I know this will be contentious - cost of living rise

[qualitychat]

My mum is a pensioner and gets Disability Benefit and Mobility Benefit and Pension Credit. She receives almost what I get in a month. She is moaning about the Government not doing enough about the cost of gas and electricity, which I agree with. The thing is they have said that people on benefits and pension credit will be given lump sums towards their bills. I am a middle earner and so is my husband. We will likely get nothing. Do you not think it will be the ordinary working families who will be squeezed the most if something is not done?

No you don’t get carers if you are working and earn over £132 a week as I would be entitled but don’t get purely due to income. Dla is not means tested though

You need to factor in that pensioners don’t have the same costs though, so no childcare and for a lot if they have had a mortgage it’s paid off so no mortgage or rent to pay. Privately renting pensioners are the ones that will struggle most though

Most people don't get that much, I used to get £1100pm on benefits and had to pay all my rent and bills out of it.

Is it fair?

If you look at it from a purely monetary perspective, no it isn't fair.

But if you look at it from a health perspective - what is the potential health outcome of living in fuel poverty? - then a disabled pensioner is right up there in terms of vulnerabilities and the potential expense of nursing them back health is far more likely and costly to society than a household full of working age people who do not have health issues so severe as to be in receipt of disability benefits.

That’s garbage about paying into a private pension not being expected for the over 40s. I’m nearly 50 and have know all my life I’d need a private pension to top up as state wouldn’t be enough and it’s always been actively encouraged by government of the day to have a private pension throughout my whole working life. Various methods of trying to get the take up were tried and they’ve finally got to auto enrolment where it’s opt out rather than opt in

they should have had a pension scheme available for those who wanted to join since 2001 as thsts is when stakeholder pensions were available. It was 2012 when auto enrolment started so it was mandatory to have a scheme and opt people in but employers were required to have schemes available before then

Rubbish, you could have joined the civil service, military or NHS. Not all the defined benefit pensions are gone even now.

The vast majority of these schemes are nowhere near as good as they were in the past.

I hate threads like this which seem to be more and more common on Mumsnet these days. bashing both boomers and people in receipt of benefits. The situation isn't their fault. Boomers - welll so what?

I know middle earners will be squeezed, but the answer isn't to take away support for those who are on really low incomes (and contrary to the myths on this thread, most people on benefits are either working or looking for work - only a very few - usually the disabled or those with babies - aren't working) it's to add support for those on middle incomes. Benefits recipients don't live a lovely life. It's fucking miserable and hard on benefits. it doesn't give you enough to live on, and even more so now. (and stop with the myths about your neighbours and their flat screen tvs and all that shit).

It's the cost of living, low wages, and a completely immoral Tory govt that have caused this situation, not your boomer mother, or your disabled neighbour. The answer isn't to deprive them, it's to increase support for everyone. And to vote the fucking Tories out of office.

You wouldn’t need to claim to get the ni credits that come with carers if you were working and no longer able to claim carers as you’d get the ni credit from your salary instead

My mum is on a state pension, no savings but gets just over the threshold needed for pension credit so will not be getting the extra £650 (which she will desperately need). Everyone’s circumstances are different.

Even worse, why should they pay tax so someone can inherit a property when they won’t themselves?

good point, there will be more inequality, as so much will depend on if & when you inherit.

Less than 1 million over 65s can work out of a population of 12 million

and yet the young can look forward to a higher state pension age so I assume the majority of them will have to work.

YANBU. Most of my friends receive benefits and while they do not live extravagant lifestyles, I know for a fact that they are not struggling. I’m sure there are many people who are struggling to feed their families but there seem to be a lot of families on benefits who do okay too. Perhaps the threshold for the benefits system needs to be looked at.

What a lovely thread......let's just get rid of those pesky pensioners and disabled people like in the 3rd reich.

Mind you i do find it galling when my rich, retired dad bangs on about how great it is not to work then votes tory/ brexit etc.

Over 65s is a huge age range though going from 65 up to 100 plus. I would hazard a guess most of the over 65s working are in the 65 to 70 range so it’s a much higher percentage working of that age range than looking at it as less than 1 million out of 12 million.

we have 2 children with complex needs who.have to be kept warm and have a hospital ward full.of equipment between them to keep them alive. plus endless washing due to incontinence etc
we are paying over 6000 now for our energy before even October's rise so by jan we are going to be paying goodness knows how much. in fact I am trying not too think about it but it will be over 10000 !
we will get the 650 and 150.each child. and
I am v grateful but that will not even cover a month if the prices keep rising as predicted. .
We have cut down on anything non essential but for disabled people these are v worrying times.

There should never be a situation where a household with two working adults are struggling financially to pay basic bills, and yet that's where we are heading.

The fact that the middle is being squeezed with little support, is a political failing, not the fault of those claiming benefits.

I work in a related field and there are a lot of myths, misunderstandings and misinterpretations on this thread as well as some pretty bold generalisations. I can’t address every one of them but:

1. Anyone on middle or low income no matter where it comes from will suffer in months ahead. One of the reasons that the options we have to address the problem are to provide help to EITHER benefits claimants (which includes all pensioners as the State Pension is a benefit… this is the controversial bit because they don’t all need it) or to all households eg via tax cuts is because of the mechanisms involved. It’s easy to determine who gets added help because they’ve either been through qualification via benefit system already, or else we make it universal. Much harder to start working out payments based on income and there are always people who will try to game the system. Personally I think a mix of tax cut and a benefits uplift are good approaches.
2. Benefits for people over State Pension age are substantially higher than for people of working age. The age group with the fastest growing risk of poverty are people who have had to leave work (eg due to caring or ill health) before reaching State Pension Age. Don’t forget that many current pensioners also have considerable earnings related State Pension income so the “full” State Pension for many people is much more than the standard amount. The gap between working and State Pension age benefits has been widening for years, and PPs are correct that households are estimated to need around 2/3 of working life income to maintain living standards.
3. The only added differentiation I’d make is for single occupancy / single parent households, which overall are at much greater risk than couples or families etc. This group should be prioritised for help no matter what their age.
4. PPs are correct that previous generations of workers have had considerably more generous pensions than workers today. Most pensioners had DB pensions for which employer contributions averaged around 20-30% (including public sector which is still around this level). They’ll pay out for the rest of the beneficiary’s life (and often their spouse’s too) with no risk to the beneficiary. For people in their 40s / some in their 50s and below, most will retire on DC pensions which are essentially savings pots that you have to make last yourself - you best all the risk yourself and one day it will run out. The main difference and the reason they were introduced was purely because DB was too expensive (ie too generous). Employer contributions to DC pensions are around 8%, a bit more if you’re lucky. That’s what makes up the biggest difference in pension outcomes over and above your own contributions. Add onto that tax relief. So it’s not true that someone in their 40s had same chance to build up equivalent pension wealth to a baby boomer. Almost all DB pensions are now closed, and public sector pensions are still by far the most generous pensions out there even if some changes have been made.
5. As for the intergenerational debate, personally I think we should start taxing wealth more at all ages, all including property. It’s simply unsustainable to think that our only mechanism of redistribution (which is ultimately what is funding the help that people are calling for) is to tax income, particularly when SO much wealth has been disproportionately accumulated through tax free gains in pensions (yes income is taxed but at a lower rate than the reliefs applied) and property over generations. I’m a traditional conservative voter who is now floating and I think it’s time to start redistributing vertically as well as horizontally.

I think many people will struggle. However my son is on disability benefit and ESA. EDF have just sent a bill saying his direct debit needs to go from 200.00 to 626.00. It isn't a question of struggling. It is impossible for him to pay that. He would not have money to eat. I am incredulous that the government have sat on their hands while we listen to Liz Truss prattle on about tax cuts.

In fact even though I have never campaigned in my life I am prepared to go door to door in the next election to highlight why no one should vote for the tory Party.

The most a person who is disabled will get is 619 uc and 600 pip. That is 1219 a month.

That is the highest award. On that award the needs will be so high they will not be able to live independently.

Therefore family's support rather than putting them in a residential which cost thousands a week in tax payers money.

Often carers give up there job or take work for less because of the carers working rule of earning over 123 a week ( do the maths at minium wage here).

Or if in couple then based on their income as well. If the carer goes work has to find childcare or help which again cost more money than average ( childminders charge more for sen as loose how many they can take).

Never mind using annual leave for appointments ( hospital, echp, med reviews or if they get sick which they do more than most). Called being disabled.

Annoys me when someone on 40k a year. 40k. Is jealous of disabled getting some support from government without actually knowing the facts.

I work my partner works my adult son is disabled. I have a degree.

Yes he will get the support from the government. He is at home with me rather than me putting him in residential which would actually cost the government more.

This household brings in a lot less than the OP does. Yet people are jealous of my son getting support? You know exactly what benefits were set up for? To help the ill the inferm the elderly years ago. Rather than workhouses and homes.

I would rather be earning 40k a year. I would rather my son was able to work. I would take him not having his disability over the additional payments.

But hey ho be jealous of this? It's very very odd thing to be jealous of. To judge and people need to check themselves and realise what they have.

Sorry this thread annoyed me. Never ever get people who think being elderly or disabled is a life of luxury. Ignorant at best.

I don’t agree with your analysis but just came on to say that interestingly this has now been proposed on radio 4 and the view is that it would very much benefit low income families.

Does anyone know how expensive being disabled really is? I had to take out a loan (interest free, thankfully) to buy a piece of equipment just to enable me to fucking read.

If anyone wants to swap my life (2 undiagnosed medical conditions, slowly losing my vision, hearing loss plus a load of neurological shit that no one understands) then you can. But then you'd constantly be in and out of hospital having tests done because no one has any idea what's wrong.

As an ordinary working person, you have the option to change your job. What option do carers and disabled people have?

@Tigerstigers

If your DH earns just over £50k and has pension deductions coming out of his salary then you should still get full child benefit.

It doesn't take a lot of pension deductions to get below the limit. Benefits you now (child benefit) and in the future (pension savings)

@BluePassportsAreBollocks god post