To wonder what else can be done to break the cycle of generations living off benefits?

[Allonthesametrain]

Sounds harsh because It is. As a former teacher, then eduation social worker, now the past few years more heavily involved with school attendance.

My desire has always been to help children from unprivileged backgrounds to know their worth and achieve the best they can and this has been my career from age 23 to 57.

The number of times I've cried, torn my hair out, is immeasurable. I and colleagues have gone above and beyond to support the families, genuinely care about them, but unfortunately the outcome has been, as I've said in title, it's a continiation of the cycle of being brought up within a small community and low expectations.

So many gorgeous kids (supported throughout their young lives until they leave school) who tell you their dreams of what they want to to achieve in life, we do everything we can to enable it and some have indeed broken out of the circle but unfortunately the reality has been...

Parents who live lifestyles of no bedtime routine, tell their kids not to come back before ...pm, sleep in and don't get them out of bed ready and fed for school and as for weekends, pub and take back a new bloke

Parents who have issues themselves and project them onto DC. The kids soon realise they can stay off school for feigning illness and would actually be a comfort to Mum

The parents who just cba and say shall we just still in bed?

Of course there are so many other mitigating factors but these are the 3 main experiences we've dealt with. Unfortunately it really does come down to poor parenting and no matter what interventions we do to encourage attendance, only a minority are genuine.

So the cycle...DC think education isn't important, parents are hopeless role models and can often be aggressive to teachers, a deflection of blame.

Then oh DD gets pregnant at age 15, DS has been reprimanded by the police for scooting around in a balaclava. Then pure hostility when we try to continue to talk to them and what could be done to help.

Basically it's just such a shame, these sweet young kids who say they want to be ... become so influenced by their homelife, a need to fit in with their family and peers from the same estate, that they ignore the support we give them, don't turn up to appointments etc.

For the genuine cases, DC with SEN, the effort to try and ensure they are in best place is utmost and it's heartbreaking there aren't enough of them. Yes, we do know genuine cases and not just so many parents striving for a diagnosis because they feed DC a terrible diet and let them stay up late so are tired and irritable at school.

Expecting some backlash, whatever anyone says I can reason with.

The cycle you talk about is usually genetics rather than generations copying their parents.
Learning difficulties, undiagnosed Sen or nd. This runs in families and although you may get some who are brighter and make it to uni this is rare.
You say low expectations but if someone doesn’t have very intelligent parents who are in social housing and struggle to keep a job or are unemployable which can be difficult if they have low intelligence, they usually have children with the same difficulties or intellectual struggles and that’s why the cycle continues.
Expectations are naturally higher for those born to successful parents who excelled intellectually because they have those genes.
It is harder to get a job now with a low level of education and life is a competition so those born with disadvantages are likely to be the ones unemployed. I think that’s partly a society problem because we still pick and choose the same brightest candidates and then moan the ones we didn’t pick are unemployed or on benefits because other employers do the same.

Take back a new bloke. How horribly judgemental.

*Are

I agree OP. It’s like a learned helplessness.
sadly some parents always blame “ them” for all their difficulties, whilst taking no responsibility themselves.
l coped by doing what l could- no one can do everything, but all can do something.
It did affect my home life as it is emotionally exhausting- but that is a problem in any caring profession, especially one that is blamed for all of society’s failures and is often under resourced .

Is it inappropriately judgemental though?

A child who can't engage in lessons and is behind in reading will become disengaged and disenchanted with education fast so coupled with a poor home life....bam.what else can they do ? Low self esteem sets in fast when a child can see themselves struggling with something.

Much of Sen can be passed down so if child has sen it's likely their parents did also.
I find it critical to get all DC reading as soon as possible by any means which means dropping phonics tests and using any method the child needs rather than forcing a one size fits all on all DC.
Then throw ed psychs and all kinds of other support for the DC into primary and family outreach.

YANBU to ask what else can be done.

The social support system (‘Supporting People’) was deringfenced by Labour government (2009) and then slashed by the Coalition (2011).

It gave money to councils to commission services (often from specialist charities, which employed peer mentors from the community) to help and support parents - and others - who were struggling.

It was hugely successful. Including financially successful in terms of return on investment (net financial benefits of £3.4bn): https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/rp12-40/

We’ve since had a sharp uptick in the digital revolution, with kids able to entertain themselves all night on devices and the internet (which parents use as electronic babysitters) allowing them to become withdrawn without being bored. And huge welfare, council and housing cuts (aka ‘austerity’). And a devastating housing crisis. And we’ve all survived a pandemic, with numerous lockdowns.

We need to properly fund social support. Especially to help people navigate digitalisation healthily, which their parents and grandparents never had to do, so there’s no inherited wisdom.

About 15 years ago I taught in a small ex-mining town and yes, there were many families where no one had worked for a couple of generations since the mines closed.

I grew up in a nearby city where my father was made redundant in the early 1980s and never worked again (except cash in hand). However all of us kids always worked and I was the first to go to uni from the family. My dad also wanted me to leave school asap so I could get a job in a shop and pay him board!

Whilst I grew up poor, it never occurred to me not to graft hard and want to better myself even though I had a workshy, alcoholic father. So when I went and taught in a school where the parents and grandparents of the pupils didn’t work, it didn’t make sense to me.

My older brother literally did a Norman Tebbitt in the 1980s and “got on his bike” and moved to a different city to look for work when he was made redundant.

The point I’m trying to make is, children don’t have to follow their parents’ way, they can choose to avoid benefits and work. So just what is allowing people to drift into the same benefits system as their parents?

I think some people's brains are still living in the past this sort of thing was definitely an issue 20 years ago but benefits have significantly changed now, you can no longer sit on benefits. The majority of people on benefits long term are disabled, carers or working minimum wage jobs

There was an example in the Guardian during the backbench revolt over benefits.

A young woman had ASD. She had been awarded a PIP payment of nearly £5000 a year when younger because of her difficulties. She then trained to get into a career which suited her and at the time of writing the article she was full time employed on a good salary with no additional needs which required any additional funding.

But for some inexplicable reason she had been given the status of never being reviewed and the award was for life.

At the end of the article she said she couldn't give it up because she used it to pay for her car.

I have an acquaintance who is in a similar situation, same diagnosis. Of course I don't know the full detail of their life but they have written about it in considerable detail over the 10 years I've known them. Again, £5000 a year. They hold a full time career in a well paid profession with very minimal reasonable adjustments.

It's just no good people who know that they, their friends, their family, all deserve their own payments and really need them declaring that there's nobody getting disability benefits who doesn't need them. Or people knowing how hard it was to get their own payment declaring that other people haven't found it quite easy to exaggerate and lie. Or continue to claim when their need has reduced or been eliminated.

It isn't true.

But we have cases of fraudsters going through the courts every week, and only the worst cases make it to court. How can you claim this isn't happening?

This is correct.

I see a lot of repeated myths on here inferring people choosing to live on social security as a lifestyle choice, without acknowledging sanctions.

Or the fact social security is inadequate and doesn’t make you secure.

Nobody said it isn't happening. I'm saying its not a big an issue as the daily mail like to make out. No matter what you did to the benefits system you will always get a small percentage of people who will commit fraud. But changing the current system which is already at the harshest its ever been will just harm the genuine innocent people

Exactly. It already is. Record family homelessness.

I'm struggling to think of solutions that aren't pretty damn Draconian, tbh. Matching the long-term unemployed to jobs and requiring them to accept, even if it means moving to another region. All benefits to be stopped (for the able-bodied) after a certain number of years. Bring back Borstal and corporal punishment in schools. No benefits at all for unmarried (as in never-married) mothers and mandatory adoption of babies born to those who can't support them. Not saying we should do all of that, but I think at this point this is the only approach that would make any difference. Some behaviours don't change until absolutely forced.

I think a reversal of the acceptance, and state support, of illegitimacy would, in the long run, benefit children, women and society in general. Women get trapped in poverty by raising kids alone while men dodge most of their responsibilities, and can only manage by drawing benefits for years; the state, in effect, has taken on the role of the husband. When the state didn't do that, premarital birth was rare. Maybe it's time to go back to a state that doesn't do that.

What do you think, OP, after so long working in the field? Can you see a way to change the attitudes and behaviours that wouldn't involve straight-up coercion?

With respect, you see it every day if you look, personally know one family who are now on the third generation of living on benefits with every indication there kids will be the fourth

But it's not at the harshest level it's ever been PIP payments are going through the roof.

The lifting of the 2 child benefit cap has put an average extra £3,650 a year for every extra child.

A 5 child family that had been just about surviving is overnight £11,000 a year better off.

Yes because more people are disabled due to a failing nhs and increase in pension age its not because pip has got easier to get
Edit i don't agree with lifting the 2 child benefit cap.

@Elsvieta. Wow. So your answer is violence to children in schools?

Would you like to add workhouses? Where children were taken from their mothers and left to die alone (a system we had until the 1930s). Return of the workhouse wail?

I’m a never-married mother. Because I’m a feminist and atheist. And don’t wish to ‘register’ my relationship with either religious bodies or the state.

@JLou08 I quite like the Swiss model of secondary education. Students are grouped into different strands of secondary school. My niece is highly academic so is in the highest type strand school suited to this. My nephew not so much so he has an option of a standard secondary or a vocational college when he moves up in the next year or so at 12. It's all based on assessments and their primary school advises early on to where they should apply. There is none of this forcing all children to stay on the same educational path to 16 it starts much much earlier. I love that my nephew in particular will be able to see where his interests lie and be able to work towards a trade for example without being made to feel that he is stupid. Whilst my niece will be with like minded students and not be having the same low level disruptions in class because the ones who aren't academic aren't disturbing the class.

No one should be just about surviving. Not sure what you mean about through the roof. I get 603 pounds a month in adult disability payment - because I'm disabled and entitled to the payment.

My mum has two kids to two different dad's. Both of us have degrees and we didn't grow up on benefits. Let's stop shaming women

If this post is a true reflection of who you are, you should be thoroughly ashamed of yourself.

And I’d happily pay more tax to make sure you can live comfortably and with dignity 💐

The problem is there are a lot of freebies and incentives for claiming but the minute you work more hours these are taken away or reduced. I purposely keep my hours at a certain amount as the more the work the more your wage gets taken off you in other ways.