Universal credit - Child element details

[Orwellian]

I just had a look at this; ssac.independent.gov.uk/pdf/uc-draft-regs-2012-memorandum.pdf

If you scroll down to page 9, point 45 it says;

"The child element comprises of two rates; one rate for the first/only child and then a reduced rate for second and subsequent children.".

So it looks like what is currently child tax credits will no longer be paid at the same rate for each child and will instead (within universal credit) be paid in the same way that child benefit is now paid. I wonder what the rate will actually be for first children and then for subsequent children?

I feel for the north-west. When does the trial start?

" Those who live off their backs are not so constrained but perhaps now they might be."

Xenia, that is a disgusting thing to say.

tripletipple I can't get that link to work.

This is madness. It's well known that there are not enough jobs for every single unemployed person to have one.

If this rule also affects workers claiming HB on NMW, this is going to be disastrous!!!

It is too much for me to digest tbh. I can't even contemplate what kind of govt would cause hundreds of thousands of families to be evicted, even when they are working full time, simply because they do not earn enough to pay the rent.

The more i hear the sicker i feel....
Im a single mother to 2 boys (not by choice) working 16 hours as my dads pa (he has alzheimers).

I work a damn sight more hours than that though as im there 6/7 days a week, during school hours and often afterwards. (Its awful to get paid to look after your own parents btw...)

Im pushing my children to achieve academically so they hopefully will avoid benefits of any description, but this universal credit makes me feel like im not doing enough. I dont know how much more i can give. Im already nearing breaking point.

What does this government want?!?!?!
Im doing my best, but nothing will ever be good enough for them!!!!

Xenia I went back to work when all the babies were 2 sweeks old. People can. They have just got lazy and reliant on benefits

That is quite a ridiculous suggestion. Many people are not fit for work 2 weeks after giving birth. And most people would not advise it and regard it as seriously neglectful of your newly born child's needs. What a stupid thing to write.

Also, if there was full employment I would have some respect for your argument. BUT there are 2.6 MILLION people unemployed. There are few jobs available - about 50,000 net gain in Q1. This fact is ALWAYS ignored by people like you. You are thick and bigoted. Shut the fuck up until you have something intelligent to contribute.

Luckily I live in a country with freedom of speech. Not everyone is fit to work at 2 weeks but plenty of the full time working squeezed middle who rely on no benefits do work very hard without any state help and the country has got a bit fed up and simply cannot afford to pay in benefits what is has been paying.

IDS' new system when in force will be a force for good. He is a good man with good plans.

Xenia, rights come with responsibilities. You may live in a country with freedom of speech but that also means that people have the freedom of response.

You are deeply privileged. You may take the view that your position in life is of your own making, but the fact is that your circumstances allowed you to rise to your position.

I have always admired your industrious drive which is evident from your posts. I have admired your success. However, your posts lack the humility which makes great people truly great. That humility, which recognises that were circumstances different, life also would be very different, is what both you and the leadership of this country lacks, at the detriment of both our current and future generations.

When financial segregation takes place, when people who cannot aspire to professional careers are forced to move Northwards, will you deem it a success that people who would previously have taken professional jobs are doing low paid jobs? Those jobs will still need doing, you know. Rich or poor, if you are old and incontinent, you will need someone to administer intimate care. Rich or poor, if you want to eat in a restaurant, someone will need to wash the plates.

If the ideology of the Leadership is that benefit claimants are somehow illegitimate, then they need to increase the NMW to lift full time workers out of the benefits system.

You forgot to include childcare workers, most of whom are low paid. Hard to work when you have no childcare because they can't afford to keep going.

Absolutely. I am more than happy with response, bring it on. It's fun. If I wanted to be into some kind of yes men club aren't we all lovely I'd mix only with free market libertarians. Plenty of people in the UK only associate with other Guardian readers or golf club members or stay at home mothers or whatever their own grouping so they can each pat the other on the back and always support their views. That is very dull. I can instead convert everyone to my views and thus I improve the planet - doing God's work if I use the words of one of our better bankers.

I have never said I had no advantages. One is that I am never ill (although mind you I don't eat junk food, don't drink, don't smoke etc not fat and do a raft of things which mean I am healthy). Another is I was born reasonably good looking, certainly not in Samantha Brick levels... laughing... but I don't look too bad and that alone helps people get on at work. My IQ is reasonably high too which again is an advantage which is fairly random except both my parents were clever and married each other so I suppose in a sense that was cause and effect.

The difference between left and right is not that one cares and the other doesn't despite the left thinking they have some monopoly of caring. It is that the right has the better way to achieve that.

I do not castigate people for claiming benefits if they are entitled to nor claim pension tax relief (arguably being morally "repugnant" but lawful tax avoidance) if they are entitled. People can only work within the system where they are. If the system is not working we change it. The 59% who want benefits tights so the squeezed middle suffer less they are probably right - I am in a massive majority on this issue. Markets decide. If there is not enough work here people go where there is work. My suggestion if young people cannot stand living with a parent they move somewhere with work si not at odds with the new under 25s policy at all. If your parents are awful or you aren't prepared to camp on their kitchen floor or sleep in the bath then go where there is work even if that's abroad or find a job which is live in.

Xenia, you're probably not familiar with the concept that the mark of a civilised society is how we treat those at the bottom of the pile.

As an article in the Guardian put it yesterday, this is worse than the Victorians. At least they distinguished between the desrving and undeserving poor. This treats all poor as automatically undeserving. Just for the crime of being poor.

It is ridiculous that someone could work full time yet still not have enough to pay the rent. This is a failure of the free market; or rather, the markets are not free at all. If markets were truly free, house prices would have fallen by loads. As it is, they have been propped up by historically low rates, QE, etc etc etc. When we have a situation where big, hugely successful companies are gifted hundreds of thousands of free workers, with wages paid by the taxpayers, under the guise of workfare - this is not free markets working well, this is the worst kind of corporate bailout - like the banks privaitising the profits in the good times but socialising the losses when they'd fucked up royally.

Free market my arse.

Sorry littlemiss hopeless at links.
Google "universal credit" then click on the dwp page that appears at the top of the list. Follow the links to draft regulations published on 15th June 2012. You will have to click through 3 times to see the full document. Part 4, chpt 2 covers House Costs Element.

Thanks tripletipple.

I found it. I also remembered that in the document OP showed us in the OP, the decision to stop housing costs after 2 years was limited to those people who would be under the full conditionality rules.

I don't think anyone working full time, even for NMW, would be under full conditionality rules. My understanding is that it will affect people who are unemployed??

Does anyone know what groups of people will be under 'full conditionality' under the universal credit?

What you also forget Xenia is that of the 2.6 million people unemployed there are many who have paid taxes for decades. They have been the 'squeezed middle'. They have paid taxes so that when they lose their jobs they will be supported until they get another one. That could be a long time with unemployment rates so high.

The Universal Credit sytem will stop supporting those of the EIGHT million people who work part-time are are low income as a result. Easy, they get full-time jobs you say..... but 2.6 million are already unemployed and the rest of the 8 million will be after those full-time jobs too. Failure is built in. This is the wrong time to attempt this change.

My other real worry is that if your children are 13 or older you will be expected to work full-time. But many, if not most, children of 13 are not responsible to be left for the 13 weeks school holidays, times when they are ill and the couple of hours either side of the school day when their parents are at work. It will result in many social problems and unhappy kids.

Austerity is a problem caused by the economic system that benefits the rich minority. It is the poor majority who will suffer the results. What's New?

Most 13 year olds not responsible to be left on their own in the school hoidays? Really? Sounds like learned helplessness (obviously excluding SN).

I don't know anyone who works who pays for childcare for a 13 yo, because they cannot afford it and don't think its required.

we have to change this way of thinking that I Cannot Be Expected To Do... And Someone Else Needs To Pick Up The Cost.

People are capable. How did we get her?

Her= here

When DS was 13, I was working long hours, 3 days a week.
I didn't finish work until 10pm, and usually got home by 11pm.

My mother sat in my house and was there to supervise DS when he got home from school.

It depends on the child, but imo, very few children aged 13 are happy to be left completely alone (no siblings/neighbours/friends with them) until 11pm with no one in close proximity to call on.

The world becomes a different place when night closes in, and there are a good many adults on here that are afraid to be left alone late at night. The slightest creak/noise can appear much more frightening in darkness, as opposed to daytime.

FWIW, I would have no problem whatsoever with leaving a 13 year old to fend for themselves if I was working 8am until 5pm, but for less sociable hours, maybe not. Like I said, it depends on the individual. Unfortunately, many people are going to have to take jobs with unsociable hours as the pressure to find employment (any employment) increases.

Perhaps if so many people can no longer pay their rent, then landlords will be forced to lower their rent or have an unoccupied property rather than having it subsidised through housing benefit?

That may be possible if the tenant could afford reduced payments, but in the case of the people on FC, I'm not sure many of those could afford to pay any rent if their housing costs were cut to nothing.

Take for example an unemployed couple with 2 small children, if their rent is not paid via housing benefit, how much would they be able to afford to offer as a reduced rent??

Good idea, but only if housing benefit are only paying a small percentage of their rent in the first place??

Sorry to barge in, been lurking as i have been worried about the changes. I work 25 hours a week with 2 school age children.....posted a message in money i think, a couple of weeks ago but i just had to say that Xenia reminds me of Katie Hopkins who was on The Apprentice.....

does anybody know the basic rules and elegibiity regarding UC ?????,ive read some of the white paper but considering its due in next year their dosent seem to be a plain text explaining the guidlines etc

im sure some of us are going to be in for a shock

"91. There is to be a time-limit of two years on payment of housing costs to claimants in the full conditionality group of Universal Credit. When such a claimant has received help with housing costs for a period of two years these payments will stop and will not be reinstated until a claimant has had a break in claim and has served a further waiting period. This is underpinned by the principle of providing short-term help through the benefits system and because it is not considered appropriate that this help is provided indefinitely. This is intended to focus the help that is given through the benefits system on those on low income when they need it most."
The FUCK? You don't suddenly stop needing support with housing costs, if you're receiving them in the first place.

The Government is so out of touch with reality, it's scary. :(

full conditionality group = job seekers only, so people who havent found a job in 2 years.