To not understand how people can justify it

[ijustdontunderstand]

Okay, not a bun fight I just want to understand how those who vote Tory can think the cuts to disability benefits are OK.

This is NOT saying if you vote Tory you're a bad person, at all, I just want to understand. Will you vote them in again knowing?

Eh, what wasn't a proper left wing government? Skipping back to the 1970s?

Or are you a bit lost because a 90% top tax rate hasn't existed since then and no one has suggested reintroducing it?

No need to apologize worcs - I honestly think that reasonable minds may differ on this type of thing and I enjoy debating it. It's just disappointing when MN degenerates into Tory-baiting and playground insults.

Pausing the discussion was about whether Corbyn would introduce similarly punitive tax rates as those that applied under the last "proper" (i.e. Non-Blairite) Labour government.

The Tories have also cut the armed forces, Bugger. Cut of 20% to army personnel since 2010.

Armed forces job cuts reach target three years early

Am I on a different thread now? I thought we were discussing real people losing money they rely on right now, not some pie-in-the-sky anti-Corbyn scaremongering (and for the purposes of drawing accurate insults, I haven't voted Labour since the 1980s).

the discussion was about whether Corbyn would introduce similarly punitive tax rates as those that applied under the last "proper" (i.e. Non-Blairite) Labour government

I thought the discussion was about whether Tory voters think the cuts to disability benefits are ok........but that the question was side-stepped by quoting Labour government tax rates?

X-post Brecon

Hah, not just me thinking that then, Brecon and Greenish!

I was responding to an earlier pro-Corbyn post from Cauliflower but having committed the cardinal sin of admitting to being a Tory voter on MN I can obviously expect no better than ad hom frothing!

So you must be a bit disappointed to have people criticising your arguments and use of rhetoric, then?

No-one's attacking you personally.....just expressing different views to yours.

Get over yourself please

Thanks YoungGirlGrowingOld but I've requested Mn delete - I really am sorry if I offended and would hate to squash debate which is so important at this time. Unfortunately you seem to have become a poster girl for political bigotry. However, your debate and willingness to support your arguments will sort that out.

Argument is always good so.... you hark back to the 70s but those politicians are mostly dead. This is the 'real' Labour party. Now. We cannot argue with dead men but we can learn from the past. Ted Heath was in power for the first half of the 70s and introduced the 3 day week. He was very keen on Europe and Thatcher, who succeeded him had to negotiate the CAP. The mining industry was needlessly obliterated. It devastated entire communities. This may have finished by Thatcher but it was started by Heath. In the 70s, when the Tories were in power. I'm not being partisan, just saying.

Oh God, another x-post

So about three posts till we start getting accused of being the borg, Greenish.

Pausing Yep

X post? Oh dear, sorry I'll just watch.

I read the news, but am happy to still be proved wrong on all counts as it's hard to find 'non propaganda' sources these days it seems.

As far as I can tell, cuts need to be made, all around. The disability one seems to have got a lot of press of late. Not saying it's not important, but I think that everyone can tell a story where cuts are affecting their lives, whether it's finding work, the resources available in state schools, libraries closing and so on. Yes, cutting benefits for some (all?) groups is not ideal but screwing up the education of many children is not great either, nor is not having money for the NHS for people to get a GP appt or have a child seen in A&E. They are affecting so many people, some more directly and some are maybe not considered directly but the longer term impacts may be really high but harder to pinpoint just now.

Any government coming in at the last GE would have to make cuts and painful ones. I don't agree with them all but I don't know all the details either.

Sometimes I think I'd love to spend a day with the important Gov people and sit in a room with the budget (in my mind this is a simple Excel spreadsheet that any idiot could understand....I suspect this is not the case) and go through with them what needs to be cut where - kind of like budget cuts to a project at work.

I'd like to see if I came up with the same views as them (or if they are all evil-minded eejits) or if I'd be going around in circles for hours going 'Well, can't cut that....what about X? Oh no, can't do that!' whilst there is the head of finance tapping their watch saying 'well, you have to have this done by 5pm and something's gotta go'.

Not sure if that makes sense.....I want to have faith that they are all well-educated, nice people who are trying their best. However, I have no evidence of this - no evidence either way tho. Hate putting blind faith into such things, but without the huge picture of the whole UK economy in front of me I do find it very hard to judge.

Nooo! Worcswoman, please don't be shy!

I think Greenish was talking about her x-post with me.

Yes Worcs, I meant with Pausing. Sorry, didn't mean to upset you

As far as I can tell, cuts need to be made, all around.

Not according to Nobel-winning economist Paul Krugman, Professor of Economics at Merton College Oxford Simon Wren-Lewis, 2/3 of the economists who make up the Centre for Macroeconomics or the Office for Budget Responsibility - the Treasury's own forecasting body - who have all argued against the Tories' austerity policy.

I'm more inclined to believe them than a history graduate even if he does have a fancy-sounding title, tbh.

Thanks Pausing and Greenish, not upset just a bit clueless with acronyms as a newbie. Ok then..

Basket cuts don't need to be made all round and the present changes are more likely to cause hardship whilst spending more money. For example, those who rent and claim benefits, including the disabled, will soon be on Universal Credit. This will include housing benefit and other in work benefits. Buy to let mortgages often prevent letting to benefit claimants. Insurance premiums are often higher for properties let to benefit claimants. So the availability of affordable housing is thus limited. UC will include in work benefits not currently recognised, reducing availability or increasing rents. Also, it will pay to the claimant not the landlord, putting pressure on the claimant to be good with money and decreasing confidence in the landlord, so putting off landlords renting to ANY benefit claimant. They will be homeless.

The reduction in disability benefit will not mean more doctors or schools.

Basket you make some good points. If you accept that we can't (as a country I mean) keep spending like a drunken sailor, then cuts need to be made. And we are all influenced by our own personal experience - I got very irate when they cut the cancer drugs fund, for example. My friend who tragically had a stillbirth due to poor obstetric care rattles her sabre at those who want to cut back maternity budgets. We are all guilty of it and there are no easy decisions.

It is very difficult to find unbiased commentary on the disability cuts that are the subject of this thread. One side claims that we are overrun with scroungers who only had to twirl a walking stick around to get full DLA/PIP. Another claims that the chronically disabled are being driven to suicide en masse by the cruelty of the new assessments. The average woman on the street without any direct experience of this cannot possibly referree between these extreme viewpoints and decide which is more accurate. I would hope that there was due process and a decent appeal procedure to support those who feel that their case has been assessed unfairly. Equally, as people live longer, it seems logical that the state will have fewer resources to go around and a higher degree of self-sufficiency will be the norm in future, I suspect.

We are happy with th emeasures the Toruies are taking to ensure the country can continue to support the welfare state. You care for the less fortunate by managing money well. Many many of us support the recent changes. You may not think so from mumsnet but we are out ther in vast numbers and will ensure a Tory win next election time too. I also agree with YoungGrown's post above too - we are all going to have to face tough choices as our population ages and particularly given we are the first generation to have worse health than that before us in many respects. It is a whole new world out there.

Worcs - this is what I mean I guess. I want experts running the country and don't care about political parties. When there are diff parties involved, it's hard to be sure it's all being done for the right reasons. Trouble is, I guess without that system then it's hard to police the experts.

Young - I agree. I think as a parent you experience many of the govt spending/cuts first hand starting with NHS and antenatal (or lack of!) care and you start to see the inequalities that exist everywhere from then on - which hospital has money/staff, which GP/Dentist can see your child, which school is least on it's last legs nearby, whether you have the 11+ in your area, cost of uni fees, etc.

Most of the time I am quietly despairing but never sure what I can do about it as, as said above, who the hell can we vote for that has the answers?

The high tax rates were a throw back to the second world war and survived in the 50's and 60's through both labour and conservative governments. The much quoted 98% tax rate in the late 70's was 83% income tax plus an investment income surcharge of 15% on unearned income - this tax wasn't dropped till 1985. The highest rate of income tax was 60% throughout the vast majority of Thatcher's premiership.

Some very famous people paid the 98% tax rate, but far more people would have paid 60% tax. In fact anyone with a salary in the band where their personal allowance is gradually withdrawn will still be paying some tax at 60%. As with many current Tory policies (ppi, academies), withdrawal of personal allowance was a labour policy which has survived through the coalition and under the tories.

Maybe Corbyn will raise taxes to Thatcher level rates, who knows? At this point he hasn't been specific.