To be agreeing with new conservative benefits proposal re alcohol etc

[Tigerthebreadroll]

They will cut benefits for people that haven't paid into the system and been unemployed for over 6 months (don't quote me on that number ) by 30 % and it will be given on a prepaid type card. Meaning it won't be accepted by betting shops, for alcohol or cigarettes. I feel that's right . Why should tax payers money be spent on funding cigarettes etc but I have no problem with funding the basics like food etc.
Thoughts?
Basically you will claim full benefits if you've worked and paid into the system. Should reduce generational unemployment hopefully

I can see how this policy is superficially appealing to those who like to believe that their hard earned taxes are being used to support the alcohol and tobacco habits of the feckless unemployed.

However, it is my understanding that a very similar scheme was trialled for a few years in Australia but this was subsequently scrapped as it was expensive to run and there was little evidence to demonstrate that it had resulted either in increased employment or in reduced harms from alcohol, gambling etc. There was also evidence that the policy led to greater financial exclusion as people had fewer opportunities to buy cheaper second hand items etc which could only be purchased in cash.

Social security is far more based on what you’ve paid in in other European countries and it works much better. So if you are a highly paid engineer for many years and are made redundant the state pays you a high amount, to reflect the high amount you paid in and the high costs you are likely to have, because your mortgage reflects your last salary. The state acknowledges this. It’s a good deal for workers, a poorer deal for shirkers, but this is how it should be. Respect the workers.

The theory is that giving the workers more money buys them more time to be choosy about a job, hopefully getting a job that reflects their skills, is highly paid and keeps these people as high taxpayers. Here we treat skilled workers in the same way as people who have never paid in and it’s to our detriment. We need to celebrate those that work consistently for years more.

That is utterly missing the point of why these reforms are required.

Quite enjoying the Tories being such a shambles that they accidentally elect a sociopathic liability leader, and then her galaxy-brain starts hiving off Communist social credit policies. 😂

It would, she didn’t work.

Black market racket

Interesting idea, but the devil will be in the detail.

I have been caught out by similar rules - I paid in to the system for 25 years, was then made redundant and it did not occur to me to try to apply for benefits (assumed Id not be eligible). I cared for an elderly relative for a year.

She has since sadly died, so now its time to apply for jobs. Unfortunately I've not secured anything in the 6 months I've been looking and when I tried to apply for jobseekers was told I'm not eligible because I haven't paid in during the last 6 months. No, because I've been doing unpaid labour and saving the state thousands!

It sounds good in theory, but the rules need tightening up. What we have now, and what I fear this proposal would be just penalises those (mainly women) who are kinship carers. I haven't not paid in because I've been idling about on my arse! The system needs better rules.

So we should be placing this "burden" on parents who have no legal obligation to support an additional adult in their house? Has it ever occured to you that a 25 year old living at home still needs to eat, wash, travel for interviews and have access to internet and technology in order to look for work? And that there may be a single parent on minimum wage supporting them who is also in receipt of UC and can't sustain subsidising an additional adult?

Don’t try and explain with actual numbers that demonstrate why this policy is ridiculous. People don’t care about that!

It’s a pragmatic argument. Given the state of our economy, no serious political party would be proposing policies that risk costing the tax payer money, without actually solving the problem.

If the Conservatives really thought this would have been a cost effective way to solve the problem, they’d have done it during their 14 years in power.

But you haven’t answered my question. What costs ought the state be paying for an under 25 year old living with his parents?

Then is won't affect him. `It's the job seeking element and only for those who haven't paid in.

It doesn't affect disability payment at all.

Well, that was the point of workhouses I think. The poor were helped but not with money to stop them drinking it away. There is an excellent book, The Five by Hallie Rubenhold, ostensibly about the women killed by Jack The Ripper but more about poverty and how the state and society dealt with it in Victorian Britain. It's an edifying read.

Kemi is coming out with knee jerk policies that are what right leaning people want to hear. Remember those generational non working families were forged under Thatcher. We had 14 years of Tory rule where they did nothing to address the benefits problem. Yet suddenly it's all seen as a two year old Labour government problem. I'd genuinely like to understand why that is

It's the kind of principle that does seem reasonable to someone who's life has never descended to that level of shittiness.

The prepaid cards will only be accepted in the big shiney supermarkets. There will be people whose food expenses increase dramatically because the cards can't be used in the places they can get to, and travel to a big shiney supermarket costs them too much.

Dealing with an alcohol or nicotine problem takes a lot of strenth and willpower. These addictions are illnesses, not decisions. You need support around you and to have your life scaffolded so that you can tackle the problem. Putting sufferers deeper into poverty and making every day a struggle for survival is not putting them into a position to face that challenge. Putting the children of someone suffering that deeper into poverty and disadvantage as a result of that is just cruel.

I don't think this kind of patronising policy is at all a good idea. It is judging people as inferior without having walked in their shoes.

That's already out of control. Drug habits will always be a problem.

Sounds dehumanising to me.

Neither is it compassionate to dictate what you can spend your disability benefits on, but if this policy were to be introduced that would be the next step. And let’s not forget child benefit. I simply don’t believe that all those posters applauding Kemi have never used it for something other than their kids.

The thing is, nothing in this plan is a new idea.

It’s all been suggested and considered before and rejected for the many good reasons set out on this thread.

Children (and adults but let’s focus on children for a minute) need a lot of things other than food. If parents are only allowed to buy food and items that are necessary for mere survival, many children will really suffer, and it will only increase their likelihood of living on benefits themselves.

And people will always find a way to get addictive substances even if through crime. Prohibition taught Americans that.

People are in favour of this because the general COL is so high that waged people feel the pinch and want to know that those who are unwaged are worse off than them. What we need are policies that benefit everyone, that bring us out of the economic dire straits we’ve been in for some time.

Edit - and yes you can bet if the Tories did get in and do this, they’d be lucrative contracts for their mates, and massive restrictions on which outlets could be used to buy food (to the benefit of their mates!). Probably fees levied to use the cards and all sorts.

Then the black market for cards bought at less than face value in exchange for drugs etc…

But if they’re not, this policy won’t affect them anyway. Yet another reason this policy is unworkable, ideological nonsense. It belongs in a sixth form debating society - not from a party serious about forming an actual government.

It won't affect you. For every 2 years that you have worked and paid in, you get another 6 months of full payment (not on a prepaid card).

So is Badenoch making the assumption that people spend 30% of their income on booze n'fags so won't struggle to live? Did she use the back of a fag packet to calculate that figure?

Will it apply to Pension Credit too?

It is an utterly unworkable idea. Badenoch can come up with such harebrained, populist ideas because she has no hope of winning a General Election.

Eta: @XDownwiththissortofthingX Galaxy brain 🤣

This is crap for many reasons that do not include the human rights of benefit claimants.

*How will we enforce this?
*What is the cost of moving to prepaid cards instead of a bacs transfer?
*How will we stop claimants selling the cards or value of for cash to buy drink and smoke?
*We make it illegal to swap/sell cards for money... can we afford to prosecute breaches?
*Do we have prison places for offenders or are we going to clog up the courts so a justice can reprimand them for being naughty?
*We make the poor poorer... this drives crime up. Can we police this? Do we want to have to be even more concerned about shoplifting, robbery etc?
*Buying cigarettes and alcohol doesn't automatically preclude people from working; so this really will not force people into work.

Absolute shite, in my opinion.

Nope, not how these proposals work. For every 2 years that you've worked, you get another 6 months of full assistance (not on a card) - so if you've worked for 10 years, you get 5 years of full assistance.

Maybe while they are at it, the Tories can find a way of adopting a similar approach to absent fathers on benefits.