To think the abortion rate will increase after April this year?

[RocketQueenP]

When the new rules on tax credits / universal credit come in ie when no one can claim benefit be it top up or otherwise for any more than 2 children

Sadly I am helping a good friend cope who has just had an early abortion, she did not plan the pregnancy and one of the main reasons is she and her DH are low earners/ They already have 2 at school, and won't be able to afford to have this baby. She is devastated and has admitted they could have squeezed another DC in if it wasn't for the new rules. I think this will happen a lot. :(

In times gone by people would adopt out children that were unplanned that they couldn't afford and I really feel that this is what we are headed back to. Not adoption but, you get my drift

I also think the government fully know this and its one of the reasons they have brought it in. Simple population control

Eric I have no words for your post. You are disgusting.

Erica I haven't reported your post because I want others to see it and be able to possibly help you learn that what you think demonstrates that you are a very very stupid person.

Wow, some really nasty posts on this thread. Oh life is as simple as perfectly happy couples deciding to have more children than they can afford, eh?

Well what about situations like I've had where my so called dp left me when I was pregnant with dc3? She's nearly 8 now and I've tried to get the CSA to chase him but he's now left the uk.

Fuck off Eric troll and when you get there fuck off again

'If a child has a disability and the parents are able to claim tax credits, the tax credits are boosted a lot.'

No, that is not correct. It's only if your child is severely disabled.

I hate the insinuation that children cost a shit ton of money. Clothes are transferable no matter the sex, it's in trend for girls to wear more masculine stuff etc. Plus you can go to charity clothes banks that will kit you out of you really can't afford the cheapest Primark clothes.

Apart from clothes, the next important thing a child needs is food, if you can establish BF that's free. Instead of a monster pushchair you can baby wear. Then there's love and care.

I agree it'll stop people thinking motherhood can be a long term career plan paid by the government. Although I'd say it's a small percentage that think this way.

The biggest failing in modern generations is the whole entitlement thing, before tax credits came along people managed to parents and 'cut their coat according to the cloth!' That's going to be a valuable lesson for many.

To suggest they'll add a new box - aborting because unfinancially viable due to Tory cuts, is a bit macabre. I hope people put more value on human life than how much money said life is worth.

Elvish before tax credits came along, most people could afford to buy a house (before the housing boom) and energy and food did not cost what it does today.

Minimum wage jobs simply do not cover the cost of living.

And I agree with the poster above who says that in reality most people don't pay enough tax to cover their own expenses anyway. The 3% of highest earners in the UK pay over 50% of revenue. Most of these are bankers. Go figure...

I do think it's terrible that men are not required to support their children when they move on and earn more. I have a good friend who gets zero from her exH because he moved in with his GF and got her pregnant plus adopted her two kids from a previous relationship. I don't think he should have been allowed to adopt those kids. Pay for your own kids first before you take on others.

She is now working FT hours as a teacher and tutors kids on the weekend to make enough to keep their home with 3 DC and her parents help her out a lot during the holidays. She totally relies on tax credits though. She is someone who needs to be supported but I think the support should start with the father of the DC not the government. Personally I would love that arse of a man to pay at least 25% of his income on supporting his kids.

Elvish Raising a family costs a whole lot more than most people realize. Take housing and childcare costs. We live in the US and the costs for us each year are about £50k a year. We live in a 2 bed apartment with 3 kids all aged 5 and under.

It's all fine and dandy to say you can cut your cloth but the reality is that very few working parents earn enough to cover two kids in childcare.

That isn't supposed to be a stealth boast at all. That's what we spend on a post tax basis and it's an obscene amount. It's our choice and we pay for it all ourselves. Just think though, how many couples can afford those kinds of overheads? Do we want a society with no kids? Look at Japan. It isn't working out too well for them is it?

Has anyone considered that motherhood is a long term career goal that the goverment SHOULD help with?

Id say that bringing up humsns is a very important job and more likely to be done well with financial support!

I think we live in a society whuch is bevoming increasingly mean spirited. The cuts arent helping and oeople are counting everg penny and resenting putting it into a pot.

The middle classes can hardly conceal their vontemot gor the working classes/ lower classes. Middle class families have generally 2 kids.

It's this horrid hollier than thou / dog eat dog attitude that gets to me.

Contempt even

I bet there would be enough money go round if the super rich shared.

Oh come on, we live in a country where contraception is so widely available, I don't think you can say terminations will rise. Yes there will always be contraceptive failures but often these are exacerbated by poor user method or choice, especially the pill which has an approx 1:100 failure. If more people moved to LARC choices, failure rate and unplanned pregnancy would be much reduced - see below

*Long-active reversible contraceptive (LARC) methods**

Contraceptive injections: more than 99% effective. They last for 8 or 12 weeks, depending on the type of injection. Less than 1 woman in 100 will get pregnant in a year when using contraceptive injections.
Contraceptive implants: more than 99% effective. They work for three years but can be taken out earlier. Less than 1 woman in 100 will get pregnant over three years when using contraceptive implants.
Intrauterine system (IUS): more than 99% effective. An IUS normally works for five years but can be taken out earlier. Less than 1 woman in 100 will get pregnant over five years when using an IUS.
Intrauterine device (IUD): more than 99% effective. An IUD can stay in place for 5 to 10 years depending on the type, but can be taken out at any time. Less than 1 woman in 100 will get pregnant in a year, depending on the type of IUD. Older types of IUD are less effective.

What do they do with people who have to work unsocial hours (like me?)

In Finland at least they have subsidised round-the-clock childcare for shift workers etc. That would work out cheaper than paying higher tax credits so people can pay nannies plus then the quality of the childcare can be assured (very high quality here) but of course, knowing the Tories, they'd let unqualified teenagers run the childcare on a pittance.

'We couldn't have known we'd be made redundant'.

Sure, but people who are risk-averse figure this possibility into their plans and in the absence of independent wealth have small families. Three children is a big, risky number in my view. I have two and would have felt uncomfortable with the leap to three.

Got my tax statement yesterday. Off the top of my head I paid about £3,250 towards welfare and about £3,050 for NHS. Think education was a shade over a £1000, something else was a touch over a £1000 too, whittling down to about £110 for the EU. All in a little pie chart.

Never had welfare, rarely use the NHS and often have private healthcare. DD has needed MH support recently and it has cost more than £4000 (the NHS/CAMHS refused NHS support). Both DC educated privately.

DH and I work full time. I conceived instantly for every pregnancy (a lot of miscarriages) and have never been pregnant unintentionally.

I don't think I'll ever get back what I've paid in. DH certainly won't.

I think it's reasonable to limit tax credits to two children. If people can't afford three then they shouldn't be subsidised to have three and should in 2017 prevent getting pregnant with a third. There's MAP for contraceptive failures too.

This issue has utterly divided the nation and fascinates us all. It's one reason the current Government was elected as even amongst Labour supporters most of these changes were something more people than not support. It is the concept that families obtaining no tax credits where both parents work full time limit their family size to what they can afford and those they pay for don't that really sets out the issue. I think most of us know some people are unemployed for only up to a year before getting back to full time work under the statistics so benefits for them tend to be a temporary thing which no one resents them having and ditto people who just need to get on their feet after a disaster. It is where we draw the line that is difficult.

I don't agree there is no way to avoid babies. I wasn't a single mother because I didn't have sex until I graduated with a law degree. By the way that was not difficult. Now some people will say there are a massive number of young women who are raped where the rape causes pregnancy but it is not a huge number.

I have more children than two but I don't get even child benefit never mind tax credits and certainly not housing benefit.

I certainly would support house building in cities where there are jobs and not enough housing in commuting distance (there are plenty of cheap houses all over the country where there are not many jobs). Government unused land could be available to any private citizen who wanted it to build a house or flat on for example. There are loads of those sites around.

"I think we live in a society whuch is bevoming increasingly mean spirited. The cuts arent helping and oeople are counting everg penny and resenting putting it into a pot"

Speaking for myself I have no problem with wealth redirection. I want the poor to have better housing, education, childcare and healthcare.

But I don't want people to be financially incentivised to have large families when they are on low wages or not working. And the previous benefits system DID make having large numbers of children without any external means of support manageable. I know a number of families with 5+ children. Except in relation to one very large family where the parents have a strong relationship, parent as a team and the father works full-time, all these families are struggling and are trapped on benefits. All of the women will be living in poverty when their children grow up because none have worked or contributed to a pension.

It's wrong. Money should be spent to raise people out of poverty and benefits dependency, not trap them in it.

Maybe more planning than fewer abortions. I am of the view that people can have as many kids as they want, if they can pay for them.

I am really uncomfortable with this policy for a number of reasons.

1. Women who have bee raped will be able to get tax credits for third or subsequent children BUT they will have to prove that they have been raped to do so. It will be awful for women to have to explain to multiple agencies, including the tax credits office, that her child was the result of a rape in order that she can have enough money to care for their children. And what if she isn't believed?

1. Forced pregnancies - a form of abuse that will now leave women financially more trapped than ever before with their abusers.

1. Peoples circumstances can change and no amount of financial planning can account for those changes in everyone's circumstances. Insurances only pay out for a definitive period.

1. The benefit cap already addressed the issue of issue of large families being totally reliant on benefits as they wont get more money for having more children. Therefore this policy really targets the working poor. It would be better to tackle low wages, high housing and utility costs as tackling those things will benefit all low paid workers rather than penalising just those with 3+ children.

1. The policy might encourage some larger families to work more (in particular encouraging both parents to be working instead of one being SAHP) but if they are on reasonably low incomes we will likely ending paying more to subsidise them I'm

Childcare costs than we currently do by supporting one to be a sahp.

1. It really is just divide and rule politics. It happened when they stopped higher earners from being able to claim child benefit (which I was also against).

Have we found a source on whether this will affect new benefits claimants with more than two children born prior to this April? (Sorry if I've missed it upthread.)
The only things I can find online seem to be saying that this will not be the case for the first year. Which rather implies that after that year any new claimants will be treated under the two child rule, whenever their children were born?

On this issue of cleverness and benefits...

I've lived in the cities mentioned my whole adult life; there are academics who get top up tax credits. Most won't (quite) qualify because two academics working FT (which is invariably what happens in this neck of the woods) would earn just over the threshold with a few year seniority (from running the numbers roughly). And they are the kind of people who can take on some extra work at a high enough rate to pay for that 3rd child they want. I got pregnant unexpectedly (yes, contraception failure!) with DD1 when newly married - DH and I were both pursuing grad studies. We both took on extra work so we could afford to be parents; he did private tutoring on Saturdays and I edited thesis in the evenings.

I guess my point is that people who have had a higher level of education have more choices, in general. Policies like these disproportionately affect those who already have the fewest choices in our society.

In the future only the rich will be able to have large families. Social engineering. They don't want the 'oinks' out breeding the elite?