to dread a Conservative govenment?

[tryingtobemarypoppins]

As a teacher and mother I feel I should dread Conservatives getting in.....

often the EMA helps really poorly paid families provide the food for the kid staying on in education, believe it or not some kids from poorer families were encouraged to get out and get working so they could contribute to the cost of family life, this helps those kids who aren't keen to ruch into full time employment at least have the choice.
10 weeks what's to say that kids taking home EMA don't have part time jobs as well, the few I know in receipt of this do work but the EMA helps their low paid working parents out. I can't see a problem with that. I also really can't see kids staying on in education for £30 a week.
Captianpeacock EMA is not only for non working parents but for those who are on lower incomes and FWIW there are a lot of kids not on EMA who are disruptive and unmotivated.
Jeez people give them a chance.

I agree with the EMA. Poor children get the EMA and better off children get money from their parents. How on earth can anyone object to this?

I agree with captainpeacocks comment that many of the EMA pupils are disruptive and unmotivated, but this is a matter for the college principal, and these people should be expelled - like people used to be in the "olden days" - behave badly and expelled. Why doesn't anyone do this anymore either?

But back to the OP.

This labour government has borrowed more than it can pay. The longer it is in power the more in debt this country will become.

Your children will end up paying for all the things you get. Whilst suffering from major cutbacks themselves.

My point still stands. I am not in a position to pay my dcs £30 per week, which would actually be £240 per month. I was one of the families where we went to work to earn money to pay into housekeeping as it was needed to keep the household going. It still doesn't make it right. We have had parents, who aren't supposed to be involved as it isn't their money, the money is supposed to be for books and transport, phone up to query why the EMA hasn't been paid as they need it to pay THEIR mobile phone bill. And yes we have had students who have said to the head of year that they are there purely for the EMA. This is a fact and something that is very hard for the people running these courses to cope with.

I can see that was what EMA was intended for but that is not my experience.

EMA goes directly to the child and, in the cases of my child's friends, is used as pocket money. They go to town on Saturdays to spend it, while my daughter spends 7 hours working in a shop to earn the same money.

I actually don't disagree with EMA and the way that public spending has gone to a large extent, what I would be soo glad to see the back of is the vast amounst of legislation that has been and continues to be introduced where everyone and thing is tied up in knots, and monitored and controlled; the standardisation of everything, bah!!

Many EMA recepients also work in shops 10weeks.

So your dd works in a shop and has a reasonable family income and an EMA recepient also works in a shop but has the EMA because they have a poor family income.

nametaken... that is fine if they give the EMA to parents for food etc but my experience is they don't!

We may have a 'reasonable' family income but we also have a mortgage (it's not a big house) and younger children to support. I, like Captainpeacock, can not afford to give her £30 a week 'because she goes to school'

To answer the OP.

YANBU.

POlicy schmolicy. We all know what the tories stand for. DH is a tory and always trying to convince me they have changed, they are alright.

Bollocks say I. Rich people giving each other a leg up. They don't give a monkeys about poor people, about redistributing wealth, about making things fairer and better for all. just the content of their own wallets.

And so it will always be.

vote lib dem

If teachers who run courses are finding it hard to deal with a few kids who say they are abusing the system then it's a sad state of affairs. They are getting well paid to run the courses last time I checked (i'm not saying that teachers have a great salary BTW but they get paid more than the average person in the country).
Plus can you imagine what it's like for a kid who does get EMA to get it taken away by a parent for a mobile bill? Be thankful that your kids don't have parents like that.
Also you don't have to give your kids £30 a week just because the government gives this out, these kids may include those who have parents who don't value education as much as you and by providing the EMA may give these young people the only chance to get a further education.
I really dislike your labelling of young people in receipt of EMA because of the few who may be abusing the system, it's dangerous and nasty.
Your point may stand about you not being in a position to give your children £30 a week but would you really want to go back to the days where only wealthy kids went on to further studying. I woud have qualified for the EMA had it been around when I was at 6th form and it would have helped me considerably, just as minimum wage would have helped as I was slogging my guts out for £2 an hour and trying to revise (by candlelight naturally!!)

Lovelytinofspam great name btw!! Vote lib dem....... now there is a option.

And while we're on the subject, since this bloody labour government came into power I have NEVER seen so many people young people with such bad teeth due to NHS cutbacks.

humph!

Well I'm sorry but I don't think that you understand the school that I work in. Most of the people running these course are instructors and not teachers and have not had the same kind of training nor are on the same kind of money. EMA is definitely the reason that a large majority of students stay on. £120 a month is a lot of money at 17, especially for a 25 hour week. As I have stated earlier, I also would have qualified for EMA. It is ridiculous to say that only wealthy parent can then afford to put their children through further education, because we are definitely not wealthy, and like 10 weeks have large outgoings with our mortgage. However, as stated I would not be able to afford to fund my dcs in this way.

Have I stumbled on loonyleftmums net?

"800,000 children lifted out of relative poverty

would this have happened under the conservatives?? "

Wtf is relative poverty? It is bollocks. If everyone can afford to drink champagne but some can afford Cristal and some only Moet & Chandon does that make them relatively poor? Yes it does.

Does it make them poor, no it doesn't.

The real poverty in the UK is not poverty of not having the right trainers it is the poverty of demotivation and lack of ambition to try and improve yourself. Every child in this country has an opportunity to go to university and to enter pretty much any career they went.

If you're born into poverty in Africa or Asia, you have no chance. No money, no education, no chance. The real problem in this country is why people spurn the opportunities they have, and don't give a fuck that their kids after 15 years of formal education can barely read and write.

I dread it. A lot.

My family are vunerable. Although both me and OH work we are on a low income and rely heavily on top ups.

OH has MS so is likely to stop work at some point. DS2 has special needs so I have to limit my hours (and because of OH).

I remember the last tory government and their attitude to families in need. It was all very much survival of the fittest. Unfortunately we are not very fit

But captainpeacock children from reasonable income households don't need £30 a week, because their parents can pay for many of the things that children from low income households don't have.

Absolutely right Someguy. I see it every day.

btw the fact is that the Tories were brought to power in 1992 by women, and that hasn't changed - the Conservative party are significantly more popular with women than men.

I could have fun with most of these points but these are the ones which really caught my eye for their breathtaking naivety and/or sheer twisting of the facts.

1. Record levels of literacy and numeracy in schools

You're having a laugh, no?

15. Devolved power to Welsh Assembly
    And...?

16. Record number of students in higher education
    Large numbers now in debt, and with worthless degrees. Many would have been better off going straight into the job market.

17. Negotiated the historic Good Friday Agreement in Northern Ireland
    Which John Major started

18. Banned fox hunting
    Bad news for foxes. More are now dying and they're not all the old and sick ones which hunting tends to kill.

19. Overseas aid budget more than doubled
    Most still going to dictators who have terrible human rights records

meh either way

But that's the point captain and I are trying to make. We can't afford to because our disposible income is no better than some that qualify

Well that is subjective nametaken. Just because we don't earn below a certain level, and I am not talking about people like chegirl here, who obviously are obviously working against difficult circumstances, doesn't mean that we can afford to fund £30 per week, which would actually be £60 per week as we have dcs in years 7 and 8. We both work hard but there certainly isn't enough left in the pot to pay out this money. Our dcs already do a paper round which funds their pocket money, and also to instill a work ethic. It will just mean that, as 10 weeks says, they will have to work all day Saturday to earn this money because there certainly isn't enough left over for us to fund it.

I'm sorry but I just can't bring myself to feel sorry for anyone who has a small disposible income because they have a big mortgage

Well if we all went into social housing can you just imagine the strain that would put on the economy.

Many new labour policies are conservaive ( so my conservative mum tells me).

Bottom line is that labour need kicked out - who else can replace them. I have been in the health service long ehough to remember when it was shafted by both parties.....

And incidentally it's very easy for (usually middle class) lefties to sneer at middle class right-wingers like me, but the fact is that my grandparents were poor servants, but they had what would probably be sneered at by lefties as 'middle class values', i.e. a strong work ethic, a sense of shame, etc.

So my parents went to grammar school and then university and went from poor working class to comfortable middle class in a single generation.

The same values can be seen in - usually dirt poor - immigrants from India and China, I know second-generation immigrants with parents that don't even speak English, BUT despite that their parents knew what is blindingly obvious - that if you keep your kids under control, make sure they study hard, and encourage them to aim high in life - to go to university and become doctors, lawyers, etc. - then they will succeed. And surprise surprise, the GCSE results for these immigrants, immigrants that many of the posters in this thread would insist are being oppressed by the evils of 'relative poverty' and other such constructs of social marxism, are actually substantially better than those of white children. Same is true in America FWIW. Average household incomes from Asian Americans are higher than white Americans.

Showering people with benefits solves NOTHING.