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?

Stop in work benefits. Make employers pay a wage which is decent and people can live on.

You’ve obviously never worked in a school in a deprived area if you don’t realise that there are parents who don’t have these life skills either.

The 100% inheritance tax idea is so stupid. It would mean no one had a reason to strive. One of the reasons I work hard in a professional job is to make sure my daughter has several hundred thousand when I die. If I thought that wouldn't happen, I would just say 'fuck it', go on the dole and rent. I want my money to go specifically to my child, not any other Tom, Dick and Harry. You'll find that most home owners feel the same.

Some of these ideas ignore what incentivises people to work and seem to centre on pay for no work.

@FelicityFlops Adopt an insurance and risk-based health system with appropriate premiums

How much would a health insurance system cost the average family in the UK ? Are you talking £50 a month, £100 , £400 or more ? If we move to an insurance system, what happens to those who already have long term chronic conditions, will they automatically be included ?

Can you explain what you mean by a risk-based health system ?

Wonderful- yes please

But you would struggle to pass art at GCSE if you had not studied earlier. A broad and balanced curriculum is so important for children's development and enjoyment of school.

I think there should be a ‘gap year’ for everyone who wants to do it after school and it should be encouraged.
Work experience, cooking skills, budgeting skills, running a household, looking after children, helping the elderly, access to lots of different skills to try them out, (take it in turns of planning and cooking lunches for the rest of the students and tidying up) wiring plugs, art, helping on a farm, everything and anything that is practical (and it is not graded), and then teenagers could try things out could make a decision about what to do next, after the year is over.

unrealistic and ridiculous but I would have liked that

Some kind of mechanism where a company’s profits pay any UC/tax credits of its employees. Then anything left after that can go to the business/shareholders etc. I’m not an economist, so no idea how/if it’d work. Just seems ridiculous that the taxpayer is propping up low wages of companies paying out potentially £millions to shareholders.

@Heartstopper I would love to see a move away from the large 'institutional' type elderly care settings, regardless of how well decorated or swanky they look and a move towards smaller group homes of 3-6 residents where they can parcipate in normal life.

Nationalise and subsidise public transport as they do in lots of European countries to make it actually affordable for people to use.

Young children can get a lot from art at school, I wouldn’t want it removed

You know companies pay taxes too which go towards UC/tax credits!
Under your system no profits then the low paid employees would be screwed or need Gov support and I'm sure many a creative accountant would make the profits appear minuscule.
There's nothing wrong with taxing companies and the Gov redistributing income fairly according to need. It's maybe the fairly thing we've got wrong both in taxes and benefits.

Normalise people going to university in their early-mid 20s instead of 18. Let people work for a few years, maybe in a few different roles/industries, before committing to a career. Would need to go back to entry-level roles not requiring a degree - which most actually don’t!

Bringing back Boris

Maybe the answer is just to increase companies’ taxes then, or have a progressive tax on profits. Or levels of minimum wage, whereby there’s an absolute minimum, and a living minimum - a company must pay the absolute minimum, but if they don’t profit enough to pay the living minimum, the state steps in. That’s basically what happens now, except now the onus is on the state, not the business. This would flip that.

In essence I just think we need some way to stop the need for state top-ups for anybody working full-time. And it seems doubly ridiculous that some companies are making millions while their workers are subsidised by the state.
Companies would still make their profits, shareholders would still get dividends, just after the workers had been paid enough to live on.

Allow developers to compulsory purchase land and property. Say there's a block or five of run-down inner-city that would be vastly improved if it were demolished and high-quality high-density housing and communal facilities (parks, playground, medical, pool, gym, shops etc) were built. As things stand, it's not viable, because a potential developer would need to buy up 1000 separate properties, and as soon as any owner understood what they wanted, they would hold out for prices that make the project infeasible. So the developer can go to the local authority, who approve the plan, if they agree it will improve the city, then the developer is allowed to buy everyone out at a price of say 125% of what an indenpendent valuation says the property is worth. The property owners get more than the property is worth, the city is improved, and the developers make a profit.

The essential problem this solves is that though it is easy to subdivide land, it is difficult to combine it, for big projects.

@ConfusedmumUC if you want to put a limit on rent, you also have to stop putting up the costs and taxes on landlords.

Mine would be free - or heavily subsidised for everyone - quality childcare. It would do so much to give choice back to women.

Scandinavia do this and their young people are amazing

@FourChimneys

Mandatory litter picking for everyone who is able bodied

That is what community service should be about like they do in America. But we are too soft.

One that people may not agree with , but migrants or whatever people call them, . Instead of the tax payer paying millions to keep them in hotels etc
Give them a national insurance number and let them on their way. Let them get a job and pay their own way.

Legalise assisted suicide.

A proper social care system - this could be good for NHS as a lot of beds are taken by people who don't really need to be in hospital but also can't really look after themselves at home. Make elderly care more affordable for all - we would probably have to pay more tax for this but it would benefit most people eventually

UBI and good quality affordable childcare. Life changing.

@ILoveeCakes actually most of my department are career changers so we do have life skills to share with students. We do have specific life curriculum lessons