Help me think through this - Benefit fraud as a feminist issue

[Bluthbanana]

As per the title, really.

I was reading my local paper, and there was a story about a woman being found guilty of benefit fraud for claiming ESA on the basis of her husband being out of work, when he wasn't. Obviously, yes fraud was committed and it shouldn't be let go lightly. But I felt a bit uneasy at how there was no implications for the husband involved. Surely it was on both of them to commit that fraud? Benefit payments in a family mostly go to the woman, as it's most likely the woman who claims the child benefit and all payments go to the same account, but surely the husband would have had to have provided his own declaration of his work situation?

And then the more I thought about it, the more I realised that it's actually very, very rarely that I see reports of men being found guilty/being tried for benefit fraud in our local courts. It's almost entirely women.

Am I being hyper sensitive to this or is this A Thing?

@Goosefoot when both parties consent to it in my
view. Not when the government dictates that it does in case that’s not clear.

Consent really has nothing to do with it though, it is a matter of whether the people are functioning as a unit. If they are doing it, whether they say they "consent" is really beside the point.

It's rather like the way common law marriages work in many places. They may not have quite the same implications as formal arrangements but they exist to protect the people from exploitation and make it possible to evaluate legal responsibilities or disagreements. People can't just opt out because it would be opting out of your social responsibilities.

It would be a huge inducement to commit fraud as well.

I've seen similar cases in my local paper and thought the man should be charged with some kind of fraud too since he has to have known about the benefits coming into the house.

Also when it comes to paying back the overpayment it will come from the woman's income and not the man even though he has benefited from the money.

It does totally make sense that both partners would be guilty, unless it was clear that the one really wasn't involved. I wonder whether it would just be difficult to prove the involvement of the non-claiming person in many instances?

@Yeahnahyeah that is an excellent piece of common sense, as what really annoyed me as a single parent was that single parents absorbed society's judgement in part for ''costing the state'' but it was couples who were the biggest cause of benefit fraud. It just seemed (seems) like another irony.

It's rather like the way common law marriages work in many places.

Where does common law marriage work?

There needs to be a way for single claimants, especially those with dependent children, to keep their finances separate from their partner's until and unless they are confident that they want to share. Everybody not on benefits enjoys this right.

There will be piss takers and so there would need to be rules around it but the current arangement where poor women are forced to pool all their resources with men they don't know that well (because you don't know someone well until you've lived with them for a while) is a recipe for financial abuse.

Also I find the notion that some single parent’s romantic partner is somehow de facto automatically responsible for their children is archaic and absurd. Obviously if a family gets blended or if your partner wants to adopt your kids is another matter, but it shouldn’t be a default assumption.

I agree and also find it bizarre that so many fathers get away with paying little or nothing for their kids while a mums new boyfriend is expected to support them if he stays over a few nights a week

There needs to be a way for single claimants, especially those with dependent children, to keep their finances separate from their partner's until and unless they are confident that they want to share. Everybody not on benefits enjoys this right. There will be piss takers and so there would need to be rules around it but the current arangement where poor women are forced to pool all their resources with men they don't know that well (because you don't know someone well until you've lived with them for a while) is a recipe for financial abuse.

But pooling resources is the whole question, right? If your resources are pooled, you function as a household and so you have more resources than someone who is in fact single.

I would totally support people getting enough money so that they aren't so much put in a position of setting up a household with someone that won't likely be a stable relationship just to get by. It's really not good for anyone, especially women with kids.

The fact is that when people live together in a sexual relationship there are all kinds of things that follow from that even if people don't really intend it. It will affect the kids, it will affect the decisions they make about jobs, where to live, purchases to make, it will affect what happens if they break up which is unlikely to be just like a set of roommates parting ways. It's a bit like Thatcher's no society idea applied to the famly, it's wrong because even if you don't care or want to be in society you are just by virtue of being human.

When people move in together, if they're not on benefits, they get to test the water and take things slowly. They have the luxury of taking their time to make sure they haven't accidentally shacked up with an arsehole before they pool all their money.

If you're on benefits you don't get that option, it's all or nothing. From the day you move in together you are treated as a couple with shared finances, regardless of whether finances are actually shared or not. This has two very bad effects:

1. it discourages people from forming new families - because if it doesn't work out you're up shit creek.

2. it massively increases the risk of financial abuse.

I just wanted to add a couple of comments on this as I definitely think welfare payments and the cuts have had a huge impact on women. Haven't had time to check but I think the Women's Budget Group has recently published a report on this.

And it is sad that more women are being caught up in a very difficult system to navigate (unlike landlords who are daily overcharging rents to get the maximum from housing benefit rather than the value of the flat).

Back in the 70s there was a Women's Liberation campaign called the Great Signing On Campaign as it was to show women that they were entitled whether as a daughter, wife or mother entitled to their own income (rather than getting hand outs from a male relative).

So many of the cuts in welfare payments directly effect women, eg the 2 child restriction.

I am not sure and cant find figures whether more women are prosecuted for benefit fraud than men, but more women are jailed for non payment of tv licences than men.

And I remember a situation where 2 women who were both single mothers thought it would be cheaper and easier if they shared a flat, but in the end the complications of the benefit system meant they gave up. Because anyone claiming benefit who lives somewhere where there are other adults of working age will be treated differently than if they are living on their own.

It just seems to be another of those things where people who are cheating the system eg millionaires with tax dodging accountants steal far more from the system than claimants.

And as someone said up thread it is far more likely, particularly women with children that they will be making claims.

For anyone who wants to just see or knows someone who really needs to know what they can or cannot claim you can use this online calculator (and so could for instance see the difference if you were to enter figures saying another adult was living in the same place). www.entitledto.co.uk/

The whole system is predicated on theft in the first place. I still think people have a right to privacy and societies violation of that far far outweighs what they are taking. I simply don’t care to judge people with fewer resources as were I in that circumstance would I act any differently? There but for the grace of God go I...

There needs to be a way for single claimants, especially those with dependent children, to keep their finances separate from their partner's until and unless they are confident that they want to share. Everybody not on benefits enjoys this right.

Yes, Pencils, I agree.

The benefits system is still stuck on the household unit, without any reflection on the changing nature of either family shape or the static/fluid composition.

We need a better way.

more women are jailed for non payment of tv licences than men.

That's terrifying. Such a patriarchal thing, to jail women for something like that and we can't even get rape convictions.
Its in the same vein as allowing dangerous and violent porn to exist as a hate crime against women but arresting women for tweets on Twitter. I can't get over how differently men and women are treated by the justice system and how "male crimes" like torturing a prostitute in porn are seen as "non crimes" and female crimes like non payment of TV license are punishable with jail

I am currently paying back overpayments from when ExH worked and didn't declare it. He was at the time the person responsible for my ESA claim as my carer, yet as it was my claim (despite me having no idea he hadn't declared it) I am the one who has to pay it back.

I am currently paying back overpayments from when ExH worked and didn't declare it. He was at the time the person responsible for my ESA claim as my carer, yet as it was my claim (despite me having no idea he hadn't declared it) I am the one who has to pay it back.

There are several women in similar positions who have come into our food bank. Do we see any men in this position, where women ex partners have walked away from the liability? No.

more women are jailed for non payment of tv licences than men.

Terrifying, but not that much.
The study that found that showed that, in 2015 20 women were jailed for non payment of TV licence, out of a total of 38 people, so only slightly over half.
The papers focussed on the "more women than men jailed" in their reports though.

And the previous year it had been 11 women jailed out of 39 total, so may have changed again?

I don’t know how you get jailed for not paying a TV license!? The cost of housing a prisoner per year is £37k what a colossal waste of money.

@Dervel I remember my criminology professor telling us about the TV licence thing.

Apparently it's a case of they don't buy a licence because they can't afford it, then they are fined for not having a licence, can't afford to pay the fine so don't pay it, end up with warrants for non-payment of fines & it just escalates to the stage where they get a prison term.

The entire benefits system needs an overhaul. UC was supposed to be that overhaul & while in theory it's a good idea it wasn't really thought out & implemented very well. There should be options to have it paid in the same cycle as your salary but then that would cost more in administrative costs.

I do think the government should take the hit though and devise & implement a better more productive system for benefits. The main issue is that benefits are one size fits all & unfortunately life isn't.

I also think that wages need to be looked at. If as a single person working full time on minimum wage my take home pay isn't enough to cover my basic outgoings (rent, council tax, utilities, food, travel etc) then minimum wage is below the minimum required & that's before you add in any children.

I agree the whole Universal Credit thing has been a complete cock up cascade. So basically if you don’t pay your TV License you can be sent back in time to a Victorian debtors jail?? Lovely.

They should have funded UC at 150% cost of what they thought they needed then scale it back going further until the right balance is struck. Then they would have been able then to claim victory on a compassionate social policy THEN claimed going forward they were achieving greater efficiency.

Fucks sake I’m considering I’d do a better job in politics and I’m rubbish!!

1 in 10 cases at magistrates court is for non-payment of TV licence.

Council tax arrears (and unrealistic court orders for repayment of) are another reason for prison sentences.

Yes: debtors prison has made a comeback in the UK in the 21st century.

Overall, the number jailed after dodging the TV licence fell from 39 to 38 but women evaders now account for more than half of these.

By comparison, just 4.5 per cent of prisoners are women, meaning the number of female licence fee evaders is disproportionately high.

Seven out of ten prosecutions for licence fee evasion are against women, the figures also showed.

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4130060/More-women-men-jailed-TV-licenses.html

“The gap between vision and reality is huge”: How social security is failing women across the 4 nations wbg.org.uk/blog/the-gap-between-vision-and-reality-is-huge-how-social-security-is-failing-women-across-the-4-nations/

This case, however, doesn't seem to fall into any of the categories being discussed. They were married, she made a claim for a benefit to which she was not entitled, including a statement about her husband's employment which was a lie.

There is no suggestion whatsoever that there was coercion.

Is it a feminist issue when people think that there must have been? Because that seems to be a significant issue here. Women are women capable of planning and carrying out criminal acts of their own volition.

When it can be identified that there is potentially an issue, it would be very different. But taking cases where there is no hint of it whatsoever and using that as foundation for discussion gives traction to the idea that women lack agency. Because there must be a man behind a woman's actions.

women evaders now account for more than half of these.

Yes, 20 women out of 38 overall. So 20 wome, 18 men, is more than half. For one year. The previous year it was 11 women, 28 men, so less than half.
I wonder what it is now, this was 4 years ago.

@MyGastIsFlabbered