The "Down with this sort of thing" picket. There is a burger van and you can wear your donkey jacket and fingerless gloves

[KatieMiddleton]

Fed up of the cuts? Fed up of the mislead bigotry? This is your sanctuary. Unwind. Vent. Pop over to the frothers thread if you feel like getting organised and doing some proactive stuff or just chill out with a cup of builders tea in a polystyrene cup.

Welcome.

Pag was going to tell us something nice about PagBoy

I have stayed away from the freds, as I cannot post coherently on them. Did just go and look at the one where Valar was (I think) so appallingly abused. Had to go for a lie-down in a darkened room.

Can I have some narsty coffee rather than tea? I've brought some doughnuts and I'm wearing my donkey jacket and DMs.

I'm in!

Just seen my town is starting an occupy group. Anyone been involved with them?

yy, lovely calm visions of TeBoy in his grobag, now we need some Pagboy love.

Am I allowed to shoot just four people?

Mrs H KitchenRoll Maypole bumbley

just as a start?

Awwww TeWi he is sooo beautiful

Bless. That calmed me right down.

I don't think you'll get any different responses from the brazier than out on the threads, spike.

Spike but why do you think it's a good thing when it could hurt so many people?

Hully, I loved your thread (and I may have taken the BANG! approach on another thread too). I was stunned by the stupidity of some people posting though (not you Spike).

The only hate I see is for the poor and/or inadequate who might not be able to hack it in our society for whatever reason.

Ok (needs no prompting)

I taught Pagboy how to use the email and have let him send occasional emails under my supervision. He is very excited that he is due to go out with a friend of mine soon and really wanted to email her about the day out. I kept 'in a minute'-ing him.

I suddenly got floods of emails. All saying stuff like 'er. Ok. If you like I would be happy to but you know I live quite far away'

He had sent 'hello, I want to go to cinema and gave popcorn and sprite. We will see the muppets. I love you. Pagboy' to about 50 people in my address book

I used to work in Kensington. I never met anybody who lived on benefits there. They all lived in the ghetto of White City or in shoddy private rental/B&B type places in Earls Court. Not nice places but still extortionate. They could move but often their childcare is family and they don't have enough spare cash to afford a move.

I worked in the bank so I knew the actual state of people's finances.

Spike, sod bloody kensington. The proportion of anyone on full benefits living there is totally, ridiculously insignificant.

What about the ones in cheaper areas of London who, despite the 'thousands' will actually be living on 62p per day between them after rent and essential bills are paid?

Think again, Spike, because some will. Such is the horrific state of the cost of living.

Oh Pag that is marvellous. Bless. Now I want to go to the cinema and have popcorn and wine sprite

Spike 26 is poverty when you are left with 62p a day after essential bills and rent - that doesn't include food.

So 62p a day for food, emergencies, clothes, travel, etc.

You try it and not starve or have to use a food bank.

Spike, seriously, it isn't like that. They don't get an envelope with 26K per year.

I'm not arguing in here. This is the respite brazier. I'm exhausted.

A breakdown example of a family receiving weekly benefits at the capped level from the huffpost

"£392.31 for rent (the allowable rent for Tolworth, typical of a cheaper property)
£39.06 for council tax (Kingston Council, Band E)
£28.18 for gas and electricity (DECC English average + 20% for large family, in 2011 £s
£7.21 for water (OfWAT UK average + 20% for large family)
£6.00 for telephone/broadband - the cheapest BT anytime package

Starting from £500 means that you have £26.23 per week left over for the family, which is 62p per person per day to the nearest penny.

We can argue over these exact figures. Clearly the family could choose to be cold, or to shower infrequently to save money. But against that, private rented housing is typically less well insulated, the family are at home every day, so energy bills may be larger still. I have not included a mobile phone, or any calls to mobile phones, or to 08 numbers not included in the basic package.

In any case, even after rent and council tax, the family has only £1.64 per person per day to live on. No alternative figures will make any difference: this is simply not a living income for a family with four children in private rented accommodation in a cheap part of outer London"

The vast majority of claimants are not 'lifestyle' claimants, and frankly who the hell would want that as a lifestyle?

This example family could easily be a family affected by the constant redundancies that are ongoing, ergo they had their children back when they could afford to.