Do you think we should life the two child benefit cap?

[Marshmallow4545]

I believe that the majority of people think that the cap should remain and child poverty should be tackled in different ways.

Personally I would like to see children on FSMs allowed free access to after school extracurricular clubs and activities. I would also provide more poor families with access to food banks and would look to stock these with a range of healthy and nutritious options either through donation or state funding if required. I would also look to recruit volunteers to offer advice on health and diet in these places. I would provide clothing and school uniform banks with high quality, second hand clothing that kids would actually want to wear. I have some branded 'fashionable' stuff my kids have grown out of that's still in great condition that I would happily donate.

All of the above in my view is preferable to lifting the cap and would be more effective in tackling the impact that child poverty has on the child.

So AIBU that the two child cap should remain and we should look at other more direct ways to tackle child poverty?

You seem to confuse suggestions with someone pointing out your inconsistencies. You're also making a massively sweeping judgement that anyone who claims benefits having children is irresponsible. Does someone in receipt of disability benefit have a responsibility to not have children then?

No one else is funding me or my children so I have no idea what you're talking about here

Well your income is, which you're saying isn't enough to afford your kids without living hand to mouth. Personally I think you should be paid enough of an income that just by having a couple of kids you shouldn't be living hand to mouth. If we're gonna be consistent with your attitude though,.it sounds like you've been irresponsible with the amount of kids you had of you have that little to play with...and could find yourself in the position of those you're judging on a whim if you or your partner got sick or became disabled.

If you think you have been personally attacked report it but from what I have read the op’s posts are eloquent and respectful.

I have. Do you think calling me a troll was respectful? No wonder the country is in the state it's in.

Why are those of us who are just about managing financially ‘irresponsible’? We’ve limited the number of children we have, we work hard, we retrain, we try to make ends meet as best as we can. Please can you explain what you consider ‘irresponsible’ about that?

You don’t know that because you don’t know what would have happened to the number of children being born had the cap NOT been introduced.

Quite frankly if you get with a man who has DC between multiple partners, you have to be aware he's not there for the long game and be very watertight about contraception. There's no need to have a baby with every man you get into a relationship with. The woman is also responsible here, she's not a defenseless actor in the situation.

Exactly! I bet the cap has reduced the number of children born to many parents who thought twice about having another child they cannot afford.

If we're gonna be consistent with your attitude though

The way in which you describe "helping" these children is a way that allows them no agency though. There's no evidence to back up your wish to not provide money to mothers to buy clothes or food for their children, it's just a pretty spiteful request of yours. As PP have already highlighted there is enough evidence that money and benefits when given to mothers is spent on their children. You can't give an evidence based reason why you want to restrict the choice of food or clothes they can access, it's purely a way to apply some sort of punishment which is evident in the way you are talking about people you know NOTHING of. If you think calling someone who had children and went on to be one disabled irresponsible purely because they claim benefits makes you sound reasonable - it doesn't. So many posters on here backing up capping benefits because they are struggling and living hand to mouth while working - you are exactly the kind of people that many benefit claimants were before their circumstances changed even more for the worse. Many just as illprepared for the future if they had to stop working, even temporarily, it just hasn't happened yet. Will they be instantly feckless and selfish and not understanding of their children's needs overnight?

It's this, but also women are capable of raising children on their own whilst doing FT jobs and building very successful careers in many cases. Assuming it's 1-2 kids, not 5 of them of course

But these sort of women won’t be on benefits.

Anyone who has read Take A Break will have seen the endless stories of a woman meeting someone, “falling pregnant” two minutes later, the “we grew apart” and then “he moved in” and “soon I saw the two lines” etc etc etc. The benefit cap may make such women think twice before being cavalier about contraception and having kids with someone they barely know.

Then there are the people who choose to have large families for cultural reasons. Repeated cousin marriage is giving rise to at least one disabled child, maybe several, per family. They will not care about benefit caps, but funding giant families where women and future girls will just repeat the pattern is unsustainable.

So they need to put money into housing and in particular, homelessness and poor quality housing stock.
They need to make more community funds available via schemes who offer vouchers and gas and electric- not for those on UC but for all. They need to put money into sure start.
A lot of poverty is entrenched and lasts for generations- I’ve worked in this sector for 15 years and I see the children of these parents and sadly they are now parents themselves and also on benefits.
Children need to be lifted out of poverty but in a sustainable and long lasting way.
i also speak as someone who has been on benefits and homeless, so I’ve been in the same position as lots of people who are living in poverty.

In which case it is even more disgusting. Definitely eugenics in disguise.

Low wages certainly
play a massive role though. When large multi million pound corporations like Amazon don’t pay a living wage why should people work and have to have their wage topped up by the tax payer?

You should only have as many children as you can afford. It sounds harsh but that is reality.

I would have liked more children but knew we could not afford to realistically give them the best life.

The way out of poverty is education. Children who are hungry and cold can’t learn and the cycle of poverty can’t be broken. A 4 year government can’t “fix” child poverty. It takes sustained effort through education and facilitating education to achieve it. Labour started this when they were in power previously with the Sure Start centres etc. But then people voted for child poverty to remain as they voted for the conservatives who tore down the systems the previous government had put in place. Through the conservative government food bank use rise exponentially, this is not something to be proud of! More children live in poverty than at the beginning of the conservative term.

Their underhand eugenics program to attempt to kill off poor people seems to be working and it will take another government a lifetime to reverse the effects. In the meantime children are cold and hungry through no fault of their own. They didn’t ask to be born.

So many parents make decisions like this.

I used to work in welfare and helped low income people with budgeting. I never came across any families in poverty, only single people. The majority of families had plenty of money to meet their essential expenses so I think lifting the cap is a bad move as will cost billions which we can't afford. There are hardship payments available which are means tested so for extreme cases there is extra financial help.

From what I’ve read Amazon pay very well!

The Tories did a great job of convincing the masses that the country’s problems were down to millions of scroungers fleecing the system. Now that the country is in an even worse state despite savage cuts to benefits, we’ve had to move onto the age old favourite and blame immigrants. (And trans women just wanting to have a wee in peace.) If things get much worse, all these people casting aspersions on the (proven largely mythical) families with 7+ kids where no-one has worked for generations might find themselves a little bit closer to them than they like.

They got a lot of you hook, line and sinker.

@WatchingCometsLand who paid for the cookies to be made?

Do you mean who made the cookies? I'll give you a hint - it's not the guy with all the cookies.

It was done like that as certain groups in society have keep having more children than they can afford.