Dave's cuts are going be deep and they will hurt

[FellatioNelson]

I've been hearing this all day on the radio. I can't take the suspense any longer. They are going to affect the lives of 'every one of us'

I feel like a person wincing and clenching my teeth in anticipation of the big fuck-off needle the school nurse is wielding, and I'm next in the queue....

Come on then, what's it going to be?

You can provide for 2 children now, but you forget that peoples circumstances change, sometimes very suddenly. In a recession even more so as people are made redundant both in private and public sector and I fear this will just increase - especially in the public sector.

I have 4 children and I can afford to provide for them. However, I am a great believer in a strong and healthy welfare state as I realise I am in the position I am in partly because of circumstances and luck.

As a non-Brit I think Britain is making a big mistake thinking they cannot afford the welfare state and idetifying child benefits and services as a major area for cut-costing. You guys need to INVEST in your children.

So glad I am moving back to Sweden as all the "inner Thatchers" are coming out to play......

OK Alou so I agree with you up to that last line

And I am somewhat repeating myself here

What about those who have no choice?

never in my 20 years of earning did I begrudge contribuitng towards supporting carers and disabled kids

Why would anyone?

In fact I know for a fact that Dh wopuld choose extra tax to prtoect teh most vulnerable groups: children, disabled, carers, elderly.

so you mean we all pay for schooling once even if we don't have children?

and oing back to the NI - yes scrap it all together and raise the income tax level on every person earning a wage even if they earn over 43k - at the moment if you earn for 53k - you only pay 1% of NI contributions on the 10k over 43 k

therefore you don't pay NI contributions on the first 5200k - you pay 10% on the amount up to 43k and then only 1% on anything over that amount

therefore if you scraped NI

and taxed everyone earning over 6500k an extra 5% - you would ineffect earning under 43k have a tax cut

you would have more tax coming in to the goverment and the lower earner would have a tax cut - therefore you could reduce the amount of tax credits payed out and not effect the income of a lower earner on minimum wage

but you would save money on the tax credits and increase tax revenue only on better and make the tax system fairer

Oh and also Louise, how do you think it possible to distinguish the people with a sense of entitlement from those without?

Or do you lump them all in together.

ALouier - do you apply the same rules to all people in poverty - in countries in Africa for example, who require aid? Those people who have nothing generally due to no fault of their own - you know that old chestnut - circumstances?

The way TC's work now sadly that wouldn't work, it would have once but the system has been amended so that TC's also deliver IS to children (so if you give them tax relief they will have zero), and also certain disability benefits.

Honestly PMSL and LOL @ "To mothers who breed with reckless abandon"

Tragic

V difficult to take Louise seriously actually with her sounding so pious! It's like something out of Dickens.

Oh and BTW

if anyone on here does know how I can get myself working and off benefits (specifically carer's allowance) tehn please do tell.

It can't involve childcare however, as we cannot access it (no local family to help and if there were they already help my sisters so couldn't manage it all), nor working from home as DH already does and somebody ahs to be with the boys to supervise them 24 / 7.

Tried shift work but someone is up most of the night so if the otehr was at work, the one at home wouldn't be able for worrk next day (yes yes I know we all did it when kids were small; try a decade of it and it's quite different, especially when as I you ahve 2 disabled children).

I'd ahppily do contract work only- what? nothing I ahve ever done is uitable and I would not know where to start. I cannot retrain as my degree cancels out all funding for that (was going to train as a TA but coudln't get the funding).

DH combines ft retraining with part time work; someone has to be there to colelct the boys from school (no after school club) and meet teh SNU taxi: next year we will ahev four schools on the go, 2 SNU's, all with diffferent insets, as well as various appts to manage.

I;d happily work if I could but I absolutely resent the idea that I should be stigmatsied becuase I cannot. My situation is difficult and not so much not of my choosing as against anything any sane perosn would have chosen. I;d cut off my arm for ds's to be cured: won't happen though will it?

Take disabled people out of the equation. They deserve to be properly looked after and we could look after them very well if we didn't have to support the feckless and reckless.

Ypou can distinguish them from looking at their tax paying history. If they've contributed then let's help them. If they've arsed about, gone to jail, fathered a bunch of unwanted kids then why should we keep propping them up. We could find them enforced employment, chain gangs if necessary. Then their salaries could go to their poor blighted offspring.

With regards to Africa I would halt all overseas aid until this country was back on it's feet and out of the red. There is little point sending cash to Africa while despot dictators take the spoils and build themselves palaces. When I've got a minute I'll put a link up here to one of Mugabe's dwellings.

repost:-

Do the sums on VAT on Public School fees add up? Plucking numbers from the air here, but if average school fees are 1.5 times what the state spends per pupil per year and VAT goes up to 20% then the revenue raised from the tax would be 71.50.2=2.1% of all education expenditure or 1.95% of the state education budget.

So to take 2% off the education budget you have to increase school fees, which are probably for many people who chose to pay it, their largest expenditure, by 20%.

They are bound to feel aggreived at that.

I hope you are taking the piss Louise

I fear you are not

Let them starve eh - them feckless Africans

" There is little point sending cash to Africa while despot dictators take the spoils and build themselves palaces."

That's an argument for doing aid better, rather than cutting off support for those who need it most.

Aid is also as mentioned above, a foreign policy tool. Some African countries have resources we need.

No lady blah blah I am not taking the piss. What goes on in Africa Is no more our business than any other country in the world.

I have relatives in Zimbabwe and what is happening there is pitiful. But they are not helped by aid money pouring in which is used to buy guns to murder farmers.

Riven, the information is all there, I don't see why it should cost millions to administer. We have NI, tax codes, medical records, police records. It's just a question of collation.

We should be bloody grateful to the private educators and home educators for taking the strain from the state system. Also for showing the country how high standards can be when things are not pared down to suit the lowest common denominator.

By LCD are we talking Sn kids who cannot keep up or modernistic educat8ing ideas?

personally i'd welcome a return to classics (heck, my degree is part philosophy!) and the like in schools so could agree there; but the only alternative to regression tyo LCD ijn schools is proper SN provision which- shock- costs money. So won't happen.

Our SENCO today went over to our council (a good council as councils go) to chase up DS1's and another child's statements: tehy are so short dtaffed (sickness) they are literally lining the walls with application that only get read if a SENCO physically fronts up in the office.

Address that and standards may raise across the board as teahcer time is freed up but special ed is always forst to be cut.

Mind, ds1 / ds3 are better off than ds3- bottom of his class despite being bright enough (I hope riven can back me up, she's met him)- school says 'Oh yes we are sure he has dyspraxia but sadly LEA can't assess him so he can't have help'. And clearly if we cannot find ways aorund it he will fail to achieve in the workforce as well as a result.

Actually if Sh were not at home working i;d HE like a shot: I reckon even a year with each before comp would move mountains. And I would lvoe it too, I was applying for PGCE when teh ASD got too much.

Actuallya s well, there is reason to support Africa: a potential reducation in immigration into our country (illegal and legal).

Plus of course it will be easier for terrorists to recruit from communities that are disassociated from others and extremely poor: you want to create a terrorist, create misery- a lesson the Russians learned well in Chechnya after all.

of course, reducing hunger ans starvation is good, but don't be fooled: there are personal gains as well.

Readl AK' s column in today's Times or FT. I forget which. His possible suggestions - freeze public sector pay not for a year but for 3 or even 5 years. Freeze all tax thresholds and allowances for that period. Those alone bring in billions an din a sense don't hurt as you stay at you are.

He did suggest abolition of child benefit.

As I favour one flat tax for all and no allowance, benefits, tax reliefs or any other distortions of any kind and merging of NI and tax, I would go along with that too.

This is a once in a lifetime opportunity and we need to get it right. Relative poverty doesn't matter and workfare for the fit can work

I'd certainly go along with stopping foreign aid. I'd also as we're in such trouble stop many eco projects. I would cap all public sector pay at £150k (although you cannot reduce pay of people already in work).

(Someone above mentioned not being able to work because of caring responsibilities of chidlren with disability - obviously we need exceptions to any work fare but surely you could have 1 workfarer or two of them looking after 4 disabled children so the other two lots of parents could do other work which would also work as giving people a break. Secondly as to how to find jobs... loads of people do split shifts with a spouse and sleep less. Also if you can type on here you can write so go forthe and just don it. I've sent articles to 50 publications before now and got 2 published. You can join sites too like paypeopleperhour.com. You can also market yourself on line. I've marked exam papers. There are lots of ways to make money even if you aren't able enough to leave a chair. I would say 80 % o f what I try fails as with most people who are reasonably successful so you just keep plugging away with it.)

By lowest common denominator I mean the lowest possible standards that can be got away with. If there was no alternative education, private sector and home edd. Then I think state school standards would be lower.

Xenia actually I ahve ahd articlesm published but I ahven't a clue how to take it further.

As for looking after other SN kids- you know what, i;dlove to. IN fact am trying to organise something similar but where? I can't get a venue (tenancy agreement prohbits me doing this from home).

Clearly of course the ideal is simply for dh to work and support us, but redundancy isn;t reserved only for those with non vulnerable famillies. That's life isn't it?

Also, whilst i would risk it, if I earned a week's money I woudl potentially lose several others whilst everything was reassessed: it's something that massively needs addressing. A complete disincentive to work.

And the ultimate fact remains: there are not enough jobs. And that will get worse as the public sector shrinks.

Flat tax would be a major step forward. It would cost so much less to implement,

Alou would totally bagree with LCD then: I help at school and ours is a really well thought of Church school- and it makes me weep. I stood open mouhthed recently as the teacher taughht an entire class about the Maori tribe of Autsralia, whilst referring to Aborigines.

I was desperate to work as an RE Teacher before luck hit; got the degree just not the PGCE. RE of teh if you understand other peoples you can grow tolerance and compassion format. Am hoping it's not a dead dream (would also consider social services training) but they moved the PGCE college 2 hours away. A shame.

I am not going to repeat myself but "foreign aid" these days isn't about handing out cash to those poor starving Africans or giving huge wads to corrupt dictators.

It's about helping them to help themselves and thus no longer need our help. It's about preventing failed states which can then be used by terrorists, drug lords etc. It's about building stronger economies and better civil society, about training police forces, armies, lawyers, all sorts of things. It's about making the world a better, safer place.

And yes, it is about helping the most desperate, poor people in the world, the people who have none of the benefits that even the poorest people in our country (the NHS, social security, free education etc) have. And I am no apologist for colonialism but don't forget, we as a nation got very wealthy (and therefore continue to punch above our weight on the world platform) at the expense of many of these people.

Alouiseg - I don't agree with a flat tax, but I do agree with radicly reforming the tax system, taking a flat tax (On ALL income - CG, IH - treat corporations as persons for tax purposes) as the starting point.

Then make arguments for messing with it (progressive taxation to be fairer to the low paid, relief on capital gains and corporation tax to encourage enterprise, duty on fags to discourage smokeing) and test that you get the benefits you expect. If you don't STOP DOING IT and try something else.

Where we are using the tax system to alter peoples behavior we need to acknowledge that we are doing so and test if it is working.

Xenia - there is a brief discussion earlier in the thread about how the fact that you can do something doesn't mean everyone can. Not everyone has your drive, temprement or abilities. Because you can do something it's easy to assume that others could to. That's not always the case.