To think this will just increase pressure on the poorest/vulnerable?

[Zebedee55]

Sanctions increased, putting more (often unrealistic) pressure on parents, carers, and sick/disabled.🙁

www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/universal-credit-sanctions-hunt-budget-b2298836.html

Your experience with depression is just that - yours. You are not experiencing anyone else's. Considering the pittance that someone who is unfit for work can claim on UC, I do not see how anyone would rather live on that, than have a proper wage. UC pays you even more if you manage to work.
If your sole income is UC, the amount you have to live on is enough to make anyone depressed.

This is for the benefit of the rich tory donors The government happily allow it to happen and top up the inadequate wages from the public purse. So, in effect, the poor top up the poor and the rich become richer. An ideal tory policy.

@IWineAndDontDine why did you have two close together? We have one because that's what we could afford both working in the NHS with a side gig on top. If DH works shifts why can't you pick up shifts when he is home with the kids. When DS was little we practically worked opposite shifts.

We were out a few days ago and over heard someone saying they don't want to apply where they had been told to as "I would get a job there tomorrow"!

I do think we need benefit reform and work should be mandatory. So if your claiming your out doing labour say working in the fields or litter picking

I do think we need benefit reform and work should be mandatory. So if your claiming your out doing labour say working in the fields or litter picking

So, what happens to the people (usually council workers) who are already being paid to do those roles?
If you are sending people to litter pick etc, then why not pay them a proper wage?

@Grumpybutfunny Maybe if more people stuck on waiting lists got the surgery they have been waiting for they would be able to go back to work.

And i see we have now finished USING disabled and ill people as an emotional blackmail tool to bully and berate others into following Covid rules and have now gone back to telling them "get back to work you lazy sods"

Maybe those who are claiming JSA (not speaking about UC, in specifically talking about people who are out of work and seeking work) work for the number of hours they’d need to work to be paid what they get for JSA?

JSA is £77/week, and the living wage is £10.42 as of April, so they would need to work for approx 7.5 hours per week. That seems realistic? Obviously it’s purely hypothetical though as they would then need to employ people to supervise them and such. However, it would give some people work skills which might make finding work easier.

I don’t know if they still do but they used to have people out working for companies for less than minimum wage, which seems exploitive. Any forced work should not exceed the hours that someone on NMW would have to work to be paid the JSA rate.

I do think we need benefit reform and work should be mandatory. So if your claiming your out doing labour say working in the fields or litter picking

Ah yes the fruit picking argument. Those fruit picking jobs are live in. If you have a social housing tenancy you have to, wait for it, ACTUALLY LIVE THERE. those fruit picking jobs are for weeks Sometimes months. You are not allowed to live away for more than 28 days. You would lose your tenancy You would also lose your tenancy if you arent there to let the engineer in for the MANDATORY gas safety check.. Those are the rules for living in social housing. People are quite happy to have SH tenants controlled like this. Until it comes to fruit picking oh but wait They STILL wouldnt want anything to change cos it would mean SH tenants have more rights and we cant have that can we. And im damn sure that if a SH tenant DID take this kind of job some busybody would soon be on the phone to the HA telling them that tenant has done a runner.

Incidentally @Grumpybutfunny i find it incredibly depressing that people like you are working in the NHS and knowing this could skew peoples views on the strikes.

So all the litter pickers should be sacked and replaced by workfare. there is a cartoon about that somewhere.

oh look here it is

twitter.com/its_gill__/status/314366481783742464

If the job centre can pay minimum wage for some part time hours, then call it what it is... an actual job. None if this having to work for benefits thing.
Again, what happens to the people who are already in those roles?

The Workfare scheme is what you are on about in your last paragraph. Yes, it was horribly exploitative, and many companies took the piss with it. Saying if you are good enough, you will get offered a job at the end of it.. then funnily enough no job is there, and a new person is taken on to do free labour... rinse and repeat.

I don't think some apprenticeship programs are much better tbh. There was one advertised where I live... 38 hour weeks for £3.70 an hour for a whole year. At the end of it, you get a level 2 certificate in tea making. No word of a lie, the whole role was just making hot drinks. And what level 2 qualification needs full time hours for a year to achieve? You can do one from home in about 6 weeks part time.

I was purely musing about how it would actually work.

I wasn’t aware of the name of the scheme but I know someone who was part of it. School leaver with no “major” qualifications; was genuinely looking for work which matched their skill/education/experience level (ie entry level retail positions) and didn’t really get anywhere. Was offered one of these “positions” for M&S. Worked really hard and didn’t get employed after it. Fortunately they did a second position and they still work there now though; but they may have secured that job independently of the scheme; who knows.

I agree about apprenticeships. I actually did an apprenticeship in travel myself. This was in 2006ish. I earned £435 per month, full time. I barely had time to do my “college” work outside the odd release day we had. Though in saying that; I did get employed permanently and my wage increased about 6 months in. Mine was level 3. Travel is maybe different as you do need to be qualified or experienced to do the job well though.

I am a benefits advisor so have had quite a bit of experience in this area. Most people are genuine claimants but there is no denying that a lot simply do not want to work. In recent weeks I have come across numerous women in their late fifties/ early sixties who have not worked for years and now their husbands have reached state retirement age only to find their state pensions are a measley amount and not enough to live off and to get UC they will need to work, are thoroughly aghast at the thought. then one who blatantly told me he did not bring his much younger wife over from India to work but to look after him ( he was not disabled just older !! ). I have whole families of four with grown up kids claiming PIP and UC for anxiety and depression, kids have never worked or even tried to. they just sit at home all winding each other up and making each others depression worse. I have claimants who tell lies, ask me openly how they can get rid of savings in order to get benefits, how they can transfer property to others names, how they don't think their partners earnings should be taken into account for means tested benefits despite being married for 20+ years. I have one man currently who has 6k in the bank due to large backpayments of disability benefit but still thinks it's fine to use our charities foodbank rather than leaving it for others now his benefits are sorted. He said he has plans to build a workshop in his back garden with it. This is just this week. It's irritating. Sorry I kow I need a new job. I set out in this job with the genuine desire to help but it has worn me down. the system urgently needs reform.

Benefits are meant to be short term, to help you get back to work. Obviously there are some people who will never be able to work again, but there is very much an attitude of being signed off, that's it for life. If you want to not work so you can collect your kids from school, fair enough, but why should I pay for this?

I know a family living in a new build on a lovely estate who have never worked a day in their lives. One of them "needs to lie down" all day, and the other cares for them. They also own a very expensive camper van for weekend trips and go abroad twice a year. She is healed for these events. I'm not sure why I am funding all this?

Even my own mother was at it - she got signed off from work when I was young for a "bad back" and wore a neck brace thing for twenty odd years - until the day she reached retirement- and the thing was never seen again.

There are so many families locally who just don't want to work, there's a massive culture of it being funny, hanging around the job centre, talking about "payday".

I just think when even the "middle" are now struggling to eat when they are working so many hours, it stings a bit.

The money can't go on forever. We can't demand better schools, pay nurses, increase police AND fund half the country to stay at home forever. It does need an overhaul.

@Babyroobs what job would you suggest for a woman in her 50/60s who has not worked for years, possibly decades?

I have also known people who got a huge back payment from PIP (denied but went to tribunal). They got about £10k... does that need to be declared as savings? And therefore affect your UC claim? I was always confused about that.

I turned down a cash gift as I would have had to declare it (and it reduce my UC).

£6k is fuck all in the scheme of things. Car repairs, a new fridge, a big vet bill, and dental treatment (no NHS available!). All could easily wipe it out.

I am so puzzled at all these people who seem to claim benefits, particularly for disabilities, so easily. My own experience is that you have to provide copies of prescriptions, care plans, therapy etc and provide names and phone numbers of professionals willing to discuss your disability in detail. Maybe I'm stupid but I can't understand how anyone can "cheat" the system. From my own point of view in order for me to claim universal credit without any work requirements, I had to prove I was in receipt of carers allowance for looking after someone in receipt of PIP (an extremely difficult benefit to be awarded). If I hadn't been able to prove this then there is no way they would have let me receive UC without me proving I was actively looking for work for about 35 hours a week and taking part in back to work skills training courses and meetings with work coaches and if I'd refused or missed any then my payments would be stopped.

KievsOutTheOven
i have mild bi polar, hormonal depression and Parkinson’s.
Parkinson’s diagnosed in September last year, was a relief and affects me daily, told I’ve had it 5 years.
i gave up working, being too slow ( fast paced job) and was forced out at 58, my depression and bi polar medicated well, not that I ever took much time off .
others had more time off for bugs and stuff.
My depression started a few years ago, and almost cancelled out bi polar, both awful, luckily my meds worked and didn’t numb me up,.
These bold and ignorant folk that say mental health does not affect you, of course it can, I despair at these bold statements

No . If it is backpay it does not need to be declared for UC, well it does but can be disregarded for 12 months I believe.
There are plenty of jobs that could be done by someone in their late fifties who have not worked for years- home cares, home helps, supermarket jobs, any number of unskilled jobs. i was with an elderley client filling out a form last week and a cleaner was there doing very light work - dusting, light hoovering etc and she was early sixties. There are a lot of vacancies. I agree 6k is not a lot in the grans scheme of things but personally I think it's wrong to still be taking from a food bank with this in the bank.

I agree PIP is hard to claim and a lot get turned down. The system needs reforming as so many people have to go to appeal which takes months.

Ah ok, that makes sense. Have know a few people to get lots in back pay.

Many women in their 40s and above report ageism in the workplace, and perhaps being ignored when applying for jobs, based on their age.

Perhaps you would disagree with me, but I think having some money in the bank should not stop people accessing foodbanks. Sometimes those savings can be spent and not be built back up again. Everyone needs their own little safety net.

The form to trigger WCA on UC is scary. I wrote smaller essays when I was at uni.
Life on benefits is stressful. Any text can be one about looking in your journal. I get paranoid about the same people sat in cars outside my house. Are they from the DWP and watching me? I am careful what I put on FB even though it is locked down. I am too scared to sell 2nd hand stuff online incase it gets classed as some sort of income.
That is not to mention the illnesses I have that prevent me from working anyway. Anyone who thinks I have it easy and am raking in the cash.... come swap with me, please! I would love to go earn a wage, go home, and not give it any thought.

PIP is even worse. I have not even tried for it. My CPN was worried the process would put me in the grave.

@Babyroobs I agree, if anything needs to come out of this budget then there needs to be some kind of reform of the PIP/ESA assessment system. We have been "fortunate" that dh has never had to appeal or go to a tribunal. I can only imagine the worry claimants must go through awaiting tribunal dates and how on earth do they manage financially if their payments have been stopped pending appeal? Then you hear that a massive percentage are successful on appeal, after assistance from people like yourself, and you wonder why these people weren't awarded the benefit in the first place, saving time, money and a lot of stress and worry.

Yes I supported someone last week with a tribunal and it was nerve wracking. The DWP were playing games making her an offer two days before the tribunal and sending her into an anxious state. It's horrible. Then to have to go to a court, be frisked by security guards etc, it's not nice at all. And as you say not to mention the cost of a judge and doctors time for two hours. It is an awful system.

@XenoBitch I understand exactly what you mean. My husband, who is paranoid anyway, also worries about being spied upon by the DWP. We have had to show bank statements to the council for them to scrutinise, in order to obtain council tax support and the shame I've felt if we've had a very rare takeaway listed on the bank statement is ridiculous. Living on benefits is living half a life and I suppose some might say that's all we deserve. Don't get me wrong, I'm extremely grateful for the benefits we receive, we literally couldn't survive without them but we've both paid into the system for nearly 40 years and always understood that one of the things we were paying national insurance for, was to provide for those less fortunate, we just never thought it would one day be us!

I think a lot of people who seem on the outside to be claiming disability benefits/carers allowance for "mild" problems are either playing down their symptoms or people assume that they aren't that bad. We have been living with the in-laws for the past 6 months and it's been an eye opener for them how severe dc1's disability actually is. Mil said that she always thought I was just being over protective until we lived with them and she saw the reality. Also sometimes I forget that most other people his age don't need the kind of care that he does.

@Babyroobs that sounds absolutely horrific. There is something very wrong with a system that puts people through an ordeal like that. I hope she was successful in her appeal.