To ask if you have an idea you believe would significantly improve life in the UK?

[ConfusedmumUC]

I’ll go first.

I can’t help but think making someone’s rent payments eligible to prove you can pay a mortgage would go a long way to housing security for so many people. And limiting the amount of properties owned by one landlord / amount a landlord can charge in rent, would also go a long way. I can’t help but think profiteering massively off of a basic need and right such as housing is really not ok.

Im sure there’s a reason why my idea wouldn’t work, feel free to put me right 😂

What’s your idea?

1. Over 65s do not automatically get their TV licence paid
2. Over 65s do not automatically get the Winter Fuel payment
3. "So many, etc" Care to put figure on that?

1. TV license is free for anyone over 75 and who gets pension credit ‘in the household’ www.gov.uk/free-discount-tv-licence
2. Winter fuel payment is based on your age. Income has nothing to do with it. www.gov.uk/winter-fuel-payment/eligibility
3. I don’t need to put a figure on it. The amount of help given to OAPs over other groups is shocking. We all know why it happens, which is why it’s really important to vote. Why do OAPs get free prescriptions automatically when 8% receive more than £39k a year just from their occupational pension? Take a look at this link: www.gov.uk/government/statistics/pensioners-incomes-series-financial-year-2020-to-2021/pensioners-incomes-series-financial-year-2020-to-2021

Perhaps your social housing scheme could include a fully staffed 24 hour creche for each housing development, so women could also take shift-work and nightwork jobs.

Every aspect of our country is a total fuck up, even the basics of life such as housing, education and healthcare. Everything has been wrongly set up and is badly managed, so I have no idea where to begin to put anything right!

Renationalising all services and utilities. A massive council housing building project. Making the right to safe, habitable accommodation a basic right and available to all. Free university education for all. An actual living wage as a starting point and if companies genuinely can't afford this, make it clear that the government is subsidising the company, not the employee. The company should be the one claiming benefits, filling in all the forms and going to meeting about what they are doing to make themselves financially viable and self sufficient. Electoral reform. More money on NHS and education. Close tax loop holes. Ban on non-residents owning residential property. Join the EU.

Bring back Young Offender's Institutions so horrible little **s can be sent away from whoever they are harrassing or bullying for a year of strict rules and behaviour.

Better infrastructure to get people using cars less. When you stop and observe the sheer number of vehicles clogging up towns, it’s insane!

Make it easier to study to better yourself. A lot of people myself included would love to study for a higher income job but worry about the cost and how to support myself whilst studying as I have bills to pay and a dd to provide for.

And studying for better paid work means lifting yourself out of poverty, better life outcomes and paying more tax. Plus moving away from top ups with benefits.

I agree - it’s a scandal, why should pension income be free of NI payments - we all know that these payments are a stealth income tax. Their very nature is unfair - work over the summer as a student you’ll be forced to pay NI but you won’t have paid enough to get any state pension benefit. It’s a terribly unfair tax. And you can’t reclaim the tax back.

And a true living wage to reflect the current economic situation.

So not quite the implications of your claims - bit more nuanced.

How handy, having been so vague twice, you refuse to be precise.

work over the summer as a student you’ll be forced to pay NI but you won’t have paid enough to get any state pension benefit

That is not true. All NI contributions go towards the SP award.

I would like to see much better funding for mental health.

I was reading that a study was carried out in America where they offered families access to weekly counselling for a period of time after birth. The parents and children went on to have much better social and economic outcomes. More economically active, less criminality etc. I can go and hoke out the actual quote, but the book is downstairs, and I don't want to get out of bed yet 😬.

I would have mental health support at every stage of life, including easy access to high quality counselling at any and every age and stage.
In schools psycho education is built into the curriculum, teaching children mood regulation, resilience, how to identify and change unhelpful thinking patterns, identifying your values and setting goals.

I think that a population with better mental health would be a lot less likely to be maladaptive in their relationships. Healthier relationships would lead to less family break ups and extended families working better together to support each other. This would have an impact on things like the need for housing and you would get less feckless fathers leaving mothers and the state to support their children.

I have worked in children's social care and so much of what's going on is cyclical family trauma and poor mental health. Excellent mental health support could go a long way to breaking these cycles and would save the taxpayer a fortune.

People who are happier are less likely to abuse their bodies with the likes of overeating and drugs too. They are generally physically healthier, which is another saving for the NHS.

I agree with this. Would love to see mandatory cycle paths and pavements in a 3 mile radius of each school for a start.

Tax assets properly. At the moment work itself is tax way more heavily. This involves hugely curbing the offshore tax haven industry.

Proper funding for insulation, starting with social homes.

An increase in national parks, help for communities to buy back land and hold it in public or common ownership.

Rent controls.

Ditch the bizarre secondary education system. The idea of sixth form or college at 16 is so bizarre.

We need a broader curriculum for all until 18, including some form of maths and English for all - but integrated in the secondary school system and studying at least six subjects until 18, with the ability to mix academic and technical/vocational subjects.

Our insistence that children go so narrow, so early and have to choose either an academic or technical path at that stage is a contribution to an under-educated, under-skilled population.

The point is that its not just about costings, it about staffing and the UK voted to make it almost impossible for low paid workers to move to the UK (and build a life) so they don't and then we are all amazed we have shortages in the workforce.

Atm We are heading for a society in which large numbers of the population, previously in what was considered semi or skilled employment, will be on the NMW.

What would you remove from the curriculum to make space for life skills lessons?

I think schools have enough on their plates without having to fullfill the role of parent. If a child doesn’t have basic life skills then there is something wrong with the parenting, not the schooling.

But yours isn't the middle ground is it, its a total collapse of the housing market, with no thought to the economic destruction that would cause.

Other countries manage better housing provision by having a vibrant competitive rental sector which backed by large social housing.

Here in UK we have BTL LLs as a form of investment as state pension is so poor, MPs vote down min standards & we have children even dying in damp and mouldy houses.

Social housing, run by local councils, not private companies is the solution, it is a proven way forward.

What happened to crime rates during prohibition that didn't turn out too well did it? -maybe you should try to compare vaguely similar situations when trying to make an argument.

@LondonQueen *
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How would UBI work, surely there's no incentive for me to work a high stress, high responsibility job if I could go and flip burgers for the same money but no stress and no responsibility?*
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It doesn't mean that everybody is paid the same rate whatever job they do: that obviously wouldn't incentivise people at all.

It mean everyone is paid a basic income, enough to eat, have a roof over them, just the basics, and you keep it regardless of what work you do and how much you earn.

A big problem with our current system is lack of incentive to work, certainly to work to capacity. If you can work a couple of days a week and get various top ups and fringe benefits by keeping your earned income low enough, there can be little incentive to work harder or longer or in a role with more responsibility if you'll lose the tops ups. There won't be enough differential in what you end up with to make it worth your while.

It's ludicrous to have a system which people can game. Just look at the fact that the cost of living is horrendous yet we have tens of thousands of job vacancies and it's nigh on impossible to recruit into many jobs right now.

The great thing about a Universal wage is that it puts people on a level as far as possible as a start point - it's not punishing people on benefits, it's simply providing people's most basic needs and allowing them to keep in real terms far more of what they earn on top. Even in a NMW job you'd be far better off because your wage would be on top of the universal one.

At the moment it can feel like the harder you work, the more you get 'punished' whereas the universal wage corrects that ludicrous situation

It's ludicrous to have a system which people can game. Just look at the fact that the cost of living is horrendous yet we have tens of thousands of job vacancies and it's nigh on impossible to recruit into many jobs right now. No matter how much we need to employ people - someone who likes to game the system is unlikely to have the right attitude for employers to want to employ them. No matter how desperate we are - employ someone with a shitty attitude will never adequately solve that problem because managing that shitty attitude creates more problems than it solves.

Mandate decent minimum sizes for new-build houses’ rooms. So many people would rather buy older houses because they have bigger rooms; but they’re often poorly insulated amongst other problems. Make people want the new builds. I’m not just talking about detached houses - but semis, terraces, and flats. We really need more people in flats in order help the housing crisis. So make them a little bigger, with good parking and outside space for residents. Oh and do something about sound insulation between units for semis/terraces/flats.