Aibu to not know why you wouldn't be able to feed your DC's breakfast?

[Bearlover16]

Daughters school has recently extended the 'paid' breakfast club to 'free' breakfast club due to an increase in the number of children going to school not having had any breakfast.

Are people really that much on the bread line that they cannot buy a loaf of bread or some cheap porridge oats for less than a quid?

I'm not well off by any means and I do donate to food banks when I can. I also ensure my dcs have had breakfast before leaving the house as I was always led to believe it's the most important meal of the day.

*to do anything

I'd love to, but he's a stubborn git who wants to work until he drops. As I also said, there were no full time jobs available, the Job Centre expect you to take the first job that comes up. I am looking for suitable jobs, but I live in London and travelling to interviews is difficult unless they're in the morning. Also, how do I afford suitable interview clothes?

I’m not talking about that cap 🙄

Yellow no, there were no full time jobs available. The rules state that we have to work maximum 30 hours as a couple. I've worked it out and working full time would mean losing so much we now get free, we'd be worse off.

Benefits/low wages are ok, until you've been on them a while and a massive expense pops up. So you scrape the money up, but there's been a mistake with the benefits again. Or you break a tooth as well. Or your child's only shoes break.

You haven't got anything really worth selling because you sold those things already last time you needed cash quick. Been there, done that, still not far off tipping into that spiral again. Luckily lived near an Iceland so we lived off pasta and random cheap frozen stuff. It's really shit to nearly sob with relief because you found a couple quid down the sofa cos you're nearly out of pads, you know.

That's interesting Books, but I'll still have to try and find a full time job, I also worry about the cost of childcare round here.

Wages even IF you get a full time job are not enough to cover the REAL costs of living.

They might JUST cover day-to-day but not

Dentistry
Optical care
Prescription/otc medication
Travel to medical appointments
Unexpected but large expenses like a broken boiler or fridge

And BEFORE some idiot says 'they should save just in case' people on low wage/benefits haven't GOT spare money to save.

Hell even the amount you get as hell toward a fucking FUNERAL if you're bereaved has been cut!!!!

There is no 30 hour a week cap on wtc though. As another poster said you get more for working more.
As admirable as your husbands stance is it is that stance keeping you in poverty. No full time jobs in the whole of the capital. And no clothes. And no interviews unless it’s the morning.
Come on...
by all means stay at home but don’t moan about the lifestyle it brings you if you can change it.

That's true Schadenfreude, our rent is ridiculous, and we still have to pay £33 a month of it. WTC doesn't even cover the bills, yet we're supposed to find £9 per week dinner money out of it. Even worse is the holidays, as buying food to make lunch every day is much more expensive. Today I had to buy the DC new wellies, I know that later in the week I'll be making ultra cheap meals as I'll be lucky if I can make the money stretch until Saturday. It doesn't help that DS2's bladder shows no sign of maturing and he's still in Dry Nites.

That's true DaisyRaine, unless I got a very well paid job, we're better off staying on WTC.

people's priorities are just in the wrong places! some people prefer half an hour longer in bed than feeding their kids

EvilDoctor I can't quite follow why you can't find work in London, of all places? If your husband works only 20 hours a week and your children are school-aged, why are you only free for morning interviews?

Well congratulations wannabe, do you want a badge? DS1 is 27, also has a terminal illness and is too ill to leave the house, never mind work.

I would love to swap roles, but I've yet to find a job that would pay our rent and childcare.

There are no full time jobs that I could do, that would mean I have enough money to pay rent and childcare, that have hours where I would see DH and DC occasionally. I don't have interview clothes. Can I show up in jeans that are splitting at the seams? The interviews have to be in the morning so I can pick my DC up. London's a big place. Even going to the nearest place with any decent shops, I've nearly been late to pick them up.

Honestly, another reason is, if DH was the primary carer, I think that DS2's behaviour would get worse.

If you can't find work in London of any kind then you aren't looking hard enough. However being picky about hours and will certainly curtail it,

You can't need that much childcare if your DH only works part time.

Moaning about the costs of feeding children you choose to have though is awful, they didn't ask to be born or have parents that work little.

@EvilDoctorBallerinaVampireDuck so you have an older child in the house too who could be around whilst your working.
You are making crappy excuses for not doing your bit.
And you can all you like. I had chemo Wednesday, am off for first four rounds as a teacher then back. I need to pay rent, bills, get highest rate DLA (as you must times x2) and help. We all have to do our bit. Your just being lazy. Twenty hours from 2 people.... back at you

Why can’t you do twilight shifts at Tesco etc when dp gets in?
And yes I would like a medal at the moment.

I don't get this either people can't afford to feed their kids and food banks my daughter is on benefits has 2 children has a car children go without nothing she also has a horse if she can afford to do it why can't anyone eles

The level of vicious ignorance on this thread demonstrates pretty clearly why this country is so fucked.
Wages have been stagnant for years while housing costs rocketed - the selling off of council housing was one of the most damaging policies ever invented because it was designed to harm the poor. If it had been set up so that the money the council got from selling some homes had to be re-invested in providing more, it would actually have been a really good thing. Councils were actually forbidden to use the funds raised for more housing - the idea was to push poor people further and further away from city centres. Big banks treating mortgages like gambling chips caused the property boom.

Add to that the fact that essential work is hugely undervalued and the rights of those who do it being progressively eroded, while the government's answer to everything continues to be: take money FROM the poor and give it to the rich and, yes, you end up with a situation where children are starving.

I don't get this either people can't afford to feed their kids and food banks my daughter is on benefits has 2 children has a car children go without nothing she also has a horse if she can afford to do it why can't anyone eles

Bully for her!

There are some very smug people on here as well as vicious ones.

"If X can do this, then everybody should be able to"

Well, Life isn't like that. I don't know how your daughter can afford the things she has. Maybe she is fiddling her benefits, or has a generous boyfriend, or her children's father makes sure that his kids are okay , or she has a job on the side, or sells stuff on etsy, or does palm reading - how would I know?

But I do know, because I have seen it, that there ARE people - good people - who work all the hours God sends and only just manage to pay the bills, or who are scraping by on benefits without a penny to spare for necessities, never mind luxuries.

Maybe your daughter is a very good manager and if so, good luck to her - but she is the exception rather than the rule.

I personally don't know anyone on benefits who can afford to keep a horse and I also think if she has that much money she shouldn't be getting benefits at all! It is people like her who give the Daily Mail ammunition to say that benefit claimants are living the life of Riley.

It is NOT a cushy option. Iy is a way of punishing people for not being able to work.

Anyone who has a car and a horse isn't on benefits. You cant keep a horse on £60 a week plus child allowance.

Tbf ctcs, is, etc, come to more than that.

@SchadenfreudePersonified I completely agree with you. Good people who work long hours doing shitty jobs and get top ups and struggle to survive.
It just annoys me- the same as when I watch the goady ch5 ‘benefit bollocks’ when people complain that their lives are so terrible and their children don’t have things and yet will literally do nothing to change their circumstances.
I will reserve my sympathy for those that do bloody try.

suzy your daughter is on benefits and has a horse? We don't even have a car or our own house.

wannabe no he lives with my mum.