How are you feeling about the upcoming budget?

[Bess34]

Just wondering how others are feeling about the upcoming budget? I’m feeling quite nervous as my DH is a higher rate tax payer (approx 70k pa after overtime and bonuses) I work part time (wouldn’t be any better off working full time anyway) with 3 children and expensive mortgage (rent wouldn’t be any cheaper) we’ve not been able to afford even a week in a caravan in the UK and had to cancel DC school music lessons and modest Christmas presents are all on having to be put on credit cards. As it is when my DH tries to earn extra doing overtime most of it goes in tax and a reduction in child benefit. Just very frustrated at the thought we might be seen as ripe for a tax grab, just because most people without children on 70k live very comfortably on that amount

Well then don't complain about lack of money.

Never thought I’d say this but I miss Rishi Sunak.

They really really do not, your children have lessons and clubs which are a privilege for many. And why don’t they have days out if you have national trust membership? That’s on you. You might be feeling the pinch but your children are lucky and have more than many and everything they need.

This national trust membership of £13.25 a month is doing a lot of heavy lifting 😂
btw only £8.65 for a single parent family 😁

No, you said your kids don’t have days out, but you have membership for days out… so do you take them to national trust places on days out or not?

No not at this time of year typically but do I take my kids out the house to the park or other free/extremely low cost activities then yes, do they have days out at Legoland, the cinema etc that most of their school friends go on, no (quite a few whose parents are on UC) - 1 such day out typically costing far more than our entire annual NT membership

So they do have days out, and swimming lessons, cubs and beavers, other ‘clubs’ according to your list, as well as new bikes as birthday and Christmas presents. They don’t worry about food and have secure housing. They have plenty and are doing fine, it’s daft to pretend otherwise.

You seem very keen to point out that parents on UC take their children on much more expensive days out. So just another benefit bashing thread then…
I am always surprised that posters have such detailed knowledge of the finances of their children’s friends’ parents.

Exactly!

I’m extremely worried she’s going to make more cuts to essential public services and we will struggle even more to balance the school budget, have less police, less investment in the NHS (especially with all these houses going up we need more schools and healthcare not less!). I would like my local library and leisure centre to stay open, my child’s EHCP to be sufficiently funded and my grandmother to have a shot at getting an ambulance if she needs one.
I’m on £30k a year so not a super high earner but I think my husband will be hit by any tax rises. It would mean we had less disposable income which would be annoying but we can’t afford to cut public services further, people are already dying.

Martin Lewis has a load of sensible suggestions which will really help many people. Fortunately he has been and had a meeting (meetings maybe?) with the Chancellor. It’d be great if she’d take him up on some of his recommendations at least.

You are the one who is clueless, your figure includes many children who have far more than ours, I have been a single parent with a child on fsm and still have quite a few friends who are on the benefits whose eligibility these figures are based and I can tell you there children generally do not have less than ours. Honestly they would laugh at the fact that you’re counting the opportunity for our children to visit an old house, windswept moorland or their grandparent with dementia in a nursing home as some great privilege when the monthly cost of our NT membership and cubs and beavers is less than they spend on their weekly takeaway or monthly cinema trip, trip to the fireworks, to see Santa etc. They also do cubs and Beavers to at the grand cost of £13 a month. Btw if you read my first post we’ve had to cancel their music lessons. Consider the swimming lessons a luxury if you will but I’d rather not have a teenager who drowns. I don’t begrudge friends of mine for also having that in the slightest, it’s great that children don’t generally live on get kind of poverty that existed in the 80s and 90s. I’ve just put in the figures to a benefits calculator and calculated what we’d be on if we tied up our equity into a shared ownership house, both got jobs earning 25k each to become eligible for UC and we’d be better off than we are now

Cheap bikes as their one birthday present, I don’t live in a wealthy area at all and most of the children would get a fancy bike as part of their birthday present or just purchased just because they’ve grown out of their old one

It’s not benefits bashing as I believe all children should have at least the standard of living my children currently have and from what I see the overwhelming majority do. Good friends talk, I know what jobs they do and how much they earn and how much they are entitled to, all information clearly available on a quick google search, they are not working for PwC but in job roles with a set published hourly rate. Their fb profiles as plastered with their latest trip to Legoland, Turkey etc. I was a single mother myself. They generally afford such things as they receive child maintenance on top of any top up benefits or its paid for by other relatives. Those on UC without either generally have a similar standard of living to us. I think it’s great we’ve got a welfare system that provides this but just wouldn’t be fair to increase our taxes even further when we’re already worse off than if we earned significantly less and became eligible for UC

Honestly I’m mystified as to what you think NT membership is and how do you think we get to the properties, a free shuttle service for members? Maybe suggest a visit to look round a Georgian mansion to your 11 year old, I mean I’m sure they’ll be talking for weeks with their friends as to how exciting it was 😁

What are you going on about? I assume you drive there as you have 2 cars, why would I think shuttle bus?

You've not mentioned the age of your kids, if you aren’t using your membership in the winter and feel so annoyed you can’t afford the cinema why not pause membership over winter and take eldest kid to the cinema? Sign up to kids pass on the month free trial and get cheap cinema tickets etc. Im sure you will have an issue with that idea too though, you clearly know everything and think nobody else knows anything.

Worried as a business owner, home owner and parent. I cant remember feeling so stressed about an impending budget.

people need to lay off the OP. it’s bananas that some people get more from benefits than they would in work. We are incentivizing people to not work.

benefits should be less than minimum wage. If there is a health/disability element that is different - but otherwise it should be less than you can make from work.

People don’t get more money from benefits than they would working. Even OP hasn’t suggested that

Exactly. If your children don’t enjoy visiting these places, why pay for the membership?Tbh the national trust properties near me all have activities for children at Easter, Xmas, Halloween etc and seems like a good value day out.

actually one million people in the UK get more on benefits than they would if they were working

https://www.centreforsocialjustice.org.uk/newsroom/welfare-pays-more

£1400 pm mortgage payment suggests a mortgage of £230-250k……

And you’re investing in an asset you will one day own and probably pass on, or which will pay for a decent care home in old age. Your benefit claimant friends won’t have that.

You can’t just pause NT membership over the winter, you pay for it all year or not at all. Do you not realise that petrol costs money?? Are you even in the UK (outside of London) given that you don’t even seem to have much of an idea of what NT membership is? I can already get cheap cinema tickets with my blue light card but after the tickets, petrol and parking it still costs too much, aswell as having to tell the children no to the popcorn and drinks. We buy microwave popcorn from Asda and watch a film on our sofa at home, that’s what she did with her friends for her last birthday

@Bess34 , if I were you, I would walk away from this thread. I think you have posted in good faith. You are part of the sqeezed middle. I am sure there are millions of people around the country that feel just like you. There are many different perspectives on, and yours is valid.

You have a pack of posters hounding you and picking apart anything you say. It doesn’t feel curious ir constructive. I’m going to hide this thread now. I don’t enjoy watching people be bullied. I suggest you do the same.

Except the ones that already own their own homes, the value of your primary residence is completely disregarded from the assessment of UC. Most of that £1400 goes in interest and we’ll be past retirement age when our mortgage ends