To notice the 10% benefit rise and know I'm on the bones of my ass

[Letspovertyplayagain]

I know it's tiny. But when you are properly skint after everything you notice this tiny rise will mean some strawberries for the kids or some fresh milk instead of uht. This is for the people who complain they are poor or feeling the pinch when they really have no idea. And define their poverty as not going on holidays....

@Mangolist

No ot wasn't set to rile people up. It was to answer the point that no one on benefits gets what nurses do.

Clearly they do.

I'm glad people who are genuinely disabled get the financial support they need. It should be increased more than 10%.

I'm not really sure what the point of the thread was tbh?

Other than riling people up.

@MayThe4th if you don't have children then no you won't get child benefit, that isn't being unfair 🤷

I honestly don't see how so much spending on benefits can continue without taxes having to rise hugely. We have an ageing population and I see daily how much some pensioners are getting in benefits, Attendance allowance, pension credit, housing benefit .it is a lot ! Add to that them paying out more for childcare ( I do understand why they need to do that and that they are hoping it will pay off in taxes longer term ) and private rents just rising and rising uncontrollably and more and more young people standing no chance of getting on the housing ladder until their parents die. It's just a ticking time bomb in my opinion. Also the number of people applying for disability benefits has risen hugely recently with more ill health, longer NHS waiting lists etc. And these benefits just go on for years and years on end. No sure how a UBI would work - most people would still need to be topped up hugely.

"Obviously £3.42 per day is not enough to feed a child three nutritious meals. So no, it is nowhere near enough to cover food."

Don't talk garbage

I spent just over £100 in the supermarket yesterday- 2 adults, a teenager and an 11 year old

£3.42 per day is nearly 25% of that and I absolutely can feed all 4 of us well for £100 per week

Its based on the CPI % for the previous Sep. This also applies to Civil Service pensions. One of my pensions went up by £650 a month ( net )

@Albiboba your posts are ignorant and one sided. If your that jealous of benefits go and sign on them yourself. I honestly don't have the time of day for posts like yours.

Are you 5?

And what are you basing that off exactly? I’ve no problem with benefits increasing by 10%. I think it’s a fair and appropriate rise.
I disagree with benefits raising by more than 10%, as the OP suggested they should, at a time when public sector workers are striking and being offered half that or less.

No idea how that makes me 5. It seems like
you’re the ignorant one if you’re struggling with basic comprehension.

@Albiboba I'm not ignorant. I work in the public sector myself. Don't assume, you seem to be assuming an awful lot right down to UC childcare costs how an earth would you know exactly what percent parents are getting? I'm not struggling to comprehend. I'm well aware of how UC works are you?

@Chattycathydoll I'd like to ditch my life for UC but I don't know how to. Do you have to lose your job before you claim or can you give it up. I think I'd be better off on UC than what I currently have after work related costs.

I don't see the connection between Nurses pay and Benefits increases tbh.

They are simply not related.

Food inflation is still around 18%, energy has gone up from a price "cap" of £1200 to around £2500, so a 100% increase and fuel is still around 50% more than it was a couple of years ago.

I really don't know where these 10% inflation figures come from, apparently the price of CDs and DVD recorders are included in the "everyday" basket of goods we buy

@Flowersun6 Don't assume, you seem to be assuming an awful lot right down to UC childcare costs how an earth would you know exactly what percent parents are getting?

How is it an assumption? It’s public information how much UC pays towards a childcare bill based on how much UC you receive. I don’t understand what exactly you have problem with?

@korgy If you quit, without good reason, you will be sanctioned for at least 3 months (could be more). You will also have to follow the new rules re: claimant commitment. Have a look at the info on the government site. A lotof people who seem to be better off may still be on legacy benefits or are exempt from the benefits cap e.g. household includes disabled members

@Howpo *I don't see the connection between Nurses pay and Benefits increases tbh.

They are simply not related.*

The OP said it was fine for nurses to get 5% but the benefits increase of 10% is too low.
I didn’t link them initially, the OP did.

Plus they are related in that both funds come from the public purse. It’s simply unfair that nurses have to strike for 5%.

Once again I don’t have an issue with benefits rising by 10%, I disagree that it should rise more than that at a time when public sector pay isn’t rising anywhere near that.

I am not short of money but I did some work today and the fee has not increased since it started in 2008.

10% of not very much is not very much 🤦‍♀️

UC is structured so that you should never be better off without a job. Have you done the calculations?

If you earn less than you would be getting on UC, you are most likely eligible for in-work UC top up anyway (a lot of people are including me).

Carers allowance is one of those that has gone up 10%. It's gone up from £69(ish) to £76. So a massive less than £7 rise.

Which when you consider that you need to care for the person for at least 35 hours a week means a total of.....drumroll please...less than 20p an hour.

If, like many on carers allowance you are actually needing to be available 24/7 it's an even more impressive inlecrease of Less than 4p/hour. So no its not a massive increase, its miniscule, and yet, yes it will still make a slight difference.

Can't those who work and earn and have a good life in comparison just stop this weird jealously, and have a think? maybe when those who are on benefits stop complaining that those who actually do work are having it tough too. Because prices are rising for everyone not just for benefit claimants.

Can’t we all just acknowledge that prices are going up for everyone and that everyone has to make sacrifices. And that even if those sacrifices are an activity for the kids which someone else couldn’t afford anyway, that activity is still important to the person who currently does it.

There is always going to be someone worse off than you are. Whoever you are. Would it be ok to say that people on benefits should be grateful because at least they’re not living in abject poverty in the third world? Because trust me that is far worse, so maybe everyone just needs to count their blessings here

It’s probably fair to say that the government cannot afford to raise benefits by 10% and also give a higher pay rise to NHS staff (it’s all staff on AfC payscales, not just ‘nurses’).

Faced with the choice, the government will raise benefits. This is why I think some people on benefits are ‘earning’ more than nurses or the difference in ‘pay’ between the ‘jobs’ (being an nurse or being on benefits) isn’t much when you work it out.

and yes, lots of people on benefits also work.

I don’t have an issue with raising benefits - I work in the nhs myself - but I do struggle when nurses and others leave university with masses of debt and transferable skills that the country needs, only to find themselves no better off financially than somebody who does unskilled work, has not amassed the debt, but earns roughly the same or slightly less through a combination of unskilled work and benefit top up.

I’m sure somebody will come along to say how the nurse has better prospects or she can get a mortgage (in fact she likely cannot afford one), but why shouldn’t she have better prospects and financial stability?

my point is, there’s very little reward or incentive to train in a shortage skill when you could earn broadly similar amounts by never passing an exam, taking unskilled work and having children.

It may be unpopular to say this, and terrible to even think it, but nurses and doctors are voting with their feet because (amongst other reasons) the difference between their pay and the ‘pay’ of people without the same skill is negligible. Why on Earth would they stay? I pay my cleaner £11 per hour cash in hand. A junior doctor gets £11.20 if you knock 20% off for tax/NI. 20p per hour more than my cleaner. And no, she doesn’t have a single GCSE to her name.

I sit next to a physio who is 18 months qualified and just accepted a job in Australia. My cousin is a nurse who has left the NHS to earn more money with an agency. The NHS needs to retain, not drive away.

I left Nursing about five years ago, totally burnt out and stressed. I do a totally different job now and even though it's charity sector and therefore the pay isn't great, it probably pays about as much as a newly qualified RN ( minus enhancements). Nothing would tempt me back to the hell that was Nursing, not even a 20% pay increase ! My SIL is also a Nurse but only does a few days a week and has started a second job as a cleaner and says her pay for cleaning/ housekeeping is almost as good as her RN pay !

It’s interesting that there’s so many people comparing public sector payrises and benefit rises.

shockingly, many of these nurses who are being awarded 5%, are also heavily reliant on UC and that increase to make up the real-terms pay cut they are getting. It’s not a one verses the other. The vast majority of UC claimants are in work, and many of those in public sector roles.

Not sure if it has been mentioned already upthread but the housing allowance is frozen, so the 10% benefit increase will not include any housing money. As rent has been the largest increase for many people, the 10% figure isn’t as reasonable as it seems - for families the majority percentage of their benefit is the housing benefit/housing element, so it’s a smaller portion which gets the increase.

ITT people who don't understand percentages, also twatty bastards. Op you are on a hiding to nothing trying to make people understand how shitty and depressing it is to live on benefits. Contrary to the hooters that exclaim that it was always the same, no it fucking wasn't. Been here since 2003.

Does noone remember the huge Riven thread/thing where people were outraged about her disabled child being restricted to a certain amount of continency products? That mumsnet is gone forever, its full of cruelty and snark now.

It took me a little while to work out the OP is actually complaining about the her 10% benefits rise.

OP, how much benefits rise do you think would be reasonable for you?