Apparently there will be a rethink on the scrapping of child benefit

[emkana]

according to the times today.

If they could look at the fact again that a household on 80k will keep it while a household on 42 will lose it then I'm all for it.

Sorry, I meant if I earn £43,001

apologies daisy I misunderstood your post. Ignore me

tiredfeet

No. In fact I don't have a problem losing it if the process by which it is done is fair. It's a tough old world at the moment, we have enough, and I believe the country has been overspending for ages and needs to cut back.

However, I would be annoyed were a household earning almost twice as much to keep their benefit on a technicality. Nobody's talking about people on £25k each, we're talking about closer to £40k each.

Child benefit does not 'allow' me to stay at home and live in a nice house. Don't be daft. At the moment in fact it all goes into savings for the children.

But if it was done on "households" earning over £40k then that would catch those people on 2 x £25 and to me it seems more unfair if they lose it than if a household with one sah parent and one hrt earner loses it. (And, I should add, my dh is higher rate tax payer )

But if it was done on "households" earning over £40k then that would catch those people on 2 x £25 and to me it seems more unfair if they lose it than if a household with one sah parent and one hrt earner loses it. (And, I should add, my dh is higher rate tax payer )

I'm with DesertOrchid on this one - what they are proposing is unfair and that's why I'm against it. Why should we lose it because I'm a SAHM and DH is just in the higher tax band, but our neighbours could both be working and bringing in 30 - 40k more household income and yet get to keep it? That's just wrong.

Desert, if you can afford to save it for the DC's then perhaps you don't really need it, it's was a lovely to get and save or spend it on luxuries but those days are over for many families.

I just wonder how they'll police it. What if you get a pay rise/decrease? Do they contact you? Do you have to tell them? What if your salary varies month to month? Seems like it may cost more to administer than it will save.....

Child Benefit should not be changed at all because neither the Liberal Democrats or Conservatives mentioned they were planning to cut child benefit as a universal benefit in their manifestos. If either party had put this in they would have lost a lot of votes and possibly wouldn't be in government.

Prior to being elected David Cameron talked of actually paying mothers a few £100 to stay at home with pre-school children. Not only did he not end up offering this, but he is forcing more mothers back to work as they might not be able to continue to be SAHPs after losing child benefit. Obviously others are losing out too not just the SAHPs.

As I understand it, the HR taxpayer is going to have to declare on his/her tax return that the family are claiming CB. Then the CB will be added on to the tax bill.

CB is still going to be paid to all women - it will just be clawed back through the tax return.

Is it enforceable though?

Also, apparently if the HRT'er pays the excess into his/her pension and it takes the earnings below the threshold they wouldn't have to repay the CB. www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/experts/article-1705585/How-40-taxpayers-can-keep-child-benefit.html

There is a limit on the amount you can put into a pension so not really an option for some to try and evade it. Also if you can afford to put it into your pension again it means you don't actually need the money.

It would be an option for those just over the threshold ie £1,000 over the threshold but have three kids - your CB is over £2k a year so it would make sense to put the £1,000 into your pension.

It obviously wouldn't be an option for those earning a lot over the threshold.

The govt reckons most families who have one HRT'er are on £80k a year or more. Probably true but it doesn't make it fair on those that are just a single-earner household on £44k who will lose - because there are still many of them.

I'm a SAHM and DH is higher rate so we will lose out - so unfair.

Most parents have to pay childcare costs or give up a job to become a SAHM and the loss of income hits hard especially in these times of rising costs. Child benefit should be available to everyone regardless of circumstances, we are after all bringing up the next generation who will contribute to this country in the future and we have made financial sacrifices to do so.

Many people in this country would never have voted for the government we have now if we had known this would happen.

Many people didn't vote for them. The majority didn't actually. Sorry if you did and now are regretting it. They probably won't touch your CB when push comes to shove, they will instead just continue take money off softer targets, but that's OK isnt it, and you can vote for them all over again.

Gosh I hope they do, I really want the money.

This assumption that all wives of hrt.ax payers stay at home is drivig me up. The wall. Could someone just acknowledge that it os not so black and white as sahms losing it dh is a hrt and works really long hours. I had to give up a professional career as I was at the start of it and not earning enough to justify childcare. We had the dcs, and I have taken a job which covers childcare and petrol. I work for a charity. If we lose the cb (242) I will. Go back to not working, as I will then have no income to top up the costs of work.
All circumstances are different.

I'm sure NOBODY voted for a coalition government ....

I work part time, hubby is JUST on HRT and we will have yet more money taken away that we have come to rely on - that is what gets me the most.... you see it as a universal benefit, you use it in the day-to-day pot and now they plan to take it away.... so something has to go.

No one I know personally has seen it as a jolly little extra - child tax credit being taken away because they decided to change the rules was bad enough.

How do they expect the economy to recover when they put less money in the family spending pot. When everyone has spent all their savings, since interest rates stink, where will we get the money from to prop up the economy?

Are we all going to borrow it again and restart that vicious circle?

i wasn't going to add to this, but i will.

typically, people earning less than 40k are moaning about how hard done by they are and how deserving they are and how someone on 40k is loaded. the 40k earners are saying it's not fair compared to the 80k family.

The whole point here with chb is that the proposals are riddiculously unfair. If you take your own situation out of it and look at the bare facts:

why give a household CHB who has 80k and not a household who has 40k.

how would we feel if they applied this to housing benefit? or pension credits?

That'll be next Lego That'll be next...

Tiredfeet: it's not a SAHM issue. It will hit lone parents too.

There is simply no justification for different thresholds depending on profile of household income. It should either be universal, or based on household income like CTC.

FormbyDoula: thanks for the link. It's the of the wedge in terms of independent taxation. But a straightforward approach "this is household, you must apply together" is far better than "person X, you must on pain of a fine include information about person Y on your tax form whether Y consents or not".

Also that link makes very good points about weaknesses of this system as we do not have real time taxation. If bereaved, separating, fleeing, made redundant or just suffering a downturn in usual income - will an April tax return based system be flexible enough?

DH is a HRT but only just. And the only reason that he goes over the threshold is that he works overtime to get it. This is compulsory overtime that he must do so has no option to reduce this to make him under the limit but he actually works all hours some weeks. I think it is unfair to take a benefit from us as a family who earns just over the HR when a family has 2 earners who earn just under each, gets it especially as they may not have to work as many hours to get it.

I do work but my hours have been halved already due to the cuts (work for a charity).

We are not well off and this money will definitely be missed. If we have to lose it then fair enough but the unfairness of it not being on household income really annoys me.

Summerblaze, if this does come into force then get your dh to increase his pension contributions to bring him under the limit. It will probably cost less than you'd lose in cb and you have the extra contributions too.

If someone on a lower income "adjusted" their finances to claim extra benefit they would be shot down in flames. Somehow it is a good thing to do if you are a HRT who could probably do without the money rather than needing it to put dinner on the table.