How do we as a country eliminate 'benefit culture'?

[whomovedmychocolate]

Serious question, not asking for a bunfight but donning teflon knickers nevertheless.

We seem to have got ourselves into a right pickle over this - we have a myriad of benefits - which don't seem to fit together or make logical sense and which seem open ended.

Is this right? Should we say (with obvious exceptions for people who are going to need help forever because of health issues) 'right, we will support you for X months and then you are on your own'?

Should we require people to dispose of any and all assets before providing benefits? This would counter the 'well he has a plasma telly and is receiving JSA' arguments I've heard recently.

What about generations of families who have never worked. What do we do about them then? Do we do intervention stylee retraining for them all, and force them to work?

I'm really interested in the ideas you lot might have because I am finding it very hard to establish the extent of the problem or any solution.

I don't want the same outcome!

I don't want ASD ds3 to be amde to suffer in poverty because he cannot work.

You know, I just applied for a job oline that I could do with my eyes closed.

NVQ idn relevant subject? Post grad cert, in fact.

Expereicne, refs? yesp.

Chances are I will not get it (they also asked for a vocational qual as preference, and although I have other better quals, my degree means I cannot get vocational training funding any more).

Used to exactly teh job though.

And on the rare chance I could get it? Well, i;d have to persuade SSD to put the nanny funding we've been promised in palce (Special Needs Nanny).

except

My friend is being tkaen to court because her autistic son refuses school: SSD say there is a waiting list of 8 months before she can even be seen so she might end up losing her job as she ahs no evidence of a defence (she is a CM).

So whsilt I can't do mroe than apply for jobs I am well qualifdied for, if the system to allow me to actually accept job is pretty much bound to fall aprt- why should I be penalised? Seriously?

I keep my hyand in so I can stay practising interview skills and just feel as if I am trying but as someone who has always paid NI and is douing ehr best i refuse to accpt that I should exist on subsistence.

Luckily I have Dh who is not well off but trying and has a good cahnce of a decent income one day; if he died my clear chocie would be to lose this house, move away (doubly ahrd if you ahev had to locate SN palcements etc) and probably spend a time in a hostel 9again surely ahrder with sutistic children) or hand ds1 and ds3 over to satte care at a total cost of £4k per week to the state and a heartbreak for tehm and me.

I do not get benefits becaase I am less, or underserving- I get Carer's Allowance, practically, for ojne reason: it is cheaper for the state to pay me to care than to deliver it themselves. By a long way. Anything that works aaginst that will rsult in many people giving up and putting thir kids into state palcements.

As for the comment about taking kids into care- oh for heaven's sake! I am a good parent, just a silly idea.

'The bank bailout is as much of a problem as the benefit systema nd an equal amount of attention needs to go on ensuring that those contributors to the national problem pay their contribution

just wanted to note that I do agree with that part of your post

(And after a re read realise youw eren't advocating sterilisation sorry, read that as sterlisation being a minor problem first time of reading). Sorry.

SMA and Nottirednow -The bank bailout cost was broadly a 'one off' cost. Whilst welfare costs are annual. Of course, the impact of the banking crisis on tax income and the cost of recession are ongoing.

Estimates for the cost of the bank bailout seem to vary from £6bn to £250bn depending on what you include.

What is important is ensuring the structural and regulatory changes that prevent something like it happening again.

I see the 'cost of the benefits culture' as a human cost. People growing up with low aspirations and expectations - settling for a life on benefits because they think that's normal.

I agree that they possibly represent a small share of the total welfare costs and it's not a simple problem to address.

No, and I did apologise afterwards as I read your post the wrong way.

Jacksatar I agree wrt to human cost although it's not as dark as many think- my last proper job was in the sector and many of the people had a lifestyle I would envy not becuase of anything to do with income, but just family and friends and tight netwroks we just don't have.

I think it can be amazing how people pull together and create a sense of worth and a life when things are adverse.

Nottirednow - The cuts aren't due to the bank bailout - at least not directly. The global banking crisis lead to a recession. The UK can't increase it's borrowing level - so we need cuts and increases in tax revenue. We will get back most of the direct cost of the bail-out.

Its because our national debt levels had been rising during an 'economic boom' that we can't afford to borrow in this recession.

I'm not sure that I'm comfortable with the idea that life on benefits / relative poverty is a valid lifestyle choice. A mature adult 'accepting their lot in life' is one thing - but all children deserve to aspire to a useful and productive life.

Well it's not a valid choice is it?

Acceptance can be good but in rare circs- I suspect if Ic ould accept being a carer and choiceless i;d be far happier and mentally healthier

But being poor doesn't take away your life enjoyment, only perhaps ime alter the things you do to get that enjoyment IYSWIM

Sorry, haven't had time to read everything so don't know if this one has been thrown into the ring....

We were discussing this very issue with our neighbours yesterday, and one of them suggested that people on JSE, ie able-bodies adults who aren't actively caring for anyone, should have to work in the community to earn their benefits, caring for the elderly, tending to council parkland, picking up litter, doing gardening or shopping for the elderly etc. If people on benefits had to go out to work 9-5 just the same as people not on benefits, instead of sitting home watching Jeremy Kyle or down the pub with their mates, it might not look like such a good long-term prospect for the lifetime scroungers.

'We were discussing this very issue with our neighbours yesterday, and one of them suggested that people on JSE, ie able-bodies adults who aren't actively caring for anyone, should have to work in the community to earn their benefits, caring for the elderly, tending to council parkland, picking up litter, doing gardening or shopping for the elderly etc.'

A lot of people on JSA would not pass criminal background checks. If you were frail and elderly, would you want them working with you to provide care you needed?

I have a better idea: make all those single people on JSA who've been unemployed longer than 18 months take ant-abuse so they can't drink at all and undergo drug testing.

expat, there are plenty of things people who didn't pass criminal checks could do that didn't involve working with the vulnerable.

I've read down a bit now... I'm not sure why Greensleeves was at bolbalina, I agree completely. But then I grew up in a country where there were no benefit for anyone, so I find the welfare system here totally over the top in its generosity... it completely removes accountability for poor lifestyle choices. Screw up your life with stupid decisions? Drop out of school before getting a decent education? Oh well, have a house and money.

Of course some people find themselves in difficulty through no fault of their own, and of course they should be helped. But I can't believe that's the case for the majority of the hundreds of thousands of people in this country who have never worked.

If there genuinely are so many people who genuinely can't find any work at all, well, the government's first step needs to be finding a way to create more jobs.

This might have been mentioned already but often wondered why we have not introduced National Service for our unemployed young people. A good way to get them motivated, fit and away from the benefit culture of doing nothing for your money. I also believe that our child benefit system encourages some people to have larger families, it should be means tested and only given to the first child, I also do not agree that we should be giving child benefit (£24 million) to Polish children who do not live in this country, how is this possible?

We give Child Benefit to Polish children who do not live in their country because their parents have shown the initiative to travel across Europe and take a job and pay tax in our country. I would rather my taxes helped out the families of people working on our building sites and perhaps starting out in menial work when they have good academic qualifications than people who effectively choose not to work.

The big issue is that it is almost impossible to take effective action against people who won't work without further damaging their children who are already disadvantaged. If you cut benefit for say one adult in a family, which you can do if they refuse work or bring unemployment upon themselves, you know you will be damaging the children.

We haven't introduced national service becuase the army does not want a huge influx of people who do not want or have the skills to be there. Why would they? Would you want an army almost entirely consisting (becuase it would, tehre'd be no funding for the otehrs) of srop outs and unemployables?

As for working for JSA Annie- it's a popular idea but tehre are a few reasons it has to be more difficult than that as a straight answer. not I am not anti maiing people contribute, just aware of the flaws.

1. When they introduced youth employment porgrams in the past (YTS), employers cottoned on rather quickly to this resource of ridiculously cheap labour and promptly sacked anyone whose job could be done by a YTS trainee: I was one of those people.

2. WhilstI can see the value of giving people some form of order and responsibility to eb somewhere contributing, 9.- work actually llimits peoples chances to access work; if youlived where we do for example and don't have a PC you need to use the one at the library which is open school hours. You'rre far more liekly to find work if you spend actual time going door to door with CV's in a suit than waiting for it come to you. there needs to be a balance between giving something back and enabling people to move on. For example, pertiary training (vocational, adult skills, adult ed etc) is a hugely inaccessiblesector if you are on a low income and working; would be useful for many of the people on JSA long term to be palced onto adult ed or retraining as a condition of benefit. Let's face it, if you are in a job where the employers have moved away (Dh's predicament, though he doesn't claim JSA) or have no GCSE's, you will benefit in terms of chances of finding work. Barriers against that such as long compulsory work are going to have opposite effect to what the desired outcome is.

Something of a midway is best.

According to the Daily Mail Czech Republic, Polish, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia & Lithuania migrants only need to be registered for work to claim Child Benefit for their children who remain living in their own country. It is estimated that we spend £33 million on these "Exportable Benefits", some Polish parents have been putting their children in state orphanges to come to the UK. As the DM put it "they are exploiting a loophole in the UK law".............
perhaps this an exploited benefit that needs to be looked at.

Would you look at the exploitation, or the benefit?

I quite agree about the explaitation: if someone working here pays taxes then I think they should be eligible for any children in the UK, but I don't think our benefit system should be exportable. Equally we shouldn't be able to benefit elsewhere of course. Has to work both ways after all.

Migrants can only claim benefits for 3 months when they arrive I think. After that they will need to return to their own country or be working - different matter of course if they lose their job afterwards.

I have nothing against people claiming what they are entitled to in their own country, but this loophole is unbelievable, how can we afford to give our money away to children who remain in their own countries but their parents are "looking/ registered" for work in another country be it for 3 weeks or 3 months, it's plain daft. Our benefit culture seems to extend to othe parts of Europe, how can this be justified?

It's justified on the basis I guess that we'd be entitled to move there and take advantage of their benefits system though I dount they are as supportive as ours (a plus for the UK mind; am in no way slating ours!)

We seem to export ,ainly IME older people and the childless of those I know, friends in France and Bulgaria.

And to Spain where the do take advantage of their benefits (like healthcare which is free and a lot better, imo, than in the UK).

1. Free childcare for lower wage earners,and subsidised increments as your salary increases. No excuses for lone parents to stay at home.

1. Raise the minimum wage to a living one, and raise the tax threshold so that people don't need tax credits at all.

1. Massive social housing build/compulsory purchase of empty properties, so that everyone can afford to rent a decent place to live, under secure tenencies, however low their income.

generally i;d agree though 2 isn;t that bstraightforward: we're using TC's to support us whilst we grow a business, even on zero tax we couldn't live on what we make profit as we buy stock, equipment etc: yet in a year or so the business should totally support us.

plus TC's are used to deliver a form of payment for children who are disabled with a low family income, and what used to be income support for children is now all paid via TC's.

It's also used to help those working PT on the premise that working at all makes it mroe likely and somewhat easier for you to get abck into FT work. There are many reaosns to work PT, including teh pure and basic job availabilityand childcare availability: no matter what % is paid, there is nobody in my village who offers evening orr weekend childare, so everybody ehre is limited in their choices of jobs.

And there needs to be a D) on your list: create more jobs. Until that happens people are loikley to become disillusio0ned and seriously under rate their chances of finding work. The benefits culture in palces such as the former mining counties of South Wales (now improving) didn';t arise through laziness, but a simple alck of jobs and anything to aspire to.