The Conservatives are shameless in their exploitation of women

[AdamRyan]

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2024/apr/23/rishi-sunak-dementia-adviser-resigns-over-treatment-of-unpaid-carers

In the latest "crack down", carers are being prosecuted for fraud and asked to repay thousands over quite simple mistakes.

Carers are overwhelmingly women and are already being let down and unsupported by the government despite doing a very important job, and in the case of elderly and disabled care, saving the government a packet.

AIBU in thinking the Tories exploit women?

YABU - Yes, they exploit both sexes equally
YANBU - No, they are shameless

Well, yeah, it kind of is... at least one of those six could have been a woman. Fact is, it wasn't. Yet it's the Tories who 'exploit' women...

What's say we flip the script? How does Labour NOT exploit women? Surely that would be the more productive conversation - and an even better way to 'compare like with like', wouldn't you say?

Do you mean : Right, so having 'views' is as bad as applying clearly defined consequences to people who knowingly broke a rule?

I would say it is not as bad, it is worse.

I beg to differ. The rules are complex and some of the people involved (92 year old women with dementia anyone) were extremely vulnerable. Moreover in these cases the DWP knew the rules were being broken from day 1 and yet waited years, allowing the total to build up, before contacting the people in question. That's either incompetent or wilfully cruel, and I know where my money is.

If a handful of trans people are more important to you than government cruelty towards very vulnerable people, your moral compass is malfunctioning.

I'd love to see Yvette Cooper as PM. Or Angela Rayner. Oh no, wait, she's the wrong kind of woman.

Oh god I remember her! She lived on MN posting spurious comments such as she had a boat and could sail into the UK unchecked and kept banging on and on about Boris Johnson's birthday party. Thankfully she's been kicked off or institutionalised. Those types spoil it for genuine posters.

At least the Tories know what a woman is.

They certainly do. They're people to be taken advantage of because they'll save the nation a fortune in care costs - but Heaven forfend if they should earn a few pennies over the limit, they must be punished. Women are also people who should stay in abusive relationships, as evidenced by the cuts in council funding leading to the closure of refuge places. Women are there to do the shitty zero hours insecure jobs, the temp jobs that have just had their rights to paid holiday and sick leave removed, because women don't need such things. Oh yes, the Tories know what a woman is.

The Tories have had three women leaders.

What did those women leaders do to improve the lives of women?

I was listening to a report on the radio. My understanding is that you can earn up to a limit if you receive carer's allowance, but if you exceed the limit you could be asked to pay some of the carer's allowance back.

This limit is nothing new and I don't believe it's only the Tories who tell the DWP to ask for it back, it happens regardless of who is in government.

The limit is very low, as is carers allowance itself, and I think that there should be some leeway if someone has exceeded the limit due something like being asked to do extra hours one week, or a bonus etc.

But if people are being asked to pay back thousands of pounds, then surely the implication is that they were way over the limit on a regular basis and would have therefore known the consequences?

No. The DWP has a system that would pick up the error, they haven't been following up and leaving people claiming by mistake for years. Like the woman with dementia in the link in the OP.

This isn't a case of people extorting the system (although I'm sure that happens) - this is a case of the DWP not applying their own policies, letting vulnerable people run up thousands of overpayment in error, then demanding it back.

There are many on here who still subscribe to the little woman principle.

Women have no agency and should be given a free pass for fiddling the social.