies even though the actual carers on crap terms.

Yes its good that you will be getting paid more, but some of us are arguing why aren't you getting paid that already, considering the amount of very lax tax investigation goes on. This government wants a free market look at the utilities, rail etc do you feel you getting a good deal going this route?

Theres a 34 billion tax gap which makes a mockery of 'need to tighten belts', this government has no appetite to reduce this or change the banking sector - bizarrely equivalent to what Brexiters say is 'too much to be paying to the EU'

Even if we were only able to get half of this back that would be a massive injection

so the op will be fine. the cut to benefits and services her clients are facing won't affect her wages.
cos its not the government that who pay for people in the care industry you know.

I didn't vote Tory in the last election then today u get the first but it good news I've had in a while that's it samcro - I'm not starting a fight.

but you do realise it won't last as the people who are paying for your services are having their money and support cut

Well if that happens I'll post on here and you can all say you told me so :)

When the minimum wage was first established in the 1990s (again, sorry if my dates are wrong) many doomsayers said this would lead to increased unemployment. As far as I know, didn't come true

Are the people on minimum wage NOW better off than those on minimum wage THEN? Or has the system simply levelled out, such that an "amount of minimum wage" has the same purchasing power?

more paid travel time isn't a Tory policy. It's happening as a result of a European case ruling (spain or germany I think). Like a lot of EU directives on employment, which the members have to interpret into their own national laws.
National minimum wage was brought back by Labour, the Tories had got rid of it.

Yes Labour introduced the NMW, perhaps they are the ones you should be thanking

From the way I understand it, working people on low incomes will be better off after the changes, but people who don't work will be worse off. They want to encourage people to take low paid jobs rather than be on benefits, so they are trying to increase the gap between benefits and work.

I agree with this in principle, but do worry about those who want to go to work but can't actually find a job.

I didn't vote Tory in the last election

Like the majority of the population then.

Who did you vote for?