The uk is sadly turning into a welfare state
A corporate welfare state.
50% welfare bill = pensioners
10% = working age sick and disabled
10% = working age not working (parents, carers, other)
30% = working age in low paid jobs
The majority of working age benefits claimants are on benefits despite working because they are not paid enough to live on.
This is just one way the government subsidise business. The other is through direct grants.
A good example is Ineos - A private company majority owned by 'Sir' Jim Ratcliffe. Despite being a so called knight of the realm and regularly going on TV to blast 'benefit scroungers',
Sir Jim Ratcliffe who has an estimate wealth of between £12 and £17 billion moved to Monaco in 2020, saving an estimated £4 billion in UK tax as long as he spends at least 183 days a year there. For context that is around 2.5% of the working age benefits bill.
In 2022 Ineos as a group of companies made over 2 billion in pre and post tax profits. In 2023 they made over 300 million. They have made some losses in 2024 and 2025 but this is dwarfed by the profits of the previous years.
Remember it is a private company, not publicly listed, so a large proportion of the post tax profit would have gone directly to Ratcliffe and due to his Monaco residency he would not have paid tax on it!
Despite that the government gave Ineos a £125 million support package to support the future of the Grangemouth plant - £50 million of which was a grant. £75 million a government backed low interest loan.
Let that sink in.... £50 million of tax payers money given to a private company which has made billions in profit over the past few years and whose billionaire, knight of the realm owner, intentionally moved to Monaco to avoid paying £4 billion in UK tax.
It is just one example of many where money is siphoned off to the rich. Michelle Mone, Jeremy Hunt's landlord mate, the billions in Covid loans wiped out, the lack of fines for water companies who continue to pollute our waters while still paying out dividends to their share holders ...bail out after bail out after bail out for the rich, none of whom willingly pay their own dues.
And yet Jim Ratcliffe, Reform, the Tories, the Daily Mail (which is also owned by a tax dodging billionaire who benefits from a title), the Express (owned by investment funds) and the Telegraph (formally owned by the billionaire Barclay brothers who were also tax dodging Monaco 'residents' who defaulted on over £1 billion in loans owed to Lloyds) all seem determined to make people think that it is the welfare bill and immigrants that are the problem.
If you seriously think that this country's problems will be solved by reducing or stopping the couple of hundred quid a week that Fred gets because he has depression and can't work or the £400 a week the Jones family get as a UC top up because dad works a minimum wage job and mom can only work part time because they can't afford more child care then you are absolutely deluded!