Can we all take a moment to pray for Thea, living life on the brink of poverty at £6k a month (£3.2k of which is UC).

[BananaramaDefence]

In a good month when UC gives full entitlement, Thea has a total of £6,142.00, from £2,800 in take-home pay and £3,342 in universal credit plus child benefit. Her monthly expenses such as childcare, rent, council tax, energy and food etc are usually around £6000. She says: "So it’s living very much on the edge."

And now the cap is removed she will get more!!

From this: Pregnant mum-of-four: 'Budget benefit change saved our Christmas' - The Mirror https://share.google/QGbNeuIKPAmg1qNG5

No wonder people get pissed of with welfare in this country. I work 40 hours plus a week, have children, have to pay a mortgage, childcare and I earn way less than this!!!

No child should live in poverty but at the same time no family should get this muxh in benefits.

Before people say, yes but it's to pay rent and collate, I also have to pay all that and my mortgage is half my wage!!

Well if it was that easy we would all be living perfect lives wouldn't we !

Has anyone actually worked out whether someone in the exact same position as Thea, just changing the wage to 80k a year (before tax) would actually not be entitled to anything? Because a single mother on 80k a year, renting in london with three children (therefore rent entitlement will be that of lha for a three bed) and paying for childcare (even with the funded hours, split over the year not just term time) would possibly still be able to recieve some UC top ups, even before lifting the cap. Lifting the two child limit may actually mean there are families who are struggling atm, earning 100-200 above the 'threshold' that may be able to recieve some help, even a small amount of help.

I did a quick check on entitled too...basing it on Thea's children's ages and a North London post code.

The single mum in London on 80K is also entitled to an additional 2932.84 per month.

So, with benefits, this mum brings home

Pay: 4746.46 (including 5% into her pension)
UC: 2932.85 (pre benefit cap, this will go up)
Total: 7678.96

This is the equivalent of a salary of approx 167K a year.

I wonder what the reaction to this will be...

Just did it myself. Can’t replicate that.

I did it again and still can’t replicate those figures?

I’m wondering if it’s because her rent literally rinses her. When you put it all in. It’s the private landlord creaming it.
Hands up who doesn’t want kids in poverty supported but also owns one or more rentals? One of those little nest egg pension rentals. Or a ‘good investment’ when your kids were at uni? Or a second home in a beautiful rural village where the locals can’t afford it? Or who bought in London when it was cheaper and now lives in the counties? But kept the flat on?
Anyone willing to admit you’re a landlord?

Three kids, a one year old, two year old and 5 year old. Child care is 2K, 2K and 1.5K. one boy, two girls. Mum works 35 hours, salary is 80K. Postcode was N6. Entitledto.

Most of the award is housing though

Childcare isnt as high as that- the 5 year old will be after school and holiday care only, and surely both younger are entitled to the 30 hours - which is more like 22ish hours annualised (because Thea's salary is under 100k even though her incomes is not)

The story says Thea's total expenses are 6k including rent and bills.

Exactly. It’s housing, I said it up thread earlier too probably yesterday. It’s the housing that’s destroying people. People getting their mortgages paid off on the back of taxpayers.

Full disclosure here. We had a one bed flat in a deprived area in the north. My husband owned it when we met. He rented it out until we got around to selling it. The rent paid a fair chunk of the mortgage. However we kept the rent ridiculously low and beneath the mortgage payment. It was a popular little flat. I wouldn’t allow him to raise the rent when the mortgage went up (tracker). We had one tenant who was paid via the benefits system. So I’m possibly a hypocrite. Anyone else willing to admit they’re a hypocrite?

She has to live somewhere though.

Can't have it all ways...either her mortgage is paid or a landlord rent is paid or she is in social housing.

Childcare is extremely expensive in London - it is very possible it is those numbers depending on the hours she needs. Some is subsidised by free hours, some by money.

I actually assumed it wouldn't be possible for an earner of that level to claim anything. But the benefit cap doesn't apply if you're working full time.

So, it does appear, that even those on very high incomes can get benefits and be topped up to astronomical incomes if they live in a pricey part of London.

Because the astronomical price of renting in London (and in many other places though not as bad) sucks you dry so you’re literally working your arse off despite making the ‘poor choice’ of having four children. It’s always been a fact that the lowest paid spend a higher proportion of their monthly income on rent and fuel and food. Now it seems you can’t even do so amazingly well to be absolutely smashing it at a single mom to four kids on £80k and be okay. Why? Housing. Specifically private housing. More specifically. Landlords. Oh sorry, I mean ‘developers with a significant portfolio of properties’

To be fair, the public complained so much about private landlords the conservatives changed the laws to make it basically unaffordable for people like yourself to retain a rental property. It is only economical for companies now and those who treat it like a business. So I can't see this getting any better as people like you who kept rent low barely exist anymore...

And you will always need rentals. Particularly in a city like London with so many transient members. Not everyone stays in the UK long enough to buy.

We need all types of housing.

If we reserve social housing for people on benefits (which is now impossible given the number of claimants, need for tenancy security and how you move them fairly when household numbers change) then you'd still need these private rentals.

Sorry but you’re absolutely incorrect on that one. About tories making it impossible. It wasn’t and isn’t impossible to be a landlord and have your rent paid by the government. If my husbands tenant hadn’t moved out we’d have kept the flat and got the mortgage paid by the government. She moved out as she moved back in to her family home to look after her dad after her mum died. Otherwise she was lovely and happy there we’d never have asked her to leave and his mortgage would have been eventually paid off largely by the taxpayer.

sorry also edited to add. We did sell it when she moved out so we could convert our loft for an extra bedroom so our children weren’t sharing. As we’re also unable to move due to ridiculously unaffordable housing so are stuck in a tiny house despite bringing in over £100k a year in the north of England.

Interesting.

We had a flat in London (accidental landlords).
Being private landlords changed so that we were subject to tax of our gross profits at our marginal rate.

So, the rent pushed us as high earners (similar to your) into additional rate territory and caused us to lose our personal allowance. It made it completely unaffordable for us. We were running a loss every month. The flat was on interest only (as most in London are) so not being paid off.

Compared to a company that owns property. They have none of the same rules. They pay tax on net income and at a lower rate than a tax payer.

I had that flat for almost two decades and the rental laws changed and changed and I kept thinking.. it's almost like they're trying to push private citizens out and encourage companies into this space.

So was I surprised when companies like BlackRock started buying up homes... Absolutely not.

It will be the domain on large corporations only soon. The new NI rules will drive out smaller portfolio holders.

This along with second home surcharges. Bye bye to securing retirement with a second property you intend to downsize into.

I don’t believe the family “need” this additional benefit to live , I suspect their spending has increased to match their income. The government rhetoric about taking christen out of poverty is so misguided.

We had no profit as rent was below mortgage maybe that’s it?

You don't get UC because you have spent all your money. You are given a certain amount depending on your income, and children, then outgoings such as rent and childcare.
If you are out spending all of your salary on fake nails and holiday, you don't get more UC. It does not work like that.

Thea in the example has monthly expenses (rent, childcare, food etc) of £6k and the most she gets in total from her wage and UC per month is £6142, some months will be slightly less.

£6142 will be the absolute maximum she gets. With £142 left over on a good month, she has very little wriggle room to just increase her spending.

Seems like she very much needs it to me.

The childcare/food/rent expenditure is over and above what is reasonable , families just above the limit who don’t receive benefits have to manage their money more effectively. As I said, they expenditure has in this case expanded In line with income.

She lives in a 1 bed flat with 3 children I believe.

If she didn't use the childcare element of UC, she wouldn't be able to work so she'd get less UC but then people would moan that she should be working.

Perhaps someone should advise her how to budget

She could budget as well or as bad as she wants. It wont affect the amount of UC she gets. It does not work like that.

She can't control how much rent or childcare she needs to pay unless she moves or stops working? That is where the majority of it goes.