What standard of living do you think should be the minimum everyone can afford?

[MondayAgainnn]

What do you think the absolute basic minimum should be?

I think everybody should be able to afford:

Decent food
Safe housing
Any extra medical things needed, including dentistry
Internet package as it is completely necessary nowadays
Enough clothes to stay warm, dry, appropriate trainers for exercising etc
Enough for some discretionary spending - obviously this is harder to quantify, but things like Netflix, a coffee, cinema tickets I feel should be a normal attainable part of life for everyone
Enough to save a bit

Whether it is through work or through benefits I feel everyone in society should be able to have a lifestyle that is dignified, basically comfortable and with room for treats. Not just subsistence level.

What do you think the minimum should be?

But how do you determine that? From one assessment? A lifetime of benefits is a lot of money. You can't make the system so weak because fraudsters will ruthlessly exploit any weakness.

How do you even make sure the recipient is still alive if there are no checks? They could have a family member claiming for them for years.

There has to be stringent and frequent checks. Otherwise the whole thing just falls apart.

You determine that from one assessment and clinical opinion. A degenerative condition isn’t going to get better, is it?

Can you please explain the point of assessing those of us who were born with our disabilities? After 34 years it's extremely unlikely that I'm going to wake up one day and be cured.

You can't do it that way. A lifetime of benefits can run to millions. It'd leave the assessors open to bribery (or the fraudsters getting one of their own within the system) if one assessment was enough for benefits for life. It'd destroy the entire system in the long run as the public would lose confidence if they saw it being abused to that extent.

I pay tens of thousands of pounds in tax a year and have the inconvenience of having to work a couple of thousands hours for the privilege of paying it.

If you are on disability benefits you are given tens of thousands of pounds a year and don't think you should face a slight inconvenience of an annual assessment.

In terms of hourly pay, it must amount to thousands of pounds per hour.

"slight inconvenience"? Yes it's really sightly inconvenient when you're assessed by someone who has no experience of your condition and you get your money stopped because they think they know better than your medically qualified consultant who has access to your notes.

This happened to me. No PIP (switched from DLA) for 3 months which meant I lost £60 a week ESA (as you can get extra if on mid / high care or PIP care, live alone and no one claims carers for you) plus about £70 a week DLA.

How given that I lost around £130 a week do I pay for the care and equipment I need?

Not that it really matters but I do happen to have personal first-hand experience of looked after children and their transition into adult life.

Thar being the case you’ll know that there’s a huge gap between being disabled/impaired and not having the coping skills/life experience or support to cope with the demands of adult life at 18, you’ll also know that many care experienced young people are out of full time education by the time they’re 16 and move into supported accommodation. Giving them effectively a year to get themselves into gainful employment while also finding their feet in terms of living, caring for themselves and running a home without the network of family support most take for granted is a tall order.

Having an assessment is not the equivalent to work. You get time off of work. You don't get time off of a disability.

Frankly, some of the comments on this thread are shocking, and I am so glad none of you have the power to bring in these sick policies you are suggesting

I agree. I'm truly horrified by some of the comments on here. Our benevolent Tory government have more humanity than some of these posters. And that's almost unbelievable.
What the hell is WRONG with some of you?

You'd be happy to waste thousands of tax payers money per year on pointless assessments? I'd rather we used that money to improve support for disabled people, access to diagnosis and treatment, etc.

Naive summer children thinking that the cost of administering a system of annual eligibility checks will somehow even be remotely close to the cost of having a system completely open to fraud...

It's akin to picking up pennies off the floor while notes fall out of your pocket.

It should be no surprise as to why Rishi Sunak is pushing for better numerical education in this country.

the cost of administering a system of annual eligibility checks will somehow even be remotely close to the cost of having a system completely open to fraud..

There is a middle ground where people with permanent disabilities aren’t continually and pointlessly reassessed. Degenerative conditions only get worse.

What is this "middle ground"?

Of course there is. It's a sliding scale of preventing fraud vs reducing stress for the claimant.

My opinion is that annual for all is the right balance of that scale.

If society agrees to slide it further one way or the other it would be trivial to design a way to do so. But the people who think that zero ongoing checks beyond the initial assessment is the correct approach, are dangerously misguided.

I was diagnosed 7 years ago with a progressive and degenerative auto immune disease. At the time my symptoms were quite disabling and I was only able to walk short distances and got tired quickly. Had the MRI and blood results to substantiate the diagnosis.

I can only assume that it was a misdiagnosis because 7 years later my symptoms have almost completely resolved (without treatment) and I lead a full and active life.

I’m relatively sure I’d have passed your criteria for permanent benefits had I been assessed 7 years ago but I’m definitely one of those for whom annual reassessments would have told a different story.

But the people who think that zero ongoing checks beyond the initial assessment is the correct approach, are dangerously misguided.

What about children born with congenital disabilities, for which there is no known cure? For instance, severe learning disability, profound and multiple disabilities, various syndromes……What are annual checks going to prove, except cause unnecessary stress to families? Anyone who thinks there is a cure in sight for those, is dangerously misguided in my opinion. A consultant’s opinion should be worth more than that of uninformed pen pushers!

This all sounds really reasonable. I think also a basic smart phone to access internet contact people on. X

Apologies if this has already been posted, and this is money rather than how you spend it:

https://www.jrf.org.uk/report/minimum-income-standard-uk-2022

@echt thanks for this, interestingly the report shows a significant difference in income when there’s any adult in the household working even if they’re still claiming in work benefits. On NMW though even two adults working full time don’t earn enough to meet the MIS assessed by the Joseph Rountree Foundation.

So pay for it yourself.

I am lucky enough to be fit, educated, employed and well paid. Many people are no so fortunate.

Do you really think that people who are unable to work through sickness, disability or caring responsibilities, or who work for low pay when rent, utilities and food bills are going through the roof, should be priced out of something as ordinary as going to the cinema?

Is that the society and country you want? When ordinary comforts are treated as enviable luxuries? Do you think that's the best way to create a contented, thriving country?

Judging by some of the posters on this thread, they would see benefits stripped back if someone had the cheek to use them to pay for a trip to the cinema... never mind that they may have gone without in another area so they could afford it.

Decent food
Safe housing
Medical things needed, including basic dentistry
Internet
Enough clothes to stay warm, dry,

Extras, obviously, for disabled people or those with special needs.

Holidays are definitely a basic requirement 🤣
I couldn’t survive if I didn’t go abroad 3/4 times a year! I need hot sunshine

Well, you would survive, as most people do.