What will it take for the Government to enact welfare reform?

[Schlossadler]

What has to break, before the Government is finally willing to enact welfare reform?

Its a big breach. His legitimacy is questioned by many already so I think it will be hard for him to then also breach a manifesto promise. Even though of course he didn't stand in the election he is tacitly taking on the 2024 manifesto promises.

Extend the period for which the Boris wave become eligible for benefits.
Cut disability benefits for things like ADHD and depression.
End the triple lock.
Means test winter fuel payments.
Don't allow benefits to be paid overseas.
Reinstate the two child benefit cap
Make the numbers work so that work ialways pays more than being on benefits.

The housing one I don't know but I think Kemi will have thought it out properly. Landlords are having a dreadful time under Labour anyway.

I think democracy is finished. We now have sectarian voting and also a not just significant but majority takers group who want more and more benefits and only have the mantra “tax the rich”.

Given that there aren’t enough “rich” Labour are enacting/mooting crappy little fundraisers like imposing VAT on private schools, or increasing tax on holiday homes. Things that don’t affect most people - and therefore raise bugger all money.

I think they have run out of time unfortunately. AB obviously doesmt have a plan or any intention to cut welfare. Remember not many of the PLP came into parliament to pay less benefits to people. It will be politically extremely hard for them as we saw with the winter fuel debacle.

A charmer? Hmm. Imagine, for a second, that you are constantly told you don’t deserve a quality of life, that you should be in abject poverty, that you don’t matter. I’m so sick and tired of seeing psychotic ‘we need to stop paying welfare’ shit everywhere. No one wants to live in constant financial insecurity, all the while being told from multiple sources that you’re either making up or exaggerating your disability, and that you need to work harder/more hours, and stop sponging. Can you imagine that @NorthXNorthWest? Contrary to media hype it’s actually incredibly difficult to get welfare support (my PIP was stopped earlier this year after a review assessor decided that my two chronic degenerative debilitating conditions were not impacting my ability to live independently, despite copious medical evidence and occupational health reviews and recommendations from my job) I’m now struggling to survive whilst I wait for my tribunal hearing (but it’s ok, they’ll back date the money once the panel reinstates my PIP, so it’s ok that I’m barely managing to pay my bills now)

We, as a country, could afford to support the disabled and low waged if we taxed the right people, (not the ones earning £50k, the ones earning £500k+ or international companies that are tax dodging whilst paying below-living-wage salaries in the UK) So forgive me if I get angry and sweary when I see this kind of fuckwittery day in day out. The economic models exist, it wouldn’t bankrupt the country or turn everyone into workshy scroungers, it would genuinely benefit everyone.

But no, slash benefits and welfare. That’s the answer.

Everyone seems to be conveniently forgetting how big a percentage of ‘welfare’ is Universal Credit top-ups paid to the working poor. Not just part-time workers, people who work full-time and still need UC to survive. A very quick simple fix for this is to set a true living wage as minimum wage, so that anyone working full-time doesn’t need UC, and they can earn extra and save etc by working overtime, instead of working overtime and gaining nothing because it just gets knocked off their UC.

Welfare isn’t all disability payments or to the completely non-working, but that’s an inconvenient truth that no one seems to acknowledge.

That is a record breaking stretch.

Joseph Rowntree Foundation, Trussell, Shelter, Child Poverty Action Group et al. And the best that poster can come up with is a charity primarily focused on extreme poverty and human suffering in fragile countries, dealing with very different issues and circumstances from those we face in the UK.

Hmm

No party will want to be the one to cut the triple lock even though they know they should.

Thanks for replying. I can see why you've listed those things but there are issues with them IMHO. The biggest flaw though is that none of that helps the young people who are unable to find work. To me, that is the first and most urgent problem to tackle.

We, as a country, could afford to support the disabled and low waged if we taxed the right people, (not the ones earning £50k, the ones earning £500k+ or international companies that are tax dodging whilst paying below-living-wage salaries in the UK) So forgive me if I get angry and sweary when I see this kind of fuckwittery day in day out. The economic models exist, it wouldn’t bankrupt the country or turn everyone into workshy scroungers, it would genuinely benefit everyone.

Plain wrong, I’m afraid. Those earning 500k+ are the most mobile, and many have left/are at risk of leaving. Trust me on this, or don’t.

Capital is mobile, you forget.

All of that applies to me, though it is my son, not me who has long term multiple health conditions.

Very little of that sounds like my experience. I've largely had a great experience with the NHS.

I think the opposite. I think no job, no dependents. Single and reliant on benefits.

Yes to pro reform though

Maybe. I suppose anyone can claim to move in wealthy circles etc. when the reality is the opposite.

Except everytime taxes on the very wealthy are raised, the majority don’t leave.

“SO MUCH FOR THAT: New data from the IRS reveals New York's millionaire population grew by about 2,000 people — despite the state increasing taxes on top earners.

It fully debunks the myth that higher taxes drive the wealthy away.

And here's the part that actually stings for the "they'll all leave" crowd: not only did more millionaires show up after the new tax — the number of millionaires nationwide actually FELL that same year.

New York went up, while the rest of the country went down.

The numbers come from 2023 IRS filing data — the year after New York raised its top tax rate on the wealthy in 2022 — and show the state's $1-million-plus earners grew by roughly 3%.

This is the same New York that just rolled out a pied-a-terre tax on second homes worth $5 million or more — a policy Zohran Mamdani pushed through this year, and one Trump has demanded gets "stopped."

But if the ultra-rich were already sticking around and thriving under the smaller tax hike, the panic over this hyper-focused tax deserves the same skepticism.

Every time a state or city considers taxing millionaires, the same tired threat gets rolled out: they'll flee, they'll take the jobs with them, the tax base will collapse.

New York already ran this test. The rich stayed. The rich grew in number. The state collected more.

The biggest argument against taxing the wealthy is that they will simply leave. It was never true, and now there's data to back it up.

Still waiting on that exodus.”

Absolutely, they might want to try to reform it, but the backbenchers simply won’t permit it,not as if the Tories did any better though.

Can’t it be a discussion without this stuff? It’s probably not the case but if it was a person reliant on benefits is less likely to want them cut.

Pat McFadden’s line is useful here. There are 96 taxes in the U.K. and climbing.

The OP is happy to indulge in this "stuff". Plus it is not against TG. As you often say to others, you can scroll on by if you dislike parts of the thread.

That isn't a government proposal, it has said it won't be doing it, so it won't be adding to the 96 🙂

@BendyAndTired

We, as a country, could afford to support the disabled and low waged if we taxed the right people, (not the ones earning £50k, the ones earning £500k+ or international companies that are tax dodging whilst paying below-living-wage salaries in the UK)

No we couldn't. There aren't enough of them and many would simply leave the UK (as some already have done). You could take a billion of the top 100 billionaires, and it doesn't touch the sides of our 3 TRILLION national debt. It would just pay our interest bill for a year. What happens next year, take another billion of the top 100 billionaires??

I really don't think people understand the sheer scale of our debt and deficit. Too many zeros to comprehend. It's like all those who whinge about the House of Lords, Royal Family, House of Commons subsidised meals etc - it's all chicken feed when you spread a few million saved over a population of 70 million with a national debt of 3 trillion. Doesn't touch the sides.

Ok, let’s talk finance and money.

You choose (I am not familiar with benefits tbh), but PE, equities, fixed income, trading, UHNW, macro, I can do.

And, when you get to brass tacks, it really is about the money.

I think unfortunately over 10,000 millionaires have already left the UK (we are talking about the UK on this thread rather than tbe US I understand). There's obviously also a fear of what John Healey is planning as hes being so mysterious eg an exit tax so I expect a lot more will preempt any changes and get out while they can.

Exit taxes have proven, globally, not to work.

Should the duplicitous Healey try to bring one in during the budget, you would effectively kill a significant amount of potential investment, overnight. Sterling and/or gilts would also suffer an adverse reaction.

I am not convinced that Labour are even that stupid, but I have been wrong before….

No. Not just that. The news cycle for the last 24 hrs in the UK is frankly absolutely appalling in conveying what's actually happening and the implications of this.

Today is slowly catching up but it's way behind where it should be, and I'm looking for Burnham and wondering when we are going to get past tumbleweeds for these multiple incoming crisis.

Let me spell this out. Burnham's quote about social security before national security from last week I think it was is abject nonsense at this point. And I LIKE Burnham. There is no capacity for social security if you are not economically independent enough to avoid global shocks. You get forced into a position where you have to be active rather than completely passive.

I'm reading all the threads about benefits and pensions and houseprices etc on MN ATM and going "fuuuuuuccckkkk this country has no clue what's going on".

Let me explain: Diesel is driving everything now. There is a global diesel shortage. It makes everyone in the world vulnerable. Everyone. More so than oil. More so than a lack of fertiliser.

I'll start with fertiliser though. The Iran conflict meant a huge amount of fertiliser wasn't exported from the gulf earlier this year. Prices skyrocketed. For the most part Western countries bought enough for their own production but many less well off countries didn't. So when crops which over the next six months to twelve months will be harvested, yields will be down massively. Western country are not self sufficient. But they can outbid other countries. There WILL be famine in parts of the world next year which are poor. This means significant civil unrest and that's going to affect production and imports/exports. And of course this means economic downturn across the world. As well as lots of migration. This is already baked in to what's going to happen. It's done. The moment has passed. Crops are already in the ground (or didn't get put in the ground). Food availability and price in the UK WILL be directly affected. It will be significant.

Let's talk about diesel next. Diesel is essential for trucks, trains and tractors. These Three Ts are our logistics backbone. Without them everything else falls apart. Also, what do you think cargo ships run on? There is a worldwide shortage. Oil itself is only part of the equation. It's about how much diesel you can also refine. Refinery capacity is a massive issue at this point - why?

The blockade led to contingency plans and other countries putting up production to adjust. Iraq was one of those who had done this most. They are trucking out oil through Syria under escort. That's Syria who have riots following the government there putting up fuel prices. (More instability). This is a very vulnerable and unstable route.

This week Saudi Arabia has had a massive problem with being bombed by the Yemenis. It's not just about Iran. The work around for Hormuz was the West-East pipeline to the Red Sea and the port of Yanbu (don't laugh it's a real place). At Yanbu was a refinery and storage tanks. The pipeline has been hit at three pumping stations. And the refinery and storage tanks have been hit. This wiped out the supply they had sold to Europe. Apparently a limited flow is going to be restored in a couple of days but in reality the area isn't secure so will continue to be a target. The Saudis cancelled expected deliveries to Europe for the end of September and this is thought is going to last until November at the earliest. This has left European oil companies panic buying to keep refineries going. From what I understand they've managed this at some expense (for now). The Saudis have instead refocused and their new contingency plan is to truck to Oman. This route is risky and expensive. And the oil is going to Asia not Europe. Yesterday the Saudis started to try and buy diesel from Europe. (Think about this HARD about what this implies). To get oil out to refine to diesel, Saudi Arabia is now having to import diesel which it was self sufficient in. This is effectively something of a death spiral in terms of costs and availability for Saudi oil production and exports. Unless it can fix it's security issue. And fast. The UK has refused military support but said it was considering sending advisors. Pakistan has now said it will offer support in line with it's defensive pact with Saudi.

Meanwhile, the US is largely self sufficient in diesel. It is the world's biggest exporter. I say largely self sufficient but this doesn't really fully explain the problem. The US is running all its refineries almost at full capacity. One went down this week. No production for two days now. The autumn is when the US normally schedules refinery maintenance. There isn't capacity for this (see above point about refinery going down). They import most of the rest of their diesel from a country named Canada...

That same Canada that just told the US to fuck off.

The US has said that it's considering banning diesel exports to protect prices. Except this only will bring short term relief to the US before making the situation worse because of the implications to the rest of the world and prices. It will be a disaster if they go down this route.

The UK. The UK had capacity to refine 50% of our own diesel. The rest we mainly get from the Netherlands but some from the Middle East. This makes us somewhat vulnerable. Especially with being outside the EU. Cos what might the EU decide to do? We have a grand total of four refineries - which I expect will soon have increased security if they don't already.

Libya. This week three of Libya's refineries had to go out of production due to unrest. Italy imports 25% of its diesel from Libya. Guess what Italian PM Meloni did yesterday? She had a trip to Norway. Can anyone think why?

Enter Russia v Ukraine into this equation.

Yesterday there was an air raid warning in two cities. Polish cities. There were sirens as Airspace was closed for military operations. President Tusk then did a lengthy speech detailing why. I won't go into details but it's basically about 'accidental' incidents on the border and multiple ongoing sabotage issues across Europe that haven't had a proper political response. He spoke of Russia having no where to go and putting pressure on western nations by taking advantage of issues with energy.

Russia has spent months poking Europe with sabotage attempts. Last week the Germans publicly accused them of an attack on Leipzig airport but it's not the only one - just the only one publicly attributed to Russia by a government. They have also targeted power stations. Yesterday the Dutch Railway system had a major issue due to sabotage in twenty places. These have all been infrastructure and logistics.

Within Ukraine they have been bombing petrol stations. And have started targeting border areas.

France has emergency meeting security briefing between all the party leaders. It has fishermen protesting outside oil refineries about the cost of diesel. Macron gave the reason for the meeting as necessary due to the 'significant shift in international politics'. This is highly unusual.

The energy price cap is due to be reviewed in Jan. Martin Lewis is reporting this will be a 24-25% increase due to the cost of gas. It's now almost inevitable.

So it doesn't matter what the fuck Burnham wants to do with social security. Social security isn't available if you've got no sodding diesel, you aren't self sufficient for food and you can't afford heating because it's gone up why beyond any inflationary increase. If you can't export shit to get money, due to a lack of diesel and a lack of customers cos they are busy dying or fighting a war you are in complete fucking denial about and are trying to stay out of despite the fact Russia has made it perfectly clear they see your country as a target. I mean Starmer was personally targeted with arson by two Romanians recruited on telegram by a Russian speaker. Look at this article for the shit show of trying to pretend it's not Russia.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cgmdjpmmng7o

Yesterday marked a shift in language by Tusk (and other European leaders) as addressing this all as state sponsored terrorism - something which can and has triggered article 5 (9/11). Certainly it reaches the threshold for article 4 of NATO. (Basically this is what has now happened - we are into article 4 at least unofficially with Tusks speech)

Russia on its part has essentially considered itself at war with NATO since 2014.

Zelenskyy said yesterday words to the effect that he now thought China was supporting Russia due to components in North Korean missiles that had hit Ukraine.

NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte said earlier this week they are preparing for a scenario of war in Europe and Taiwan.

Secretary General Mark Rutte says NATO's force planning has to account for a “simultaneous multi-theatre conflict”, including the possibility that a Chinese move against Taiwan could coincide with Russian military action in Europe. Rutte's concern is that Beijing could turn to Moscow to keep the United States and its European allies occupied while China moves against Taiwan.

“You would have a serious problem in both theatres
.”

China has also been stockpiling gold for sometime. You do this if you are worried about economic stability. Trump has given lots of reasons for this. The Dutch, French and German government have over the last 18 months moved their gold to London.

The US military bases in the Middle East have got hammered to the point that it's questionable if some are still operational.

Noting Amazon also said their Cloud facility in UAE is beyond repair and are abandoning it and the data stored in it.

Pretty much all this has been building up for the past ten days.

Yesterday I was going slightly potty going why the fuck is this not being adequately spelt out in the UK. Today - https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cmn0jke547r5o
There are also other articles in the newspapers from heavy weight journalists starting to ask questions including wtf is Burnham playing at on these subjects.

Events, dear boy, events.

We are in uncharted waters and no fucker seems to have realised properly in the UK yet.

It has already happened and we've slept walked into this.

Wakey wakey.

Talk of social security is so June 2026. We should be talking quite seriously what plans there are in place in terms of rolling blackouts, fuel and food rationing. Because honestly, this is where we are and how perilously close to this being a necessity not even a possibility. This is the shift in risk profile that the government needs to be looking going into winter 2026.

The whole damn country and all the ideological crap from successive governments is becoming increasingly somewhat irrelevant at this because there will not be alternative options available. Anyone still blowing hot air about triple locks and who gets what benefits could be in for a rude bloody awakening. Brexit was enough of a farce because of the total lack of understanding of supply chains and logistics within parliament on all sides of the house and amongst the public. And COVID was it's own special shit show.

This is real. This is happening. Much of it is already set in motion and not resolvable even if the war in the Middle East was resolved tomorrow. It's about infrastructure damage already done and how this means serious political recalculations around the globe are now being done. This is affecting what hostile nations are looking at and willing to capitalise on due to Western strategic weaknesses. Even if we say "oh we don't want to get involved in a Russian conflict", Russia thinks we've been hitting it for over a decade so will seek to punish. We don't get that wet excuse to fall behind because this is all 'a bit scary'.

All this is verifiable, strong and reputable sources. I have spent the last week making sure of this. Don't believe me or think I'm scaremongering, get the fuck off MN and go check for yourselves.

I am NOT expecting nukes. There does not need to be nukes. Missiles are expensive. Drones arent. And they can be hidden and launched in close proximity to a target. Ukraine is hitting the far into Russia this way. It's a war on logistics and infrastructure and economic realities. It's already happening. And at least unofficially Article 4 just got triggered in terms of saying shit has got real and you need to take this threat seriously and stop pissing about.

Burnham needs to step the fuck up.

You make many valid points, but there is a lot to cover in your post.

I agree with much of what you say, but I do not think our government has the ability or inclination to act. Their focus remains on fringe issues and ensuring that they retain and expand their voter base, in order to remain in ‘power’. Hence, in part, the subject of this thread.

Like you, I am deeply concerned about the state of the UK (not just the UK, in fairness).

Whether it works or not, it will be popular among the Labour MPs and supporters who want the politics of spite, hate and envy. They'll be glad "the rich" are being punished, whether it ends up better for the country or not.