aibu in thinking that the couples on the news

[TheUsefulSuspect]

shouldn't have had a first child, let alone a second if they think there 1 Bedroom flat is insufficient.

Why do they think they deserve to be rehoused?

smokin yes tre, but here for example if we lost the house we rent atm we'd havt to move from catrchment, if then after 6 months we had another move of school because landlord pulled out.... far from ideal (esp. if like us you have asd kids who physiologically cannot do change).

Rin when we moved here 5 years ago we were quoted £900.... must have gone up since!

Maybe Mum had experienced a shit landlord? Ours now is to die for but last one thought shjower leaking on to leccy box was OK because we had a separate bath (hardly what we were handiong over our hard earned for- uniusable upstairs bathroom and a leccy box that had been leaked over5)

another raving liberal here who agrees with custardo.

The welfare state is a safety net there to create a more level playing field, to provide basic standards of accommodation, health, nutrition. It isn't there to enable you to have exactly the family size you want. If you want more than you can house, then you may have to put up with less than ideal situations.

Again - I'm with the personal responsibilty -how hard is that to grasp? A few people on here are brave enough to say it but out in RL MOST of the older generation have that opinion.

Where has this sense of entitlement come from? And no I don't think having a child is a right. What about what's good for the children. Can it be really much fun for them when Mum has just popped out her eleven child?

Contraception brought in smaller families for a while (my grandfather, like many, was one if 11 and lived in a tiny cottage). COntraception was seen as progress, Being able to have less children and give them a better life.

I didn't have children with 2nd DH because we couldn't afford a bigger house and as I have a teenage DH and DS, I didn't want to force them into sharing with a toddler. My DH has no children - we got a puppy instead! As we own our property it's not like we could go to the council and ask them to pay the difference in the mortgage for a bigger house,is it?

Agree with custardo on so many levels!

Do most of the older generation agree? I don't know, but in my experience many of the older generation think it is utterly bizarre that many people now don't get married or have children until their thirties, because they want to have X amount of money and a certain lifestyle first. A generation ago having children young, at the start of a career so on a relatively modest income, was the norm.

"Since when is it ok to have kids you can't afford? I had it drummed into me endlessly as a kid 'study first, get a job, sort yourself out and then have kids'.

It doesn't always work like that - it didn't for my sister - but I have limited sympathy for people who can't afford a decent lifestyle for the family they have, then they decide to make the family bigger.

Discussion of rich and poor is as always on here, irrelevant. Most of us are neither. But I believe that people on low incomes have as much innate intelligence as anybody else, and so should be able to work out that if life is a struggle with two kids, it's going to get exponentially harder with more."

Well said.

Didn't see the TV clip but can imagine it and what was said. Some people believe that they are not responsible for the choices that they make.

I cant believe that maternity pay is being compared to someone on benefits! It's hardly a state benefit - yes the employer can reclaim through the PAYE system but its nothing at all like being on benefits. Why would anybody want to take maternity pay away?

I'd rather increase maternity pay for those that work and pay into the system than pay for those that dont or have no intention of working but expect the state to support them and their lifestyle choices.

There are thousands who stay on JSA for years or claim IS (even with the recent changes IS can still be claimed for 7 years by single parents). Some will never contribute into the pot at all.

We need to take the welfare state back to being just that rather than allowing people to use it as a lifestyle choice. If parents choose to have children/more children whilst already on benefits then they should do so in the knowledge that there will be no extra state support. CB/CTC could be capped to 2 children. JSA/IS should be time restricted to say 12 months and after that should only be paid in return for x amount of voluntary work.

Many countries operate benefit systems which are far more effective like vouchers, payouts only after x years contributions etc - they seem to run an effective state support system but not one that can be chosen through choice.

If we had a good overhaul of the system it would restore funds back into the pot and may even mean more money for schools, hospitals, equipment for disable children etc.

she may not have to pay removals twice - she may get a landlord that doesnt sell from under her and spend 5-10years in the same private house. Some of these do exist.

and £500-£1000 a time?! last time we moved I hired a van at £85 and roped in as many people as I could (in the end 3 of us, but we still did it in a day) I had no ideas removals were so high!

so 2old4 what about unplanned opregnancies?

thats my fear in many ways i guess, contraception can fail.

I agree haviong more than 2 without believing you have the means to cover tyhe cost is is less than responsible (I dont agree no children at all- that would affect those on benefits from no choice such as disabled women with dh carers after all).

But life doesn't always go to plan- like us you can genuinely believe you can afford (a year took us both out, dh redundancy, me caring) or you can be unlucky and have a contraceptive failure.

I presime we mean pregnancies rather than babies btw to allow for 2nd births being multiple?

Wgat if someones child is dying..... jyst they wait until that cjhil dies before complewting a faimly? what if that makes them too old?

Ohy and what about blended famillies as well-
if X and Y get together and have 2 children each what then?

Smokein that depends on how easy that is.... we did the same but as we moved 60 miles and that included a toll bridge still cost us £300 with several journeys.

A lot of cash.

PreachyPeachyRantsALot unplanned pregnancies? Most forms of contraception are very effective if used properly. I have got pregnant only twice, when I wanted.

The arguement on here seems to be about having endless children when you can't support them.

The point is that we don't get everything in life we want. Why should having a child be viewed as a right by everyone?

HappyMummyOfOne Well said!

No contraceptive method is 100% safe except sterilation: the figures given depend upon safe usagfe but say if a method was 99% safe that still means that 1 of every hundred women using it would fall pregnant. That safe figure seems to srop for non hormonal methods so women like me who can't use trhem(and for whome hysterectomy is not recommended either- DH is on long waiitng list for vasectomy) are at increased risk.

1% seems like a tiny num,ber but of all women say taking the pill it isn't really, its an awful lots of women making horrible decisions.

"Do most of the older generation agree? I don't know, but in my experience many of the older generation think it is utterly bizarre that many people now don't get married or have children until their thirties, because they want to have X amount of money and a certain lifestyle first. A generation ago having children young, at the start of a career so on a relatively modest income, was the norm."

No. You saved. My grandparents saved.

There wasn't such a thing as a lifestyle then, you had a life. You weren't going to get any help: you knew that if you had children you had to mind them.

That's not true really

Dad was the second yongest of 16 kids, son to a sick mum and an alcoholic Dad. he leived on an estate specifically designed for peole like them of which there were many (he's 65 btw not ancient history but most boirn before welfare state).

They were still born, just that they ate whatever they could steal or hunt (hedgehog for example, also salmon as poaching was relatively easy). Most days they ahd bread and jam.

Dads tarted work at 5; at 11 he passed his 11+ but didn't go to Grammar as family couldn't afford the cost of uniform etc.

On my other side Grandad was one of 11, born on a farm becuase kids were cheaper than hiring labour.

The idea that people will definitely stop having babies is wrong, some (a very few) who specifically do it for benefits might, but it didn't ahppen before and it woudln't again. Just as before those people would grow up in horrendous squalor and deprivation and the rest of society would waggle a finger and say well it's the apents fault.

maybe, but damned well not the childrens!.

Peachy you're taking it completely off track.
So what if X and Y get together and have 2 kids each, they can have as many more as they like as long as they don't start bleating that its someone elses responsibility to house them and pay for everything for them for life.

The welfare state was not created so that anyone and everyone can have as many children as they want.

Peachy was responding to me and I was responding to someone else who was wondering about how things used to be. If she's "off track" she was led there

Not all contraceptives work all of the time. Trouble is that there are plenty of people out there who don't even use it as they know that having a baby is a solution to them - not a problem.

If you're in private housing already and have more children it's you're problem. If you are in council accomadations then it's everyone elses problem!

Have read half the thread and have to go out but would like to comment. There is no reason for the family in the OP to not have another child, nor is anyone suggesting that. But they need to be prepared to continue to live in a one bedroom with their 2 children. As many families so. Children in the bedroom, parents in the lounge on a sofa-bed. Job done all happy.

But of course if the parents aren't too keen on the old sofa-bed idea then they do retain the option to, eh not have another child.

Thanks rain

'So what if X and Y get together and have 2 kids each, they can have as many more as they like as long as they don't start bleating that its someone elses responsibility to house them and pay for everything for them for life.
'

Because what is the sense behind a welfare state that says if you have 2 kids in two homes as single aprents then OK we'll help, but if you amalgamate them, cost us less in HB, TC's etc, and provide 2 loving carers, then we will stop paying for two.

That seems to defeat the whole object really and prevent people getting back on their feet.

It's also wroing that council costs people more than private: if HB ic clamied as rents differ and limits are set as maximums rather than absolutes. A person in a 3 bed council may well cost less than someone in a 2 bed private, and you reallise that many people in Council housing pay their own rent right? my aprents are in council and never claimed HB in their lives.

Ah I see, I missed that bit .

I think some of us are talking a little at cross purposes. Personally I'm not really talking about rules or regulations or stopping anyone doing anything, I'm just commenting on the attitude.
I have no idea what would be good in terms of rules and so on (and don't live in the UK anymore anyway). I just can't abide the attitude of entitlement that a minority of people in these situations have, and I don't think its a bad thing to be a bit judgey about people who made their bed and then want someone else to give them a bigger one to lie in.

Preachy, but children in horrendous squalour and deprivation would be a matter for Social Services just as they are now. My dad was one of 7. They lived in a small house, and my Grandad was a postman. It must have been bloody tough going, but both him and his brother went to Grammar School. They had a poor upbringing sure, but not a "deprived" one.

I'm sure my Grandma never really wanted that many children, and in these days of contraception there would no reason for her to. I know there are accidents but properly used, it is extremely effective.

As this "stop at (notional) 2" was my idea, I think that in cases where 2 separated parents with 2 children each got together, there should be some room for maneouvre, but the State should stop short of extra support if they wanted another baby at that point, for example.

Well said runnybottom if only I was more articulate.

Will problem get flammed but here goes...........Statistics were revealed last week that now 57% of all single parents have NEVER lived with a partner whereas 20 years ago 15% of single parents had NEVER lived with a partner! What the statistics didn't say was how many of those parents where supporting themselves and how many where expecting the tax payer to pick up the tab for their lifestyle choices. Interesting.........

Porto, i've worked alongside lkarge famillies with children badly needing removal and SSD saying no: it doesn';t work. Shame, but true. plus surtely SSD would be massively needing to up their family numbers if soem famillies are left to fsster with only 2/? children covered. I mean famillies not expecting penury, those who really thoughht it would be all OK.