Rainbowsandunicorn do u have any idea how hard it is to get benefits? Serious go on some of the Facebook pages of people getting turned down daily when they are extremely ill/disabled or caring for someone who is. The hoops you have to jump through are crazy. The decision makers have targets of turning down 80% of all applicants (ESA example) - that many of the decisions are overturned on appeal matters not to them as not everyone is up to going to appeal so it suits their agenda.
And God forbid it's a mental illness you're claimin for or another invisible illness like ME. They seems to be of the mind that only illnesses that can be seen are acceptable and even then it's not certain.
I have 2 people in my family one is bedridden, one isn't quite bedridden yet but largely housebound due to physical illness/disability BOTH were initially rejected in their claims for pip! That meme doing the rounds on fb of the gravediggers exhuming someone declared 'fit for work' is scarily close to the truth. Hundreds of people declared fit for work have died less than 6 months after the decision was made (and that's not including those committing suicide because of the stress this is all causing. One coroner has this week demanded that the increased suicide rate relating to all this be investigated in a public enquiry).
"plenty of work opportunities for those willing to work."
NO THERE IS NOT!
Even those fit for work are stuffed because THERE AREN'T ENOUGH JOBS! It's all very well telling people to get off their backsides and get a job but I repeat there are FOUR TIMES more people unemployed on jsa (so not inc those disabled or under 22 who could work if their needs were met) than there are jobs advertised and AGAIN those jobs are not all full time living wage.
You're living in cloud cuckoo land. Where I live every time a job is advertised they get hundreds of applicants. Most of the youngsters do or plan to emigrate.
It goes back further than job openings too, the cuts to education both school and post 16 mean the youngsters can't get the qualifications or training they need to be qualified for the jobs and as there are so many applicants it's an employers market so they're not needing to invest in training employees.
As I asked the op of her relative, have you NEVER claimed or been helped by family allowance/child benefit, ssp, smp, tax credits, free healthcare, free education to age 18, subsidised education post 18? I highly doubt it!
As babycham rightly points out the nmw is NOT enough to live on however the tories like to spin it. Not even 1 adult can live on that alone with current housing and fuel prices. Jesus I earned slightly less as a full time waitress in 1990!! That's 27 years ago! Nurses and other public workers haven't had a pay rise in almost 10 years! But mp's never go without they're spending £40 a day on breakfast ffs!
"DH also thinks poor people don't budget properly." I honestly couldn't be with someone like that. The poor ALWAYS knew how to budget, make food go further etc. They've no choice you see it on here the mners who give the best advice on credit crunch threads are the ones who've genuinely struggled at some point. I have a few friends who've never struggled not rich but never worried about where next meal coming from. They are genuinely shocked at what 'the government say is how much you need to live on'. They are lovely people who regularly give their time as well as donations to various charities.
"Plenty of people like zero hour contracts as they suit. Students, second earners, those that want a second job etc."
No people rarely work second jobs out of choice. They do it because they need the money to live on. Students are struggling to find part time jobs that fit round contact hours. Rolling shifts are a particular bug bear of mine. Parents can't change their paid childcare arrangements weekly at 2 days notice! Rolling shifts tend to apply to shops there's absolutely NO reason why employees shouldn't be able to work the shifts that suit their circumstances and NO reason why employers need to be changing which hours people work WEEKLY it's ridiculous. My mum worked in retail for decades and I've worked retail at various points, they are really among the worst treated employees and union membership is heavily discouraged with employees finding they're suddenly dismissed if their union affiliation is discovered (yes illegal but employer just blames employee for several minor infractions or whatever and dismisses them based on that) - sorry digression there.
What tax credits actually allowed is not people having children indiscriminately but employers NOT paying proper wages and instead billionaire owners getting their businesses subsidised by us! Do you really think Asda, Tesco, Argos, even primark can't afford to pay decent wage? Come off it!
"the fact is that housing costs are too high, wages are too low and childcare is expensive."
This with a million bells on! ^
"Ditch all chid related benefits and WTC, put the money into education, social services and free childcare for households where all adults work over thirty hours. Force people to make responsible choices and to ensure any they make they can afford." Oh really? So how would my daughter have been fed, clothed, housed, heated for the last 9 years while I've been too ill to work (I'm sure I would have been better earlier if I wasn't getting a new cpn roughly every 3 months and my Cmht could replace the psychologist that Retired a year ago!! And my medication that worked hadn't become too expensive for nhs to give me so I had to be switched to something else!) and what about the taxis we both need to occasionally take to get to hospital appointments because we both have disabilities that can seriously affect our mobility?!
Jesus - go read Jonathan swifts 'a modern proposal' I'll bet it's right up your street!
"Why not reintroduce workhouses for the poor because of course they deserve it now don't they Rainbow" yes - make poverty a crime eh? Reintroduce debtors prisons too??
Shelters study has shown 37% of families in England are ONE payday away from homelessness. There are people dying of starvation, lack of medication, there are children not going to school because they can't afford basic equipment or transport, there are people committing suicide because they genuinely believe they are a burden to the country and nobody cares. That is NOT the country I want to live in!