To be seriously worried the new govt are looking at cutting child benefit...

[cherrymama]

to 'middle class' families?What does that mean?We both work but have four kids and losing that income will seriously affect us...so please tell me IABU and that it won't happen!

'I am pretty sure that WTC will be cut and the figure that's being bandied around is for families earning over 50K.

We earn just about 50K in our house and we claim £38 p/month in WTC.'

You do not get WTC past £16,140/annum.

You get Child Tax Credits.

They are two separate things.

I know this would be pretty catastrophic for some but there really is no money. Some really hard decisions have to be made (and probably should have been made before now). If we didn't have the stupid child beer trust fund or the HIP grant then more money would be available to those who really need it. And I do think that CB should be means tested in some way.

I agree with expat.

I think child benefit should be means tested and most adults should work. If you can afford to be a sahm/d because your partner earns a lot then great but in general once children are in full-time school then adults need to be returning to work.

Sorry Expat, you are right. I had WTC on the brain after reading this thread.

Well, we will be stuffed by this Government. We fall into the 'just earning too much' to escape any of the means testing.

We will be worse off because of the NI rise - which will cancel out the rise in the personal allowance.

The loss of child benefit will cost us £56 a WEEK. This is REALLY significant for us and will affect our weekly grocery shop (we don't do luxuries, we just about manage to get through the week).

There are various 'unfair' taxes - for example VAT on petrol. If VAT goes up to 20% this will become EVEN more unfair, as they apply VAT AFTER the fuel duty is applied, so you pay for the petrol, pay the duty, and then pay VAT on the whole amount.

Whether or not the cabinet are taking 5% cuts in salary, I really don't care, they are still on £130k.

As I understand it everyone should save the same on the £10k threshold, but obviously this will have the biggest impct on the lowest earners. It should save each of us £700 a year so between two thats £1400. People like my TA on just over £11k will only have to pay tax on the £1k over the £10k she earns.

Even though a joint income of £50k sounds like a lot, when you have lots of debts from uni to pay off (which is where most higher earners have to go to get their £25k+ jobs), it doesn't actually go as far as you'd like. My dh and I have tens of thousands of pounds of debts each to pay off and we've had to sell our souls on ebay since my salary dropped (maternity leave). It breaks my heart that I have to go back to work so soon and now we also have to factor his childcare costs into the things we can't really afford.

One of the things that always used to be said about cb was that it's usually paid to the mother in 2-resident-parent families
Have seen plenty of threads on here where the family income appears to be pretty 'comfortable' but the woman actually really depends on cb, esp if she's a sahm.

I wonder if they've thought through the fact that for a large number of women in this country, child benefit is the ONLY income they have coming in that is independent of their husband/partner?

As services here become more 24-hour, it's possible for both adults to work and swap shifts/work patterns and not have to use childcare or juggle it out once the kids are in school. Ditto days off when children are ill and on holiday.

It's not easy, but well, as my dad always said, 'If you want an easy life, don't have kids.'

tsc - IHT changes have been shelved

I've been and read the Guardian article. What it's saying is that cutting CB to the middle-classes is one of the proposals that the Treasury are putting forward - proposals that had already been drawn up under Labour.

The paying to women also is used to protect their pensions - if you are receiving CB, then until your child is 12 you won't be penalised for not making NI contributions, otherwise you will hit pension age and not get the full state pension. Wonder if they've thought of that. Oh wait a minute, they'll just wait for people to hit that age and then hit them again by not paying the pension.

That's kind of how it works for us, Post.

I work 8 hours a week, just because I didn't really like the idea of having NO money of my own. DH pays all of the bills out his salary and I get my salary and CB and my salary paid to me. I will be flat broke if CB gets cut. Totally flat broke. Still, no point fretting over it until we know what is going to happen for definite

Oh goodness no

It makes you hope you don't get a pay rise!

Tittybangbang, if the woman can stay at home on the husbands wage then surely it should be joint money so she wouldn't just be recieving cb?

I voted Tory too and am certainly not an idiot.

People need to realise that we are in huge debt as a country and, unless we want to end up like Greece, then we need to cut spending asap.

I'd happily sacrifice my CB/CTC if it meant more people kept their jobs and the country make some impact towards our huge debt. Given the limits quoted we would not be affected anyway so its not sour grapes.

Too many people had children and then relied on state benefits to provide for them or to "top up" their lifestyles / work less hours etc. Yes, it may mean some people have to work more or some SAHM mums have to work but providing for your own family should be down to yourselves and not the state.

Laurie - I agree with you. Once children are settled at school then both parents should be working rather than relying on CB or CTC or whatever to top up the monthly income.

tittybangbang - I don't see that as the government's problem though. It is up to a couple to manage their finances to the satisfaction of both.

Well dh and I couldn't work more hours than we do. Dh has 2 jobs (1 FT, 1 PT), I have 2 PT jobs, and do about 8 hours self-employed work each week. We can't afford child-care and have to juggle the children. I hardly see dh.

As a result the Govt will 'reward hard working families' by taking nearly £3k a year from us in CB, and that's before we factor in the NI/VAT rises.

That's true. Child benefit used to be paid to the mother as cash in her hand, in case the father was feckless and was spending all the wages on beer.

Re an earlier post - I somehow don't think that cutting things will be aimed only at those earning over £100K. My guess is that the bar of "a good wage" will be put rather low.

I also think that for those with young children, and childcare being so expensive, and so many jobs paying such a low wage, that "well go out and get a job" is not very helpful. A lot of people can't, not without ending up worse off than where they started. Even if you take all their benefits away that will still be true. With childcare as it is, it's still more cost effective for one parent to be at home.

I suppose there's always the idea that one parent works days and the other nights, but is that really the way we want our society set up? Is that something we should be telling people they have to do?

I am also a bit that they are going to get rid of child benefit, that (like the NHS) is "untouchable" in the national psyche. Child benefit for every child in the country is quite fundamental to us somehow. There will be a lot of upset if they get rid of that - far more than other things.

Like I said, I work 8 hours p/week. My DS is 3 but when he goes to school next September, I am going to want to work full-time or close to full-time again. However, it's stressing me out already thinking about finding a job that will give me hours that allow me to take DS to school/take time off to look after him during school holidays since I have no childcare and sure as hell can't afford to pay for any.

"sorry,before you accuse me of scaremongering without checking your facts,take a look at the Guardian and Daily Mail wrbsites today..it's one of the top stories."

OP - a link in your OP may have been helpful.

The problem is the people 'just' over the threshold are hit EVERY time by cuts. If you're a bit richer then you have more of a buffer, but when you're literally just over the threshold of where the cuts bite, it is miserable.

'It should save each of us £700 a year so between two thats £1400. People like my TA on just over £11k will only have to pay tax on the £1k over the £10k she earns.'

It will be phased it.

VAT and NI will rise, so this 'savings' will be negated quite a bit, particularly if the Working Tax Credits are cut as well.

Sorry, but the government just can't factor in debts people went into into decisions like this.

It might well, however, in the future make more people compelled to work and study simultaneously and make more universities have to be more flexible with regards to timetables.

This can work for instructors and lecturers, too, and allow them to take on work in non-traditional hours that fit better round their schedules, too.

It's not going to be pleasant for many of us, but it's a done deal now: there is a Tory/LibDem coalition and they are going to make big cuts.

I'm not happy, either, but this is no time to sling mud anymore or play the blame game.

There will be no election for another 5 years.

Times will have to change, more adults will need to go out to work, hopefully more work will be created as the demand for 24-hour services increases, etc.

I think it should stop for the richest people, not necessarily "middle class". Victoria Beckham gets her child benefit still which is ridiculous