Skint Britain: Friends without Benefits on C4

[amrscot]

Is anybody else watching this?

One of the couples take their dog out to hunt rabbits and squirrels that they can eat.

They've just shown him with a dead rabbit he has caught skinning it in the kitchen

Horrendous..

@Ummaybenot. I understand what you are saying and I appreciate that it must grate to see the life that your SIL is living, but ask yourself what is a fair system? Everyone gets a tenner a week each regardless of circumstances?
I think this is what the government is trying to put a stop to, however to go about it in such an inhumane way is shocking. I'm led to understand that it was rolled out in Hartlepool as a pilot scheme and has been put off being rolled out nationally due to it being a failure.
Having a disabled man sobbing and pleading on the phone is sickening. No one should be reduced to that, whatever their circumstances.
The problem lays I think, is the government placing everyone under the same umbrella. Ian Duncan Smith once famously said that everyone can live on 7 quid a week. That's true......until you need to pay your bills, your shoes have holes in them or you need to spend that weeks 7 quid on bus fares.
He wanted everyone to be working, which is a nice ideal if that's possible, however for the chronically sick and severely disabled it's not possible. Not a problem for the government though, we will just starve them all to death, that will get rid of the problem.
He's another one who talks out of his well padded privileged arse.
I don't know what the answer is, but degrading and inhumane treatment isn't one of them.

Of course, the other reason for cutting benefits and banging on about 'hard work' is that the wealthy minority want cheap labour. One of the motivations behind the Brexit campaigners was the desire to get rid of nasty Europe-backed inconveniences like workplace health and safety regulations, minimum wages and so on. A lot of wealthy, powerful people are very keen on the idea of a large pool of desperate, hungry, penniless people who can be coerced into working for shit pay and accepting all kinds of mistreatment and unreasonable demands from employers as their only alternative is starvation.
Of course, this is terrible economics as well as profoundly unethical, but right-wing billionaires don't seem to be able to understand that.

I don't think they will be happy until they've gone back to the working conditions of 1810, complete with work houses and lunatic asylums for the insane poor @ Reanimated SGB.

My SIL has 4 kids.
So your brother is supporting here with regular payments then? Or are they together and he works?

Lives in a very large council house
So you'd rather they be what? Homeless? Living in private and paying someone's mortgage instead of paying local authority?

has been abroad every year for 3 years
Credit cards, your brother paid, her parents paid, she paid for a cheap holiday weekly etc.

Goes out a lot.
So people that don't work rent allowed out?

The 3 oldest kids all got a brand new Xbox for Xmas EACH.
What did your brother give them? How do you know how the Xboxes were paid for? How do you know which model they were? How do you know how much they cost or here they came from?

She has never worked a day in her life for the 13 years I've known her.
You mean she's never been employed and gave her time in exchange for payment. Cause I guarantee, with 4 kids, she's worked harder than most.

Her 2 year old gets free childcare... Why?
How anyone can justify that I'll be interested to hear!
All 2 year olds can get free childcare if their parents don't earn enough. It food for the parent to get a break and it's good for the child to socialise.

But again, let's really think about and engage your brain a little.

SIL gets maximum Benefit, 384.62 a week from DWP.
Made up of:
Child benefit at around £65 a week ish (£20 for first child, £15 ish for the other 3)
Income support (which most parents of under 5s get until childs 5th birthday) of £73 a week
Housing benefit £246 a week for her council mansion

Child benefit, don't count that cause everyone can get that.

That leaves £319ish a week of housing and income support.
multiplied by 4 weeks makes £1276 a month.

So DWP give her £1276 a month.
Now for the complicated maths sort of bit.
How much do you reckon it would cost the DWP if she went to work full time to stop judgemental asshats looking down their nose at her?

She'd need child care before and after school for 4 kids, child care through the holidays. She'd lose housing benefit because of wages but she'd be claiming Universal Credit which has replaced working tax credits and child tax credits etc.

So conservative estimates:
4 kids, 3 hours childcare daily say £5 an hour £15 per kid, £60 per day = £300 a week, £1200 a month.
Of which DWP will pay 85% so around £1020 during school term.
(£5 per hour per kid for 8 hours X 5 days a week is much... Much more.. but we'll ignore that for this example)

Then universal credit top ups on top which is hard to calculate without running a benefit calculator..

But in the old working tax averages:
£2000 basic element
£2000 single parent element
£800 working 30hour element

£4800 a year or £400 a month.

So money from DWP:
£1276 not working (not including child benefit. Not including administration on DWP side. Not including council tax benefit)
Vs
£1420 for working (not including housing element which could add hundreds. Not including child benefit either. Not including the cost of administration on DWP side. Not including council tax benefit or reduction)

This is based on very cheapest childcare and very average payments etc.

Better for tax payer she stays home in her mansion.

I think a lot of people don't view the long term unemployed as human or the same level of human as they are. It's not necessarily out of malice. It's a security blanket. They'll never have to survive on benefits because they aren't one of those types of sub-humans. They don't need to worry about homelessness or hunger or poverty because they're not one of those people. They work hard and we all know hard work cures all.

What they don't realise is how easy it is to become one of those people. I had a good job once. I was assistant manager of a hotel on a good wage with a good career progression. I gave it up when I met my ex-H, a niace, middle-class property owner with a good job. I didn't give up work, I moved to be with him and went into bar management and then I got pregnant. We could afford for me not to work. Ex-H owned two properties and had a good career. I was so far away from being one of those people at the bottom I never had to think about how those people manage until I questioned ex-H's alcoholism and his ability to care for our six year old while he was pissed up. He kicked me out, transferred his properties to his sister's name so he didn't have to pay as much maintenance, ditto his inheritance and took a part time job with a pay cut. I became one of those people overnight and have struggled to get back on my feet ever since.

The Conservatives support a welfare state and do not want anyone dead. Time after time people suggest there is some agenda to kill people who are long term and on benefits. That is definitely not anyone's agenda. People just want a fairer welfare state and on the whole tend to be very much behind the reforms.

@weetinkermonkey
Its not my brothers wife, it's my husband's sister
She is single
She has no help from her parents
She boasts regularly that she gets £2000 a month benefits
She moans that the council aren't replacing her shabby looking kitchen quick enough, or replacing doors that her kids have kicked in fast enough.
The xboxes were brand new, she brags about everything.
She goes on holiday with her mates and their kids, all of which are in the same situation
And course she's allowed out, but every weekend shows she isn't living in poverty I'm afraid.
She is one example of many i know who are in similar situations! She has said to us she will never work as it won't pay her to.

She's lying. No way does she get £2k a month.

I watched this and cried .
But this situation is nothing new.
My first job in UK when I moved from US was a Council post.In 1989, the year of Poll Tax , so 30 years ago. I had no idea of the implications of this , coming from US with a Wall Street boom background .
Until I had to deal with people .There were pensioners , who had gone through WWII having to choose between food and heat or paying this Tax And face being fined if they didn't .Anyone 18 and over in a household had to pay , so of you were a household of Mum,Dad , say 2 adult kids at home in a terraced house thay previously had rates of £150 per year , you now had to find £300 EACH so £1200.The only people who benefited from this was the people in large homes, ie the wealthy.
You could bet certain exemptions if you were on Income Support or Unemployment Benefit.But the day you started a job, you were liable for everything straight away.including HB which was almost always paid direct to landlord And you might not get paid for a month.We had the discretion. to spread it out a "benefit claw back " but only if you asked for it . And some just struggled because they didn't know this.
Remember how the UK got the Poll Tax repealed ? Action - people simply refused to pay and even rioted.
But this UC is in my opinion, the worst thing ever.It hits at the most vulnerable , the weak,the young, the disabled .I too, would probably self medicate with drink , drugs or tobacco to get through my life.Nobody 's ambition in life was ever to live in grinding poverty. And that is the terrible society to live in. God help England

Considering the benefits cap is £1769 a month inside of London and that includes housing benefit it's impossible for the SIL to get 2k a month unless she's working part-time and therefore not subject to the benefit cap or unless one of her children is disabled, so somewhere along the line Ummaybebot is not telling the whole picture.

To whoever commented on the take away thing and explained the effects that starvation can have on food choices thank you.

I had a difficult childhood and spend a lot of it hungry or starving due to my mothers complicated MH issues. We were on benefits and I’m thankful every day for the benefits system that allowed me to have some semblance of a childhood. Although I am well off now as an adult, educated, and in a generally secure position with housing. The lasting effects of poverty effect my actions specially surrounding food. When you don’t know when your next meal will be, self control surrounding things like take away is very hard to deal with. I have been there, dragged out in the middle of the night waiting for the clock to strike 12 so my mum can withdraw benefits. Running to the local take away and feeling the warmth of a portion of chips in your belly. The day of your mum getting paid and she buys you a chocolate bar from the shop. I recognised those same feelings of excitement and comfort watching them order a take away. Yet people still judge.

Poverty can really mess you up, ask anyone who’s experienced it. I cannot understand where the people’s compassion has gone. Everyone is brainwashed so they ignore the real enemy, the large tax dodging corporations and evil tories changing the country so only the elite benefit. Not the local single mother in the council house digging into their child’s money box again so they can get a loaf of bread.

The Conservatives support a welfare state and do not want anyone dead. Time after time people suggest there is some agenda to kill people who are long term and on benefits. That is definitely not anyone's agenda.

Ok, if you believe that, tell me...
After the first 1000 people that died due to Universal Credit, why didn't they stop it?
Go Google "number of Deaths due to Universal credit"
Then pop on back and let us know why the conservatives are continuing with it.

People just want a fairer welfare state and on the whole tend to be very much behind the reforms.
No, people don't want a fairer welfare state. Read this very thread.
They want people with less than them to have even less than that.
They have some misguided and blinkered view that starvation and homelessness is a cure for unemployment.
They resent people getting £1500 from.tax money and think nothing of the MPs claiming £1000s in nonsense expenses, think nothing of wealthy MPs owning properties that they then rent out and get housing benefit for and do nothing to keep rental prices down... Funny that.

People don't want fairer, if they did, they'd actually research the welfare state and know what they're talking about.

@Aprilshowersarecomingsoon my thoughts exactly. Smoking yet saying, they are skint is one of the things that pisses me off. Stop smoking then and buy food.

She is single
So is probably getting maintenance of some sort.

She has no help from her parents
She must be getting help from someone though even in the form of babysitting otherwise she wouldn't be going out.

She boasts regularly that she gets £2000 a month benefits
We've already established that's bullshit, see PP with the benefit calculations. She'd be getting c.£1200 a month excluding child benefit. The only way she could be getting more is if someone in her household has a disability in which case she'd get disability premiums on some of her benefits and - as you already stated - you don't begrudge benefits to disabled people.

She moans that the council aren't replacing her shabby looking kitchen quick enough, or replacing doors that her kids have kicked in fast enough.
Councils have service level agreements that they have to meet. If the kitchen is so shabby that it needs replacing then it really must need replacing otherwise they wouldn't do the work, usually kitchens and bathrooms are done in batches as a mass update to their existing housing stock. Kicked in doors don't get replaced for free unless it's the result of a crime against the tenant. The council will replace them but will charge for the work so, again, someone is bullshitting.

The xboxes were brand new, she brags about everything.
Presuming they weren't a gift from the father I would put money on them being from Bright House, a catalogue (e.g., Very), or Provident loan or a combination of all three.

She goes on holiday with her mates and their kids, all of which are in the same situation. And course she's allowed out, but every weekend shows she isn't living in poverty I'm afraid.
If she doesn't have much money then why begrudge her what pleasures she does have? She's a single parent. It's grinding and unending, she deserves a break from the kids. For the holidays I would imagine they'll be shopping around for deals, taking advantage of free child places, less popular hotels, and if there are a few of them they probably get a group discount. And of course there's always credit, never underestimate how easy it is to get credit you can't afford and then more credit to help cover the original credit. Nights out are as expensive as you make them, plenty of places have offers on if you know where to go such as buy two glasses of wine and get the rest of the bottle free, doubles for the price of singles, etc.

You really don't like her, do you?

Her 2 year old gets free childcare... Why?

The nursery places for two year olds aren't childcare. They're restricted hours (usually three hours a day, Monday to Friday) and term time only because it's for early years education.

It's to improve education and socialisation outcomes for children in households that are classed as disadvantaged. Obviously the government can't visit every household to see who talks to their kids, who is reading with them, who is playing with them, etc so they used criteria based around statistical data. Any two year old from a household who meets these criteria is entitled to fifteen hours of free early years education.

Are you really begrudging a small child a few hours at nursery school?

www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/benefits-sanction-resulted-in-my-brother-david-clapson-s-death-says-gill-thompson-as-she-pleads-for-a6911386.html

I often think of this man. He is one of many horrific stories behind sanctions and austerity but his story is the one that stays with me.

How anyone can say the party who created sanctions and still defend them after the death of this poor man cares about welfare is beyond me.

@WeeTinkerMonkey

Thank you for the information you have provided. Excellent posts.
I'm sick of people not bothering to find out the difficulties people who are in receipt of benefits face.
I spent many years struggling to manage as a single parent many years ago and was unaware that I could get help. To think people would be happy I had that struggle rather than claim benefits is sickening.

I agree @Frequency. How anyone can lack the basic compassion is beyond me.
MP's are claiming thousands in expenses ( duck house anyone? ) on top of their salaries, yet the poor of society are being ridiculed and humiliated.
As I said up thread, are we living in a communist country?
Why don't we just bloody round them all up into a massive cage where the more affluent members of society can throw crusts of bread at them while jeering!!

MPs expenses claims...

Which they get on top of their wages..

And people moan about a poor fucker getting less than £1000 to pay all their bills.

And if anyone is wondering, MPs are paid £77000 a year basic.
Of which they dont pay for travel, staff, second homes.. thats all covered by expenses.

And people moan about a poor fucker getting less than £1000 to pay all their bills.

And that's without the income from the other pies they've got their hands in @ WeeTinkerMonkey.

Her 2 year old gets free childcare... Why?

To try nad break the cycle so that the 2 year old will have a better future.

Surely you don't begrudge money being spent on trying to give a 2 year old a better future than his mother?

Also worth remembering...

When Esther McVey resigned as Secretary for work and pensions she tweeted that her wages have effectively halved.

We can sumise from that that the person currently in charge of telling the poor how much money they need to live is currently earning minimum £77k as an MP and £77k as secretary for work and pensions £150k per year... Plus expenses.

And people moan about a poor fucker getting less than £1000 to pay all their bills.

Unemployment benefits cost the UK around 2.9 billion a year (not including in work benefits or housing benefit which is also an in work benefit).

Uncollected tax through avoidance, evasion or incompetence costs the UK 34 billion a year.

There's a special hotline you can phone if you suspect Jo Bloggs is getting more JSA than he's entitled to. It's advertised on the telebox all the time. When did you last see an advert encouraging you to report Starbucks for not paying their fair share of taxes?

Getting very young children in pre school education if they come from disadvantaged backgrounds, has been shown to save money later on. Its not about the mothers needs, it is about the kids. It has been shown that kids from disadvantaged backgrounds who go to pre school education are less likely to be unemployed, to go to prison, more likely to achieve qualifications, etc. So it is about saving money and breaking any negative cycles in families.