Dispatches - Growing Up Poor

[TurquoiseKiss]

Did anyone see this? I'm half way through on catch up - very tough to watch.

Dotty what would you do if your husband cheated on you and left? You lost your job? You ended up unable to work due to caring responsibilities or disability?

These things can happen to anybody despite their best intentions.

@raskolnikova

Sometimes I wonder why we bother to repeatedly type ‘this doesn’t apply to genuine unplanned pregnancies or unforeseen changes in circumstances’ as obviously people are far too busy being offended by common sense to read it 👍🏻

For anyone who was interested in this programme, there was another one on a few years ago that I watched with my dc who were beyond shocked. It’s called Poor Kids and is on YouTube.

There’s always one on these types of threads who lacks compassion. The one who thinks it will never happen to them. Think again, this can happen to pretty much anyone and without the safety net of a large savings account it’s easy to see how quickly life can change. I should know. It’s happened to me recently and we are now at the mercy of the Universal credit system.

Life has a strange way of not discriminating who it shits on. Maybe something to think about dotty. Shame on you.

Dotty - I really hope that Karma doesn’t bite you in the ass.

😂 so funny how some ignorant weirdos have jumped on this thread with their battleaxe attitudes and political agendas (UC isn't that bad, vote Tory!). Statistics confirming the rise of in work poverty, food banks and homelessness speak for themselves. Anecdotally everyone is talking about more visible homelessness and the division between rich and poor, old and young. Harking back to years gone by saying it was harder back then doesn't wash with me. I was poor in the eighties and it is much harder how. Besides that, after 30 or so years, all this demonstrates is that politically, we have not progressed at all, as 30 years ago there was an expectation that society would be fairer and poverty would have been stamped out by now. It has got worse and our political and economic system is failing. All parties are to blame for this. How depressing.

So if you are coming on here worried that after seeing this programme people might not want to vote for your party, I just want to say that people with attitudes like yours make me definitely not want to vote for your beloved party, and I'm very much a floating voter who has previously voted for all of the main parties. You are wasting your time trying to persuade us. You are an idiot or blinded by your own ignorance if you can't see that. Please stop ruining mumsnet with your political agenda. There is a politics section for people like you. This is a thread about a TV programme

Dotty - I really hope that Karma doesn’t bite you in the ass

Or that it does...

There are 2 different types of people on benefits, those who through no fault of their own, disability, death, illness etc have been forced to claim; and then there are those for whom it's a lifestyle choice.

The first category is what the welfare system is set up for, they absolutely deserve our help and support.

The second however are irresponsible and feckless, the decide to have children with no solid current or future plan on how to support them,they expect handouts to feed and house their child whilst making no attempt to better their own situation. Unfortunately there are a huge amount of people living this second lifestyle. Be honest I bet we all know more than a few families who are like this.

Even those 2 parent families both working in low wage jobs can't afford to have 5 kids, surely that is common sense. They make bad decisions to have more and more children which they just can't afford and at the ultimately the kids are the ones who suffer. As we should, we have to bail these people out because who wants to see a child hungry (obviously no one) but at what point are we going to take control of the situation and educate people on making better decisions for themselves so we don't have to bail out the irresponsible?

I’d be interested @purpleboy in seeing the data for your assertion that there are huge numbers of people falling into your category 2.

Single parents as a group generally have fewer children - 1 or 2 is the norm. You are actually wrong in your assertion and really? Very few people are having kids in order to get benefits and housing (because, why? Given the level of benefits and the availability of housing) . But if you have data on this please share. These daily mail bigoted views are just so damaging.

My data is my eyes!

I live very close to several large council estates. I owned in a hotel on the edge of these estates and daily would see the benefit parents in drinking for 3 hours plus most days, you hear their stories, not a single one worked, numerous proudly admitted how they would keep having kids to increase their house size and benefit amount.
How stupid my staff were for working when they can claim more for doing nothing.
I had a member of staff who refused a pay rise as it would mean she would loose her benefits, even when I offered her full time work after all 5 kids were at school age she refused as she could get more money in benefits by working less.
Faked disabilities for long term disability pay.
My brother unfortunately got mixed up a with a woman who had 4 kids by the time she was 21 with 3 different fathers never worked a day in her life and regularly pawned her kids games consoles so she could buy drugs. No supine her 15yr old don was sent to young offenders for shoplifting whilst his 14yo gf was pregnant!
I now have several businesses and the nature of some of these businesses mean I encounter the second category a lot. The background is always the same.
I only know 1 family where the mother is disabled but she still works so she can provide for her family, the benefits she gets aren't enough for her to ever better herself, even working she has no chance. These are the sort of people we should be helping those who are actively trying to work.

The benefits system seems so wrong it doesn't encourage people to work, and there was a thread on here a few days back where the poster was going to go on benefits because the cost of childcare was roughly what she would earn at work, so for her it's a life choice, these are the people the benefits shouldn't be helping as they are taking the provisions away from those who genuinely need it.

Even those 2 parent families both working in low wage jobs can't afford to have 5 kids, surely that is common sense. They make bad decisions to have more and more children which they just can't afford and at the ultimately the kids are the ones who suffer. As we should, we have to bail these people out because who wants to see a child hungry (obviously no one) but at what point are we going to take control of the situation and educate people on making better decisions for themselves so we don't have to bail out the irresponsible

We'll see a change in this now that there is a benefit cap on 2 children only.

Anecdata doesn't count Purple. 1) Take a look at the Joseph Rowntree Foundation, you will find accurate figures of people with three children or more on benefits. It's not that many.
2) You clearly do not understand how benefits work. You cannot be lazy and feckless these days. You need to prove that you are job seeking for 35 hours per week or you will get a sanction. If you are a single parent then you cannot keep having children to fund a lifestyle as you will only be given money for two children.
Oh, and before you start saying they're all claiming disability that too is extremely hard, requires a great deal of evidence and the fraud/mistake figures combined are less than half a percent.
So, before you make an absolute fool of yourself, try finding some accurate data first.

In my job I speak to a very broad range of people who are claiming Universal credit. I get the odd few who are trying it on but as a PP said they are soon weeded out. If they are capable of work they must document every attempt at finding work and how long they have taken to do so.
If they state they are not capable of work they must go through an assessment process to see if their condition prevents them from working even if it is not work they have done before ( ie a warehouse worker may be capable physically of doing office work) . The same assessment applies to everyone and only once the assessment is passed at the highest level will there be an increase in the amount they receive per month.

It is a terrible benefit and I hate having to explain the new claimants that their expectations (led in the main part by media ) that although they will not lbe in luxury they will at least be comfortable on benefits are actually way off once we do do the calculation.

Please - all of you who assume families living on benefits have it easy -do the benefit check for your own family set up and assuming you have no earnings coming in.

Remember that if you rent your home even from the council you will still have to pay full rent and council tax out of the amount you receive.Plus there is a limit to how much you can receive for rent .Tough if you live in a high rental area. If you have a mortgage you will receive no help at all for at least 9 months .Then come back and tell me how long you will survive if you and or your partner loses the jobs you have now.

I think the problem here is that so many people seem to think that they're owed an explanation about how people came to be in poverty. You're not.
And if that makes you automatically assume it must be somehow their fault, that says a lot about you.
Bottom line, the desperately poor are not costing you more than the obscenely rich are, but I guess it's easy to ignore that.

Dont know, i watched part of the programme. Children should be helped but how do you do that if parents keep making bad choices? The Cambridge family, needed money for heating and the mother was thinking to paw the 8 years old phone, for example. And i agree that if u cant feed the kids you shouldnt keep the dog. Walking miles to food bank could have been done when the kids(both school age) were at school for example, not sure if the mother worked, if she did anything would have helped toward food. Also shameful from her to project her MH issues onto her child, she should have known better. Shown the program to the kids to show them how lucky they are( we are a low income family but live comfortably and no debts)and my DD 10 was the one to notice that lady has no food but has her nails done. I think it would be more helpful a program about people that find themselves in poverty thru circumstances rather then bad life choices.

Really @Watchitt you are seriously making a point that the mother should have walked to the foodbank rather than get the bus?! Really?

jeez.

I agree, I also see a lot of UC claimants as part of my job. It is a terrible benefit, and also agree that although there may be some people trying to play the system, they really are rare.

@Watchitt

How is it a bad choice to pawn the eight year old's phone for heat? The child needed heat, she did not need a phone. The mother must keep her phone as she must have internet access and a working phone or she'll be sanctioned by UC.

The dog issue has already been addressed. Those children were ripped from their home, school and friends, and probably their extended family in order to flee a violent homelife and you think they need to give up their much loved dog too? I honestly question humanity everytime I read a benefits bashing thread and comments like that are the reason why.

Nails, hair etc are easy to get for £ or free if you know the right people. If I lost my job tomorrow we'd soon run out of food and money but I'd still have my hair professionally coloured regularly, my make-up professionally done when the occasion required (such as for job interviews) and my nails done. It's been true in the past and if I fall on my arse again it will be true then. I'm sure people will judge and I smile and think they're a twat. If they bothered to ask me before judging I'd explain I'm a qualified hairdresser, make-up artist and nail tech and own my own professional kit and would pass them a business card with the promise of a discount if they booked one of my services. I could have sold my kit when I needed money but it made more sense to keep as it was a source of income, albeit, a fluctuating one.

How do you know that woman doesn't have a mate or a neighbour who does nails or didn't used to work as a nail tech and still have kit left over? Or that she doesn't go to the local trade college and get them done for a fiver?

Also food banks open at certain times. They don't operate 24/7. They tend to be open for two or so hours once or twice a week.

Maybe someone gave her some nail varnish and she did it herself, you know a wee treat to make her feel human?

She said herself on the program that they are walking so dont pay bus fare. And she proposed to pawn 8 year old phone but they slept in their clothes instead. Of course they should pawn the phone, 8 year old doesnt need it anyway. Also could have found a shopping trolley rather then nailpolish so kids wouldnt have to carry heavy shopping bags. I think people try to make themselves feel better by treating all those without money as some kind of saints. Poverty isnt purely lack of founds, its closely linked to issues like addiction mental health and the way people have been brought up( some people use benefits as a way of life ).projecting( make her feel a tiny bit human) isnt going to help sorting out those issues.

If the mother worried about her kids mental state rather then keep the dog maybe could have avoided sharing her worries and creating anxiety in her 8 year old daughter. Being poor doesnt have to mean no common sense.

A dog can cost as little as 30p a day to feed if you use budget food and vet care is free from PDSA if you receive certain benefits. I highly doubt a raise of

Purple boy that absolutely happened in days gone by but not now.
Life on benefits is hell.

And FYI I used to make my kids carry the food shopping home too, still do in fact, despite and being able to afford taxis now and do you know what? They're still alive. They're also fit and healthy. I don't abide laziness and we live within walking distance of various supermarkets.

I also thought it was awful how she shared all her worries with an 8 year old, what a burden to that poor kid.
But the kids needed that dog, to have put it in a shelter would've been beyond cruel. To the kids and the dog

The father should pay for his children not to go hungry,not good enough laws for that. as she had to flee abuse i would have thought that thats the reason the fathe ris not involved, maybe theres court proceedings ?seems obvious enough.should i mention everyone else? Where s her family for example? No one to help her with food and fuel? And is she working whilst kids are at school? We arent going to have the full picture from the program.