Am I the only person who thinks parents should feed their kids outside of school?

[HalloweenDoughnutAnyone]

Obviously it goes without saying I don't want any child to go hungry. But. Am I the only person who thinks parents should feed their kids outside of school?

Just that really.. it's free school dinners. Not free lunch all year round.

I don't understand why people think the tax payer should be paying even more? Maybe, if you can't afford to cover the basics (food and clothing) you should think twice before having a child?

Or should we extend free school dinners, to cover all the food a child needs inside and outside of school ?

I'm not tarring everyone with the same brush but I know people who rely on free school dinners. But have sky tv, expensive mobile contracts etc

@HalloweenDoughnutAnyone

Obviously it goes without saying I don't want any child to go hungry. But. Am I the only person who thinks parents should feed their kids outside of school?

Just that really.. it's free school dinners. Not free lunch all year round.

I don't understand why people think the tax payer should be paying even more? Maybe, if you can't afford to cover the basics (food and clothing) you should think twice before having a child?

Or should we extend free school dinners, to cover all the food a child needs inside and outside of school ?

I'm not tarring everyone with the same brush but I know people who rely on free school dinners. But have sky tv, expensive mobile contracts etc

I wouldn't mind paying more in taxes to help people on a low income. I'm on about £12 ph and feel lucky - I'm older so smaller mortgage.

I think we ALL need to help everyone. That's what our country should be about IMO. Can't believe that anyone would be annoyed because kids are getting a meal for free.

I'm saddened by this.

This video is heart breaking. twitter.com/i/status/1200927491134820353.

I do know someone who gets quite a lot of benefits as well as maintenance and cleaning on the side and never worked and her kids get free dinners. Her one kid stopped at its dads at lockdown and she was still accepted the hamper. Also got a lot money. She gives a bad name to.people who need help in the holidays

@Dugee

*If the benefits were enough to provide food, clothes and shelter then there wouldn't be so many hungry children.

It's precisely because they are not (in no small part due to the cost of housing) that there are so many children in need of this help at the moment.*

Child related benefits do pay for the basics, they don't pay off debt, pay for holidays or nights out though because they aren't meant to.

Regarding the extortionate cost of housing, that's a London and SE centric comment. There are areas in the rest of the country where housing isn't extortionate.

It's not a remotely London and SE centric comment at all.

I couldn't live much further north without being back in Scotland. Private rents still cost considerably more than the housing allowances in housing benefit or UC.

I can't even begin to imagine how people in the South make benefits stretch even further.

Totalloy agree with you OP,

During term time where kids have been off school due to Covid, absolutely free lunch.

Holidays and other times, parents should be putting their kids needs first.

And there are food banks if needed.

social services should be looking into this.

@Dugee but housing benefit is capped everywhere and it is not enough to cover 99% of private rent costs. The housing benefit limit is about £450pm for a 2 bedroom house where I live, most private rents start at £100 more than that, often even more. So parents have to use their child benefits to make up the rest of the rent.

*It's not a remotely London and SE centric comment at all.

I couldn't live much further north without being back in Scotland. Private rents still cost considerably more than the housing allowances in housing benefit or UC.

I can't even begin to imagine how people in the South make benefits stretch even further.*

LHA / Housing benefit is £550 a month for an adult with two children in Manchester. There are plenty of areas to rent around Manchester fir that.

YANBU I know people who got £15 per child (she has 2) per week throughout the pandemic and 6 weeks holidays who openly admitted that was her weekly shop so was now up £30 every week. Got extra uniform grants etc. Managed to save it all for Xmas and is now saying how she's spent over 400 on each child and is not finished. If they could give food parcels instead of cash or vouchers then it's a different story. They don't need the cash because some parents don't use it on what it should be. If anything they should make up food parcels which then people can't abuse and no child then goes hungry. It's a shame that so many people abuse the system

@Dugee

Real people live in London and the South East too. Actual people.

I couldn't afford to pay my debts when my life collapsed. Haven't had a night out in 7 years and we have been on a Sun holiday once in the last few years. Many people are having to use their child living money to pay for the shortfall between the LHA rate and cheapest available rent.

I have looked in to moving to a cheaper area, but the LHA rates there are also lower than rents available. It isn't just a SE problem.

what rubbish @wewillmeetagain. Most people claiming benefits are in work! They just don't earn wages high enough to live on.

I do see "learned dependency" in society though: tories with so much inherited wealth (usually made on the backs of miners, factory workers or slaves) that they're completely out of touch with reality; women who have husbands so rich they think they don't need to work and are mc by association. Until it all goes tits up and he hides his assets and they end up on benefits like all the 'scroungers' they used to slag off on here; politicians happy to let kids starve while they campaign to keep the house of commons canteen free...

I'm looking to move, and haven't found a single property yet with rent that would be covered by HB, unless I want to live somewhere with no jobs/shit public transport/deprived areas. I am in the north. Even HA (so social) housing is higher than LHA in some areas.

Have a look at Sharston in South Manchester. My friend has just been given a 3 bed housing association house there, it's £280 per month and is a nice estate. It's also got good transport links, being on the edge of a major city. Before that she was renting a 2 bed flat privately for £550 a month. £550 a month is the amount of LHA/housing benefit a single adult with two children receives in Manchester.

@Dugee

*It's not a remotely London and SE centric comment at all.

I couldn't live much further north without being back in Scotland. Private rents still cost considerably more than the housing allowances in housing benefit or UC.

I can't even begin to imagine how people in the South make benefits stretch even further.*

LHA / Housing benefit is £550 a month for an adult with two children in Manchester. There are plenty of areas to rent around Manchester fir that.

If there's so many affordable areas why are so many families in B&B's and temporary homeless accommodation?

And how many of those "plenty" affordable houses/flats are available to people who need housing benefit or UC?

I would - but my experience so far with social housing in an area other than where i currently live, is that HAs will require you to be on the council's housing register if you want to be their tenant. In order to do this,you need to have a local connection, or meet specific criteria so say that staying in the area you're in will cause hardship. So the fact it exists doesn't mean it's accessible.

I know there are waiting lists but my friend decided it was worth waiting (for her) due to the long term benefits. So she put herself in the waiting list when she arrived in the area from Poland and rented locally, to demonstrate a local connection - kids in local schools etc. She was on the waiting list for 3 years.

It isnt actually easy to get put on the waiting list. You need to have enough points to qualify and here the waiting list is much longer.

During lockdown our local primary school issued Tesco vouchers to the value of what would have been free school meals.
I'm guessing other schools around the country did this too. The government should now have a decent amount of data and a good picture on what these vouchers were actually spent on.

Most people didn't know there was a global pandemics coming. Clearly you did OP

Hard to answer this without breaking the talk guidelines. I hope you are being deliberately provocative rather than totally devoid of decency?

You really haven't got a fucking clue have you.

I don’t think people realise how quickly you can fall into poverty. I’m currently married with 1 DC. When I looked at going back to work and looked at childcare, the cost was extortionate compared to what I was being paid, it left me with about £80 a week take home and I am by no means on a minimum wage. If I became a single mum I would only have £320 a month to support myself and DC, I wouldn’t be able to do it. Just because we can support ourselves now doesn’t mean that this will always be the case and it will have nothing to do with prioritising other things.

From what people are saying, I wonder if a large proportion of benefits were given in food vouchers/fuel/homeware and clothes vouchers if this would help solve some of the problem. Those parents who don't prioritise properly would be forced to spend the money more appropriately.

@studychick81 or they will sell the vouchers just like they used to with milk tokens.

Meanwhile the "good" parents who are prioritising their DC are stigmatised by having to use vouchers rather than having money to spend like everyone else. At the moment I can buy clothes when we need them, if we don't need any there's a bit extra for treats. How would that work with vouchers? unless we sell them and get accused of fraud

@PamDemic
Well said!