Do you feel bad for receiving a ‘high amount’ of UC?

[AnotherNameChange1233]

Last week I went to my local Children’s Centre and attended a Citizen’s Advice group that runs once a week.

As long as you’re registered to the Children Centre, you can turn up for any advice needed. Some people want privacy so they go into a side room with the advisor and some parents may help other parents if they’ve been in a similar situation/can offer the correct advice. It’s also like a social group for parents, hopefully you get the jist of it.

On the table I was sitting on, one parent was trying to get her head around UC as she didn’t quite understand LHA rates, how DLA impacts UC and what elements she would be entitled too. Anyway, I started speaking about my experience with DLA, UC and offered to log into my UC account if it was easier for her to look at the breakdown visually (instead of me talking and complicating things). I also got her postcode to explain how the LHA rates work and etc.

Another parent suddenly spoke up and said, ‘don’t you feel bad for claiming that much money?’ She wasn’t argumentative or anything and we had an interesting conversation but it made me think, are people like me supposed to feel bad when receiving a certain amount?

She also said something like (I’m paraphrasing here as I can’t remember it exactly word for word) if people can’t afford their rent then they should move to a more affordable area. I raised the point of Landlords purchasing properties as part of the Right to Buy scheme, charging extortionate rent which taxpayers then pay through UC. Surely, it’s more a problem that there isn’t affordable rental properties in many areas.

For full transparency, I’m going to mention all of my UC amounts and wonder if people that claim similar, feel bad?

• 292 single person allowance
• 1450 private rent
• 539 for 2 children
• 293 for 2 disabled children
• 589 childcare costs
• 189 carer

£216 is deducted from my entitlement due to my wages. That means my UC amount is £3133. My wages is £771. I receive two amounts of MRC through DLA which is £580 all together.

Now that I’ve written it down, it seems like a whole lot of money but the costs that come with raising one of my disabled children (the other still costs a lot, but not as much as the other) is through the roof due to their issues

One of the main things that should be tackled in this country is parents (mainly men, let's be honest) walking away from their kids.
The CSA or whatever it's called this week is an absolute joke.

The men are usually on benefits as well.

You’re right, maybe this is where I went wrong to be honest. As I was explaining all of the elements, I could see that I was confusing her so I thought it’s best if I offer to show her so that she could see what I meant for herself.

In hindsight, I probably could have stepped outside of the room instead of showing her at a table where others were present. Or maybe just not offer to show her my personal claim at all

I have a daughter, and let me tell you, £2.6k is not nearly enough to stop her from being petrified seeing her mum having a seizure and not knowing if I’ll be ok. It’s horrific.

You are vile for saying that. The pain and suffering I have endured you wouldn’t even realise. All for money?

Really? You know uncontrolled epilepsy can kill you! Would being dead better your family?

This place sometimes 🤦‍♀️

I know little about UC, but have always believed anyone who in dire need of support should be helped by the state. That said, it's very hard to swallow someone receiving the equivalent of £63k a year when I'm struggling to earn half of that in full time employment. I am staggered people are receiving so much money.

Yeh, funny how that just dawned on you now, isn’t it?

And yet, here you are again…. Showing your whole entitlement.

Why should people be able to inherit 1 million pound tax free? How is this fair?

Someone will correct me if I’m wrong but once they become adults, I’ll no longer receive the child element and disabled child element on my UC claim. I’m not sure if I’ll still be able to claim the carers element though. Child Benefit and DLA will stop too.

I know that as adults, the children can claim PIP and UC themselves but I’m not sure how it works if they aren’t capable of doing so. I believe I would be their appointee but as my children aren’t close to being 18, I can’t tell you exactly how it works, sorry!

There's always loads of stories on here of men going self employed to get out of maintenance too.
Makes me so annoyed.

Do you think they will ever be able to live independently as adults?

I think PIP is 16.

I’m not healthy too anyway, I’m an asthmatic, but you said would I swap, yes I would, because at the moment I don’t have great health anyway yet only being home 1.5k. An extra £800 a month for the rest of my life would be life changing for my kids, and in my eyes, they’re more important than me and if I could give them that I would, even if it meant trading epilepsy with you.

That is a lot of money.

I do not believe benefits should be any more than "average" earnings.

One of my children receives DLA and I have child benefit for two children.

I am not entitled to any other assistance as we earn too much. However I work part time - unable to work full time time due to child needs and have a partner.

We receive no help with rent, we do not qualify for carer element. After all bills, we have little left and continually in debt. I could quit my job tomorrow and claim all the extras but I'm not that sort of person, I need to work for my mental health. Having a disabled child is tough and it gives me time to be myself.

Honestly the system needs a full overhaul.

Would I feel bad receiving over 3k a month from the government? Yes, yes I absolutely would! Yes your children need to be housed, clothed and fed but every time I bought any type of luxury, had a night out, spent £4 on a Starbucks or whatever I would feel mortified, that it wasn’t my earned money.

When I was 28, I was made redundant, people told me to sign-on and claim job seekers allowance while I was looking for work. It was £60 a week. I felt utterly ashamed, I hated it.

Quite.

I wonder if @Creamandtan fancies coming and telling my daughter it's OK that her Dad is no longer with us because he left her relatively wealthy and that's the most important thing after all.

It does utterly bonkers and totally enraging that somebody can claim this level of benefits in this country. When I think how many hours I have worked, not been home to see my kids out of school and into bed every night for years to make ends meet yes it sticks.

I really wish I hadn’t seen this thread. Single mother of two, working full time, paying mortgage, no benefits other than CB. I am thinking to myself why bother.

I have asthma….you understand that people die from that yes?

So, all in all, how many people are reconsidering possible benefits reform having sworn before that benefits were a pittance and anybody looking to slim down the system is a heinous bigot who want to see the workhouses brought back?

This is London, anyone will say anything to anyone’s face. I’ve also seen her at the Children’s Centre many times before so she probably felt like she could say something.

She also seemed as if she blurted it out whilst hearing me speak and the conversation went from there. We were hardly going to start arguing at a Children’s Centre were we?! It was simply a civil conversation with opposing views

In case anyone doesn’t know about Right to Buy and the impact it’s had

The Right to Buy scheme is a policy in the United Kingdom, with the exception of Scotland since 1 August 2016 and Wales from 26 January 2019, which gives secure tenants of councils and some housing associationsthe legal right to buy, at a large discount, the council house they are living in.[1][2][3] There is also a Right to Acquire for assured tenants of housing association dwellings built with public subsidy after 1997, at a smaller discount. By 1997, over 1,700,000 dwellings in the UK had been sold under the scheme since its introduction in 1980, with the scheme being cited as one of the major factors in the drastic reduction in the amount of social housing in the UK, which has fallen from nearly 6.5 million units in 1979 to roughly 2 million units in 2017

It’s not that social housing has failed to keep up with increasing demand. It’s that it was deliberately sold off, at a discount.

You're claiming what you're entitled to and that's fine. Your post makes me think that absent fathers absolutely should be made to pay for their childrens' support. But in a patriarchal society single mothers are villified, in a way that responsibility shirking absent fathers are not.

Yes, I do. I have it too. I'd still pay every single penny I have and more to have DH back.

Same. Scraped for years to get ourselves on the property ladder and having been struggling to make ends meet during the CoL crisis. Should've stayed in rented accommodation.

I mean, £63k a year! I just can't wrap my head around the amount.

I do think we need to hold women to account who pop out baby after baby with crap men and expect everyone else to foot the bill, sorry I know it’s feminism wrongthink but we’re all adults