To think the benefit cap is going to plunge families into poverty

[Firsttheworst]

Next month the benefit cap comes in. It sets out the maximum that can be claimed in a week across all benefits. This doesn't include disability or wtc. Its aimed purely at women (mostly) claiming income support. You can only claim income support if you have a child under 5 and don't work.

The benefit cap is in the government owns words designed to get IS claimants out to work. The cap is currently £500 and will be reduced to £384 a week.

This includes, housing benefit, CT benefit, tax credits, income support. So all in total cannot be more than £384 a week. Over a 30 day month that comes to £1645.

From that £1645 I need to pay

rent £900 a month (no I can't move, its impossible to rent on benefits as it is, not giving this house up and its below market rent as it is)

CT - £60 a month

Electricity £80

Oil £80

Diesel £ 120 (rural don't drive anywhere other than school runs and supermarket/town once or twice a week)

Car insurance £49

Car tax £19.99

Phone/internet £40 (thats a basic mobile and broadband)

House insurance £13

TV licence £11

That leaves 272 a month to pay for food, clothes, car breakdown, school trips, birthdays, miscellaneous and god knows what else. For one adult and 3 children.

AIBU to think that the government have just decided that if they starve us out for long enough we'll be forced to go out and find a job? Like I said rural area so jobs are rarer than hens teeth and believe me i'm looking. It is pure discrimination against single mothers with small children (i doubt many men claim income support)

So you'd like a job? Well go out and find one? We all had to!

Childcare? Well yes, sort that out too.... you'll need to juggle, but it's doable

Affordable? These child carers need paying you know? A fair wage..... or do you expect 'someone else' to pay that too?

I think the OP has said she is trying to resolve her situation though, and she faces some obstacles, so I think it unkind and rather unfair to admonish her for not trying hard enough.

No I am not but I will be the one sorting out drop offs and pick ups for the dcs because dh has his own business so works very long hours.

Needs- haha! I most certainly have worked in schools, in fact for my whole career and still do. That's how I know lots of people work in schools as it suits school hours for their dcs.

If there's a gap in rural areas for childcare perhaps OP could be a childminder.

Lots of people would like to live in or close to London, but we can't afford to so live elsewhere in the country!

My first job was in London, and I loved living there. However after 2 years I realised that on a teachers salary I would never be able to afford a decent place to live on my own, so I left London.

Incidentally, after tax I earn £500 a week, for about 60 hours. And no, I don't get any benefits, nor would I expect to.

Thank you Didijustgetwinkpointshitcanned

I am not sure why everyone is advising the OP to move when it won't gain her any money

Dawndonnaagain the gentleman I'm thinking of has no arms and no legs, do you think he hasn't been depressed or had mental health issues ?
I have no doubt there are exceptions but I also bet there's plenty could do with getting themselves something to do which would increase their self esteem
As I said, please do not use your friends with disabilities to bash another group. You can bet all you like, but actually you have no idea. None. Nada. We're not all paralympians and some of us are trying to live quietly in our own heroic way. At the moment, getting out of bed and getting dressed each day is my goal. That's heroic enough for me, and as you have no idea what got me to this point, you have no idea regarding anybody else with a disability.

OP - no judging from me as I'm in the same boat. Only I have 4DC (2 at school, 1 age 3 and 1 age 1).

My rent is substantially lower than yours (£400/month) as I have a HA house.

I decided to apply for every job with suitable hours - went to two interviews and got both. I've gone for a 16 hour cleaning job (4 mornings a week after school run).
It's not my ideal job and not what I spent 4 years at uni for but hey ho life changes!

I'll earn £120/week and pay out £200/week childcare and I'm still better off than on Income Support.

It's really scary and it's a lot of money to lose but you can do something about it.

My back up plan was to apply for a Discretionary Housing Payment - get the forms together and get your last couple of months bank statments.

Oh and sorry to a past poster - I do have an abusive ex

OP - not sure if you read my post at 18:28? Just wondering if you acted on one of the letters ( some areas also received phone calls) and went to your Jobcentre to see what they could do for you? Also, do you have twice yearly meetings at the Jobcentre and, if so, do you receive helpful support?

It will 'gain' her money if she's going to work, as she won't be saddled with crippling rent.

Well hopefully the op has had some helpful suggestions - going back to uni if you passed that access course I would suggest would be bloody brilliant - nearly £10,000 a year in loans/grants on top of anything you're currently getting and at the end of the three years your self esteem should be boosted too - can't see any disadvantages there.

I tell you what always grinds me on these threads - a presumption of a them and us. As if the vast majority of claimants have never worked or put into the pot previously when the opposite will be true.

It's utter crap.

Benefits were brought in to help people in dire straights, not a lifestyle choice so as you can have internet access and a phone and car. Goodness me, what's the world coming to, if you can't afford a car, don't have one. There must be buses? Lots of people can't afford cars or internet access, and yet have to pay for yours in their taxes? As others have said, if you can't afford the high rent in your area, you will need to move somewhere cheaper, or find good employment and pay for childcare like everybody else.

I have several disabilities, never stopped me working. But caring for my children's disabilities has. And many people who I worked with were unable to work (or live independantly) because of their disabilities
Just because I could work despite all my disabilities doesn't mean I expect everyone can. Anyone who does is stupid.

Yes keepTrudging, so in a few years when she's been working her way up and established a bit she can save up the money needed to move. But posters here are suggesting she do it RIGHT NOW even though she'll gain nothing and it will cost a huge amount of money she doesn't have

Mumz, what a patronising load of crap.

In fact to maintian a basic standard of living a family is assumed to have a car and internet access.

Busses are very rare in rural areas, unreliable and often expensive. In my mother's not so rural area of county Durham, children don't recieve subsidy for travel to school so the OP might expect to spend between £30 and £40 a week just on the school run. Which as a cost would add up to £120 a month, without having to factor in shopping, other travel costs etc.

Benefits weren't just designed to keep people in dire straights, they were designed to enable them to continue to engage with society.

Benefits were brought in to help people in dire straights, not a lifestyle choice so as you can have internet access
This is a boringly tired trope. Internet access is an essential if you have school aged children.
Internet Access is an essential if you are on JSA.
Your taxes are not there to bash other people with.

The cuts to benefits are a political point scorer - designed to make the working poor resent those on benefits seemingly taking it in whilst they work their arsed off for a pittance. It's just divide and rule. £384 would be enough for a family of 4 to live on without any help if they had cheap housing costs. U fortunately the right to buy scheme means we have a severe shortage of affordable housing and people are forced to rent expensive private rental properties. £900 is more than I pay for my mortgage and if DH lost his job we would not get any )or very very little) help towards our mortgage so we would probably be worse off than the OP. However, I still have my concerns about the benefit cap because at the end of the day it is likely to be the children that will suffer. There are some areas where perhaps the OP could cut her monthly outgoing snit there are other families who will be affected by the benefit cut who won't have anything they can cut. What about the woman who has five children and could manage without any benefits when she was with her husband but having left his abusive arse she can't afford to pay her rent and feed her children die to the benefit cap? There are lots of scenarios where people will be affected and can't necessarily change things instantly to financially improve their situation.

Do all these people bashing the benefit recipient but on low wages too realise that they get more from the state than they pay in?

Yes you too are a burden on society, yet your lack of empathy is staggering.

If there's a gap in rural areas for childcare perhaps OP could be a childminder

Bingo!!

Now someone mention the bloody chicken

Whose everyone else?
Lots of people don't work because after childcare it costs them to work.
I don't think somebody who does this is better than a SP not working and receiving benefits, far from it.
They are choosing to work for nothing, some even complain they have to work, so what Maths are these then?
We all make our choices and decision in life, some know during late teens what they want to do and go to uni. They make their choice of lifestyle, meet someone with the same values, hopefully.
For some it goes to plan, for others things go wrong.
What sort of society doesn't want to support people when it all goes wrong.
I'm pretty sure OP didn't plan this when she was younger.

Noooooooo not the chicken 😂😩

Smallfox

you put it so much better.

going back to uni if you passed that access course I would suggest would be bloody brilliant - nearly £10,000 a year in loans/grants on top of anything you're currently getting and at the end of the three years your self esteem should be boosted too - can't see any disadvantages there.

No.

The grants/ loans replace the HB and Income Support.

That's all been thrashed out (with links and evidence) on MN before.

My DH was working full time to earn that and pay for everything for our family of four along with prescriptions opticians school lunches (I'm back at work now) house etc.
I didn't bleat about it.

Matching, £60/day van hire. Credit union v low interest loan for deposit. The alternative is OP continues to stay in housing she can't afford, which leaves her unable to work, and unable to save. Move now to somewhere where she doesn't need a car, that's an instant £300/month saving (between petrol/insurance/upkeep). Somewhere with childcare, and lower rent, plus no car costs, makes working possible, even worthwhile.