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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

ok, so i know im gonna get hounded for this one!!!

336 replies

benbon · 21/09/2008 19:18

but AIBU to think that if you live in a council flat you shouldnt be able to afford a brand new land rover with personalised number plate and full leather interiour

its just so frustrating when we struggle to pay our rent and have a crappy car and a man living in the council flats opposite us can afford brand spanking new car

so aibu????????????????

OP posts:
DaphneMoon · 23/09/2008 12:18

Forgot to mention my BIL is a CPO, he does not earn anything like 30k but had to go away and train and puts his life at risk every day in his job. Is that fair? I think not, but we could not manage without them either.

justaflyingvisit · 23/09/2008 12:21

that is a good point daphne, and actually i think that raises the issue of gender, with nursing being traditionally a womans job - a whole different can of worms there. I guess the world with never be fair for everyone, perhaps we should stop worrying that jo bloggs down the road might have more than we do and think about more important issues.

TinkerBellesMum · 23/09/2008 12:29

Tink's godmother is a social worker and her husband works in a factory. Mum (her senior practitioner) is thinking she (Mum that is) is in the wrong job because he is earning more than she is!

When you look into who gets paid what, it's not always the qualified jobs that get paid well (I remember thinking that playing Game of Life as a child)

DaphneMoon · 23/09/2008 12:37

Justaflyingvisit, don't even get me started on the men v women pay war. It makes me so not just pay either, cars perks etc. grr

justaflyingvisit · 23/09/2008 12:42

Yes that is so true tink, i have studied science to PhD level but have decided not to persue an academic career because the pay is SHIT! and the jobs are not secure, this however does not really reflect gender, its more like geekism .

Daphne, i remember seething once around my MILs house when she was bemoaning her grandsons low paid job, she said "thats woman's money" - i could see my DP wince and i just smiled at him and bit my tongue. Ohhhh yes, don't get me started.........

DaphneMoon · 23/09/2008 12:50

Just, your MIL should be ashamed of being a woman, fancy belittling your own sex! tsk tsk. How an earth did you manage to not brain her one. By the way. ......how's the painting going

justaflyingvisit · 23/09/2008 13:00

its not going well!!! lol, still clearing the room out - it was my daughters room, she is 18 now - im thinking about protective clothing

elkiedee · 23/09/2008 13:09

It's not completely true that social housing is subsidised. Tenants on benefits or very low wages may have rent paid through housing benefit but it's hardly unusual for families to be earning a reasonable income for other things but not to be in a position to buy. I'm an owner occupier but the only way we're ever going to move to a bigger property (needed) is by selling and moving out of London, and we were lucky because we bought 10 years ago, no way we could now.

In fact the government takes more council housing income off councils than it gives back, so anyone paying their full rent (and I'm sure a council tenant in a similar sized property in my area with a job paying much more than benefit levels would be paying far more than we pay off the mortgage) is actually subsidising other people, perhaps taxpayers generally.

Yes, the rent is lower than the rent for privately owned housing, including all the ex council properties which are now rented out for profit. But that doesn't mean council tenants are subsidised. Private tenants are paying for profits for banks, private landlords, people who exercised their right to buy and then sold up and moved to somewhere where they could get more for the money.

daftpunk · 23/09/2008 13:10

justaflyingvisit;

yes i am shocked that bin men earn £30,000 a year.

isn't that what most teachers/nurses earn?
i'm not saying bin men don't deserve to get well paid..what i'm saying is, i could do that job...99% of people could do it...i couldn't be a teacher.

comer on...it's an easy job...smelly...but easy.

georgimama · 23/09/2008 13:22

Edam

As I have other things to do than sit on here all day the thread has moved on, however, for what's worth I will make my point...

I'm not prejudiced, "repeating the same tired old lies", bigoted or any of the other things you suggest. I don't agree with you; I have examined the same facts, the same arguments, and come to a different opinion. You may not be aware of this, but that is allowed, in an open society. You sound like a member of the bloody government, who try to make out that if only people understood then they would of course agree with every flipping word they say.

You don't think that council rents are subsidised, and that the charge to the council tenant represents the cost of the bricks and mortar. I don't agree. The council is able to provide itself with an infrastructure for supporting the maintenance of council properties, collection of rent, works and all the staffing/resourcing that goes along with that etc, which is also used for the provision of "services" to non council house residents. Private landlords don't have such an infrastructure at their disposal in maintaining and running their lets.

I think that this makes council rent subsidised. OK with you? Not that opinion, obviously, but the fact that I am allowed to think it?

StewieGriffinsMom · 23/09/2008 13:24

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn

ahfeckit · 23/09/2008 13:25

daftpunk that's hilarious : nurses earning 30k!!! i wish...

ahfeckit · 23/09/2008 13:28

I know someone who owns their car outright and is on JSA, they also pay a mortgage on a 3 bed semi. they don't have a job. so yeah, it's not that outrageous to think that someone could own a landrover and have been able to afford it on benefits. you'd be suprised what some folk can buy on benefits actually...

georgimama · 23/09/2008 13:29

Isn't that kind of the point, Stewie, the chap the OP is talking about clearly isn't living on the poverty line and therefore, she wonders whether it is right that he gets cheap rent in a local authority property which someone else might need more?

ahfeckit · 23/09/2008 13:30

I don't know what people have got against being a binlady for, it's not anything to be ashamed of. If I was to jack my career in tomorrow, I'd seriously consider being a bin lady.

daftpunk · 23/09/2008 13:31

so someone that empties my bin earns more than someone that teaches my child or saves lives?? omg..that's so wrong!

TheUnsinkableMB · 23/09/2008 13:33

There is a lack of housing where I live too...there is also something called a credit crunch going on and some people just can't get a mortgage.

Yabu, feel kinda sorry for your neighbour.

justaflyingvisit · 23/09/2008 13:52

who used fecking bin men as an example.......idiots oh hang on, it was me .

Not sure lugging shitty bins around and stinking of rubbish is an easy job, intellectually easy maybe. Its like factory and shop work, its dull, its boring, its not rocket science, but its still hard work.

Anyway daftpunk, it does seem unreasonable that unskilled jobs are paid more than skilled jobs but i honestly think its either a gender issue or stemming from gender.

daftpunk · 23/09/2008 13:59

yes, probably.

and yeah ..justaflyingvisit, you managed to change the whole direction of the thread with "bin men" ....i can't even remember what the threads supposed to be about now ...lol

anyway...i'm outta here...nice chatting with you..

worriedmummyto1 · 23/09/2008 14:12

Okay only read op but my university proffessor lives in a council house so council properties dont mean everyone who lives there doesnt work, infact I lived on one for 6 months before we bught our house and all but 2 families did!

It also doesnt mean you are poor, when we did live on a council estate the family in the flat above us had both been professionals and had huge private pensions, you cant tell people "er sorry you earn too much money you will have to move". The family next door had three business and two properties as well. Although that baffled me as one of the properties they let out was beautiful and the flats we lived in were err not.

TinkerBellesMum · 23/09/2008 14:27

In case anyone hasn't worked out my little maths puzzle. If my house at 30k had been paid off in 9 months by putting all of a bin mans salary into the mortgage, he's earning £40k.

georgimama I'm not sure what facts you have studied but I'm sure you haven't come to them by the same way that some of us have on this thread. My Resident job is to work on budget for the asset management side of the HA, one of my other jobs is to sit on The Forum - which is one level below The Board - we set the topics for The Board to discuss so again I'm involved with budget. Private landlords are allowed to set their own rent and they are allowed to make profit on it, HAs and councils aren't. We have a set amount we can charge and at the moment we're being told to lower the rent, out of that amount we have staff to pay and maintenance of the estates. There is no left over to line anyone's pockets because the only owner of my property is me.

I think it's perfectly reasonable for anyone to decide where they want to live. Living in HA gives them different rights (I know I'd prefer the rights of HA than private) and they know they're paying for what they get, not to line someone else's pocket. I like the idea that when my toilet floods at 2am I can have someone come out and fix it before morning and I have nothing to pay because I already did. If I owned my own home I couldn't do that and a private landlord isn't going to like being woken at that time.

I second what has already been said about our rent subsidising others rent because we have joined together with other HAs to create a group and we pay for a company to look after certain areas of maintenance over the whole group.

justaflyingvisit · 23/09/2008 14:28

Here's another curve ball then girls, what about my mother - she has lived in her council house for 36 years, since i was two. It has three bedrooms and a huge garden which is her pride and joy - should she move to make way for a family as she is now a widow living alone?

justaflyingvisit · 23/09/2008 14:30

40K for a bin mans job?? excuse me while i go online for an application form for DP!

DaphneMoon · 23/09/2008 14:33

Would someone from the HA come out at 2 in the morning to fix a leaking toilet?

I rented (privately) for 3 years and although I would not have been able to get someone out in the middle of the night, I too paid in advance and anything I complained about was seen to immediately as per my tenancy agreement.

georgimama · 23/09/2008 14:43

"My Resident job is to work on budget for the asset management side of the HA, one of my other jobs is to sit on The Forum - which is one level below The Board - we set the topics for The Board to discuss so again I'm involved with budget."

I can't even begin to decipher what that means. I'm thinking it's basically a public sector non job, where people get paid for doing not a lot that no one would notice whether it was done or not. Paid for with my (our) taxes, with which you then pay for your cheap housing. Great.