Dispatches- Britain’s Benefit scandal

[Sunnywalker]

Anybody watched this? It’s made me so angry. Some highlights include a company that can’t recruit an apprentice on 26k because sickness benefits would amount to 24k so it wouldn’t be worth it. 500,000, 25-34 years old on long term sick, a woman who has never had a FT job and claims 35k in benefits, this lady would like to work but says will never achieve the same income if she worked.

This country is bankrupt, public services crumbling! What is going on? Why isn’t there an overhaul!

Yes but that is still the income of one family

Who was severely disabled, and eligible.

It simply boils down to the fact that the piss takers need to be flung back into work, the genuine sick/disabled need to be looked after, but the system needs to differentiate between the two. Too many people expect life paid for them at the expense of the working people. Some how we need to ween people back into work and properly assess them. And I'm sorry but more in depth assessment of the amount that people receive needs overhauling, when school mums are on benefits and discussing their 2nd holiday, then excuse me but catch yourself on. It needs to be made more fair to the average person getting up each morning and turning up for work. I think there should be a monetary payment or something, even shopping vouchers for the workers to give them a bit of a pat on the back.

This person in the program had one 7 year old child and was on some kind of sickness benefit. After she had her son, she has a problem with her pelvis and it needed fused and she now walks with stick . This person admitted she could work, but won’t make as much as she would now..

It depends on which part of the south you move to. Have just looked on Rightmove and there's a one bed flat for sale for £80,000 in one if the cheaper areas in Kent.

If the government really wanted to help disabled people to work, they would make it easier to come off and on benefits. Trying to work after a long time on benefits is hugely intimidating because they may not let you back on if you can’t cope. People can’t afford the risk.

Yes exactly. Even lower rates of PIP and UC with LCWRA come to around £1300 a month. When you are getting all your rent and most of your council tax paid I also don't understand why anyone would work. It is perfectly do-able to live comfortably on that.

As I said in my previous post people who have LCW or LCWRA ( sickness elements) on their UC claim can keep receiving those elements and try doing some work. They are even given a work allowance so that they can earn a significant amount without their benefits reducing at all. It is a very generous system for allowing people to try doing even a few hours work a week.

There needs to be more stigma to not working when you are able to too. Less money and maybe having to queue at the job center to collect it like the old days. I think direct payment is one of the problems people not feel it is normal not to work This culture has to change.

That’s so unfair, can you appeal or get help to fill the form out in more detail? From what I understand there is a total knack to putting certain phrases into the form to maximise the chances of getting it?? There are companies which help with this, for a charge. I think CAB may help for free.

Obviously that happens all the time. 🙄

This was in 1999
We paid exactly £100k for a four-bed in Rochester.
It was an ex whore house
in a street that was notorious so the street name had been changed
we had no bathroom ( there was pipes downstairs tho ) and pebble dashed ceilings, no internal doors, rotten or non existent windows just boarded up.
it was a complex buy as the owner had run off to Crypus for killing someone in a pub nearby
First purchase, I was 33 my dh 39

But it's true that poorer areas always have lots more takeaways, nail bars and betting shops than more affluent areas. Denying this does not make the poster wrong.
Or are you saying this is not the case?

She said they'd stop her benefits as soon as she got a job and that's just not true, her benefits would continue and be assessed based on her income each month. She would be better off and that could have been explained but that wasn't the aim of the programme.

A successful PIP claim isn’t dependent on the claimant actually receiving the help they need - the need is enough. And as I’ve said to many people on benefit bashing threads claiming to know the ins and outs of someone’s condition and claim, you can’t possibly know that unless you are qualified to judge her medical condition, are privy to her medical records and have actual knowledge of the benefit claim, which is between her, her assessor and the DWP decision maker. And DWP are not stupid. For a claim to even be considered the claimant has to give full, checkable details of where they live, how they can be contacted, and details of GP, other healthcare professionals involved. Unless she’s repeated the fraud with all of these people, she’ll be easily found out.

Thats the problem!

Where I live, and in social housing areas nearby, no, it’s not the case.
My nearest betting shop is, I believe 7 miles away.

Which is as much use as a chocolate teapot to someone on benefits who obviously can't afford to buy.

My posts are clearly addressing the idea that people on benefits who live in expensive areas should simply move to cheaper areas to save tax payers money. It's simply not feasible unless you have spare money to facilitate such a move, and it's ridiculous to suggest that cheaper council areas will house people from out of area while social housing is at an all time low.

The trouble is that many of us know people who game the system. I know someone who proudly gets disability payments, including council tax paid on her property, who owns an inherited house in Germany and a second local house. Her disability is anxiety, but that is it. Anxiety is unpleasant - I get that - but she drives for miles to look after her grandchildren, and is out and about. I do get riled, as I work hard for a pittance. On the other hand, a friend has a daughter with CF who gets virtually nothing because she was declared healthy enough to work.

That is an extreme example when the state pension came in the average life expectancy was 65. If the age of pension age had kept up with retirement ages over the last 70 years the pension ae would be nearer 80.

But surely you can agree that most people are living a lot longer than they used to, and were expected to when the state pension was formulated? In my family alone, my dad died last year at 87, my MIL the year before at 89. My mum and FIL are still going strong at 93 and 87.
I am only 58 and I can remember a time when making it to your 80s was worthy of comment.

https://www.disabilityrightsuk.org/news/dwp-spent-£50000-trying-stop-release-review-disabled-man’s-death

Strange how yet another shoddy documentary is churned out just as the government are yet again discussing how culpable the DWP are in respect of benefit deaths.
Look at the whole issue and stop being so gullible
It’s like the brexit debate whipping up …. To hide from the truth

And will get topped up with pension credit

Wow, get you, you found the needle in the fucking haystack! 😃

I already qualify now despite being many years off. I was a SAHM for years.