Another potential chop to CB

[scaryteacher]

www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/politics/conservative/8047447/Conservative-Party-Conference-George-Osborne-to-take-another-bite-out-of-child-benefit.html

crazy, so more teens will leave school at 16, where are the government going to get all the jobs from??

I know, I read this earlier. It means that my DC wil not be able to sit A-levels or do a college course, as if they stop CB at 16yo, the CTC will also stop. With no income coming in for the child, and DP only earning £16K, there will be no way my dc wil be able to educate themselves out of poverty. I'm very . about this. My DD has learning dificulties, wil fail her GCSE's, and the only hope she had of getting ANY job was to learn a trade at college. Won't happen if they do this.

ELitism at its worst. Keep higher education for the rich, and keep the poor poor, with no hope of the next generation bettering themselves. You can't even get a checkout job these days without a C-grade GCSE in maths and english. Which DD will not get.

Will they open workhouses for people like DD who aren't able enough to get good enough grades for a crappy job and aren't rich enough to have parents who have savings to feed them for 2 years with no income?

oh but they will be expected to work to support themselves....... but where are the jobs??
seems like the government don't realise that people are soon going to be loosing jobs at an alarming rate.

i wish someone would take a bite out of George Osborne

as far as I know children don't stop magically costing you money once they hit 16

The school leaving age is increasing. It will be compulsory for them to be in some sort of education. Another poorly thought through idea from George.

Maybe 16yrs olds could just eat gruel and wear rags?

Why are children being picked on so much?

Odd photo - makes George Osborne looks like he's surrounded by UFOs.

Wish they'd beam him up.

Beam him up and anally probe him.

Exactly my thoughts missanneelk

I have worked with many young adults who have left home because their parents couldnt afford to keep them. Bloody sad.

I suppose that EMA will stay, so those on lower incomes can claim that for their kids. That's more than cb; maybe that's why they are cutting the lesser amount?

Doesn't automatically mean that CTC will go for 16-18's or EMA, will have to wait and see. Now this would have affected me if it was in place now. Trying to think if it would have stopped me letting DD stay on to do A levels. No it wouldn't I would have gone out at night and scrubbed toilets instead.

OMG, here we go again

Why do they insist on throwing scraps of news our way and let people work into a frenzy before they release the full story? It's cruel.

I don't get it either, as children will be forced to stay at school until 18. How is this workable? Esp for the worse off?

And no qualifying statement about how disabled and SN won't be affected.

Don't think they are actually increasing the school leaving age but saying they cannot leave unless going into approved training. Shop work could be NVQ Customer Service, Building/Joinery an apprenticeship etc.

I knew this CB cut for higher earners was to bury the real bad news further along the line. That's why the reaction amongst the 15% highest earners losing £20 min a week was annoying me so much.

have to say I am wondering what the knock on affect will be for us.
if they were to stop it now.
dd is 15 and will be going to a college(hopefully the one at her school, but the LEA want to move her to a cheaper option, which is crap for her)
I wonder if they could magic up a job for her.
so what do you think?
severeley disabled, wheel chair user, needs one to one for all her needs and assistance in all tasks......
wonder what she could do?

seriously it is a fucked up idea.
as someone said if they are making staying on to 18 compulsory how could they consider doing this?

There is no EMA if household income is over £31k. Can't see that threshold being increased. Where we live the catchment school is 12 miles away and the bus costs £500 per year. To be honest, this doesn't affect us as we are losing the child benefit anyway and will survive (although by 2013 will we still have jobs at all?). The point is I do know people that it will adversely affect. Again, it's poorly thought out.

Oh great abouteve. The poor kids can just go and work in a shop - let's just call it training. Even better if we call it training there is no need to even pay minimum wage - job done!

The more I think about this the worse it is. Imagine if they stop EMA as well, I will cry. Children from poorer households having to find paid employment at 16 (albeit on a training programme) instead of doing A levels and going to Uni. God knows what they are going to do about Uni fees aswell.

We will find out what it's really like under the Tories soon and that these HRT payers are still the lucky ones.

I am so glad I brought DD up under a labour government for the past 10 yrs or so.

MissAnne, I haven't looked into it properly but just supposing that is what it meant. They cannot force people to stay on at school surely, that would be so wrong.

'Why are children being picked on so much?'

dunno CF, maybe George doesn't like kids
maybe some nasty teenagers were mean to little georgie once and he's getting his own back

Whichever govt was in, these cuts would have come sooner or later.

In Scotland, EMA payments are only being guaranteed until Christmas this year. Because of budgetary constraints, EMA might be scrapped by the Scottish government as of January 2011. There are also no bonus payments this year and the threshold has been lowered from 31,000pounds to 20,00 for those with no other school age children and 22,000 if the applicant has school age siblings.

If CB goes for this age group as well, then so will CTC, then many young people from low income households will have no choice but to leave school because their parents will have nothing to keep them on.

Scaryteacher - cuts would be made but not necessarily these cuts.
From a personal point of view, so far, although we have lost our child benefit, we have got off lightly but I do have concerns about DHs job and my small business will almost certainly be affected. What I really object to is the unfairness of some of these things and the - not insignificant - number of people caught in, as The Times laughably called it, the wrinkles.

Stressed, that's terrible, at least you get Uni tuition fees paid. How much warning did you get about the EMA?

Mine has it this year, year 12 and just hoping it will remain for the next year as well.

Not good for the ones coming up behind her though.

The economist's take on the budgetary fights are that William Hague seems to genuinely want to sort the benefits system out in the UK - as he didn't quite work out as Tory leader, this is his new tack. GO, on the other hand, wants to cut as much as poss., from whereever possible. They're not allowed to touch the NHS (they've already said as much) and William Hague's reforms of the benefits system will be costly in the short term (as he intends to try and get rid of the massive drop in earnings, or stop in earnings, people get when they go from unemployment benefits/JSA to work), but ultimately cheaper in the long term. But, they want to cut 40% and GO doesn't want to cut too much from government services.

Seems the solution is hacking at CB.