Cap on benefits to 26k- am I missing something?

[buggyRunner]

As far as I can gather it's the normal benefits ie housing/ cb and wtc. This seems like a large sum. Is it accross the board or does it include disability related benefits? Are the figures misleading?

Couldn't agree more TIBS.

I don't think it's about disposable income, it's just about income.

It's all housing costs, everyone has to pay to house themselves somehow. Some do it through renting and the money going to a private landlord, some do it through mortgages and the money going to the bank.

But like I said, at least those that rent don't have to worry about finding the money to make basic repairs to the house which will keep them warm and with flushing toilets and the like.

Look at my figures up there. All those numbers are for us living in the same house, paying the same council tax. As low-earners - BOTH WORKING - on 17k a year we were topped up by nearly 10k a year.

When UNEMPLOYED we were expected to live in exactly the same house and the same situation for less than our wages had been.

We had much LESS disposable income as unemployed people, and it was lucky that we had been working before and had saved a little because we wouldn't have managed without it.

Look at the real numbers. Don't imagine figures.

Yes zephrine, and you will have worked to pay for it. Some people work and won't get that, but that's life. And it doesn't amount to much if you are forced to sell it for care in your old age anyway.

I fear it's no use TeWihara. If nothing else this government has enormous talent for PR, and this £26,000 figure is proving mesmerising.

Zephirine - there's a flaw in the logic that doesn't assist with paying the mortgage when someone falls on hard times. They lose their home and end up in the benefits system, probably claiming way more in HB and other benefits than a few months of mortgage payments.

Perhaps HB payable across the country should be the same, with a London weighting - same as public sector pay. What the hell does a public sector worker in the south east do?

zephirine - I had to move out of the area I grew up in because I couldn't afford rents there. I moved somewhere cheaper, I then moved again because I wanted somewhere larger and couldn't afford larger places in the new area. My journey times to work have doubled and my neighbourhood isn't half as nice as where I was before but those were choices I had to make as I was paying my own rent. Perhaps the government should have "topped up" my income so I could continue to live in a nicer area? Strangely enough through all of this I never once whinges about being socially cleansed out of areas or the emotional trauma of moving from where my friends and family live.

I use toomuchkitchenroll you would be humming a different tune if you had been living underneath me last Feb. My bathroom floor was collapsing and HA wanted to wait a whole MONTH to fix it.

Public sector workers live in all the shitty areas that those who don't pay for their own housing deem to be beneath them.

Gaelic I really can't see that the state can take on the responsibility of people's mortgage debt.

I assume you are joking about the public sector and the South East but I don't quite get what the joke is about.

carer - my friends have got a leak coming through their ceiling and have had to wait SEVERAL MONTHS before fixing it as they just don't have the money.

I'm not joking. In my specialism my wages would be the same in the south east of England as they are in northern Scotland. Hence I live in northern Scotland and could never afford to take a job in the south east.

But a collapsing floor which is giving way and taking the toilet with it could give way and kill the tenant underneath.

carernotasaint

You are right, I'd be humming a happy tune that I had a HA who would fix it for free. As opposed to now where I'd have to find someoen AND pay for it myself.

The state should pay the mortgage interest to keep people afloat while they sort themselves out. Not capital, just interest to stop them losing their homes in the short term. That's just common sense - not much of that around at the moment.

Oh, do you mean how do public sector workers in the south east but not eligible for london weighting manage?

Yep!

carer - what do you think low income property owners do in that situation? You are in a better position than they are.

the flats above mine have had numerous leaks. the managing agent is shit. the latest leak has been going on since october & i emailed them only yesterday.

my ceiling has been mouldy since... ..sept? & that is in a 400k 1 bed flat!

It is not free.
A. we pay a charge along with the rent.
B. My husband is in his sixties and retired so hes paid in too.
C. Hes also not full of resentment for others even though he has stable chronic heart failure.
D. You could have guessed from my username that i might care for a chronically ill or disabled person but you didnt WANT to see that.
You just wanted to see Ooh HA =free housing.

Sorry, gaelic, misunderstood completely. I think London Weighting extends quite far out, so if you are working outside the zone you will generally be in commuting distance of more affordable areas.

Maybe I wouldn't be happy about it carer, but then nor was I happy when we had to wait two weeks before we could afford to have someone round to fix the broken boiler and restore heating and hot water last November.

We had to wait and pay for the privelidge.

carer - I am not sure how any of your last post is relevant. Unlee we are all meant to say "oh you're a carer therefore you can never be unreasonable or unrealistic about anything"

If you are so happy to pay for things I would suggest you organised to sort the bathroom floor out yourself, rather than complain about the fact that the HA didn't immediately jump to it.

I'm very pleased that the Bishop's amendment to exclude child benefit from the cap was passed in the Lords.

The cap will save very little money - may very well cost money in fact, if families are made homeless and councils have to pay for temporary accommodation. So the motivation is purely ideological. It's designed to appeal to the lowest common denominator, to people's sense of grievance that someone might be getting something they're not. And to judge by this thread, it's doing that very successfully.

Josie - The ORIGINAL people who bought buy-to-let in the 80's are the only ones letting to HB/LHA tenants. NOT a contradiction at all, when you bear in mind that that statement was made wrt Margaret Thatcher bringing IN the RTB.

No, they are not CURRENTLY sleeping on the streets, they will be when UC cap comes in. Because in the Lords tonight, the tabled amendment for an exception to the cap for people who are at risk of becoming homeless, or those in expensive Temporary Accommodation, was passed. Meaning that if you can't pay the rent in your current home, and are made homeless, the local council will put you in temporary accommodation. That may cost £200+ a week. If this then takes you OVER the UC cap - you will be evicted from teh TEMPORARY HOMELESS ACCOMMODATION. Where will you go then? THE STREETS. It hasn't happened yet. But it WILL.

So it was NOT the 'rise' in housing benefit that pushed rent prices up. It was the fact that DEMAND for social housing outstripped the SUPPLY.if this was true due to the present slump in the housing market there will be many more properties being rented out as owners cannot sell , this will result in/will have resulted in a fall in rents but this has not happened due to subsidy by tax payer This, you have got the wrong end of the stick. Or don't know the subject matter on which you opine. SOCIAL HOUSING IS NOT owned by private people. SOCIAL HOUSING is the council and Housing Association properties. So who exactly is selling them? How can more SOCIAL HOUSING be rented out when the government isn't BUILDING any more?

WHY isn't a cap on private rents for the whole country possible? Genuine question? No Landlord, whether the house is in Newcastle or Central London, being able to charge more than a certain figure per week in rent. Why wouldn't that solve this whole crisis? YES some BTL LL's might not be able to keep up with their mortgages on that BTL property, but then the repossessions from that would flood the housing market, thus dropping the prices of houses to a level that first-time buyers could afford. With NO huge Housing Benefits bill, as no LL would be ABLE to charge that figure. Just like the old way it USED to be.

And as for having a house in Notting Hill repossessed - if they were made redundant, they then WOULDN'T have a huge income any longer, hence having their home repossessed (DUH!). So they would be housed by the council in that local council area.

NiceGuy - 65% of Housing Benefits claimants WORK FULL TIME. Full Time. 15% work part time. Maybe due to caring responsibilities, for young children, for special needs children, for an adult child with disabilities, or the claimant has disabilities THEMSELVES that preclude them from working FT. Then just 20% of benefits claimants are unemployed. and a significant portion of THOSE are not expected to seek work due to having a child under 5yo, or being in receipt of ESA, a DISABILITY BENEFIT.