Harassed by universal credit!

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Hi
I was just wondering if anyone else felt harassed by universal credit and how to deal with the situation.
so I have worked full time since 16 now 34. In 2020 my partner left and I had a baby (now 3) I have worked part time 8-10 hours a week since he was 9 months old.
recently he turned 3 and I have been non stop harassed by the job centre about getting 16 hours of work. I currently work 12 hours on a self employed basis but for a company. I have very limited child care only 1 day a week, going to 2 mornings and 1 full day in September when little one starts nursery. I don’t drive so need to stay local and also have no family to support with childcare. My sons dad is not involved in his life so I am literally on my own!
my question is how do you get the job centre off your back, they call me in 2-3 times a week and have done since my son was 9 months old. I feel like I’m doing everything I can right now to work but it’s never good enough and they are constantly on at me. Has anyone dealt with this before?
its making me so anxious! I literally don’t know how I can work more than I do without leaving my child home alone! (Obviously this isn’t an option)
Thanks in advance

@Mumtothreegirlies You sound very bitter tbh

1. Do an extra 4 hours at your self employed role, perhaps it's admin that you do after your shift and its charge goes into the rest of the invoice. Now you're working 16 hours Or is it a minimum income floor?
2. You spend 4 hours a week until you get a job for 16 hours. You can do more than 16 hours and so can still do the self employed stuff. Many jobs do 16 hours to suit this requirement.

@Mumtothreegirlies You can have allocated SEN workers in mainstream school

Wrong again. I worked part time from the age of 13. I worked full time from 16, whilst studying also: had to because as I said I was living alone from that age. No benefit help for me, they said they'd only help if I got pregnant. I chose to work full time and study instead and work my way out of that situation.

I "could have chosen to claim and work part time"? This is exactly the attitude that is wrong. Benefits are there to support people who need them. Not because they'd rather work less. Wouldn't we all?! THAT is why there's so little money available to help those who can't work more, and disabled people.

People should work as much as they can to meet as much as they can of their own living costs. If that's not sufficient to meet the costs, of course that state should top it up. If they can't work because of disabilities, the state should pay their living costs. And far more generously than it does now. Realistically the state (i.e. other taxpayers) cannot fund a parent at home or working minimal hours for every child under 5 who just feels this would be more pleasant when there is no disability for them or the child and no reason they can't work more. And so many people doing what you suggest - just deciding not to pay their way because they'd rather not and have more time with their "precious little ones" - is exactly why there is such an appallingly low level of state support available for those who genuinely need it due to health reasons, who can't work more.

And why should working people pay ever higher taxes to fund other people who are perfectly capable of work deciding not to, or working part time, and hence have less scope to spend time with their own children while young, because so much is deducted in tax? People talk all the time about the systems in Scandinavia, Germany etc but what many don't seem to grasp is that actually people earning £50k-£150k pay some of the very highest taxes in all of Europe. The difference in the systems people say they want is that there is collective responsibility, a very different mentality, a wider tax base where the lower earners under £50k pay a FAR higher percentage of earnings than they do in the UK. As well as the truly wealthy who mostly don't pay income tax at all and instead pay much lower capital gains/ dividend taxes etc pay much more. But that alone wouldn't fix it: it needs everyone to make a fair contribution is you want decent services and decent provision for those who genuinely can't work. Not this expectation that always someone else should pay. It's basic maths, to make it function people at the lower end of earnings would have to pay much more and also stop trying to do the minimal work they possibly can.

So no, I wouldn't personally just decide to "claim" as much as possible and not bother to contribute just because I could. I don't think that's a good example to my children, either.

Still very interested in your proposals of how to fund the state paying for every child under 5 having a stay at home parent. What specific taxes would you raise to fund this and by what percentage?

I also note there is still no apology for your earlier vile comments about my children and parenting and about all working mothers who use childcare.

Perhaps you should start a separate thread about this rather than clogging up the OP's thread which was - as far as I understood it - about what to do in her situation where she is a lone parent struggling to find childcare and appropriate extra work that she can juggle (with a non-disabled child).

I think it's the job of uc staff to make claiming as difficult, unpleasant and stressful as possible. They aim to get you off uc as fast as possible. If you are a personable and reasonable client they will probably harass you even more than someone who is difficult or challenging. So sorry, that's my experience! Childminding is a good idea and might be good experience for later working in a school, which I think is a good way to avoid the holiday child care issues.

@Kafkaland I wonder if a low, means tested benefit, paid to mothers who want to stay at home until their children are of school age, would cost the government the same as paying for childcare?

@user9630721458 I think the benefits system is fairly stressful and dismal to navigate round already. You are at the mercy of the DWP continuously. They have the power to stop benefits and sanction, whenever they decide things are not quite right.

I'd like to think that most people would not like to be caught up in that web??

Use it if you need to, but then try your best to get out of the system quick!

@user9630721458 yes that's my experience also. It was horrid.

I think that would be a really
good idea and would save money as childcare is so expensive

What would happen if everyone did that though? And I’m getting tired of ‘blame the politicians’. Personal accountability exists regardless of what they do, and to be honest the money ‘sponged’ by the government hardly makes a dent even if we got it back somehow

if you have a disabled child you actually dont have to work at all as a career you are exempt from the requirement to do any work related activity

I send my child to a childminders for 32 hours a week and I work 12 hours a week paid and then 8 voluntary. I get 85% of my childcare back and I’m a single parent. There’s really no excuses as to why anyone can’t work and afford to pay 15% of the childcare fees. I am looking at upping my hours to 28 hours a week paid in the job I’ve been volunteering to do. I don’t understand also how they’ve been on your back since 9 months I’ve not been pressured at all to find more hours ans I got told I wouldn’t by someone who is also claiming until my child is 2.

That's actually a brilliant idea

I have no idea either. I just assumed that’s what happened. I was made redundant from Debenhams while on maternity leave and got a new part time job a week after and assumed that’s why I was pushed to get more hours from when he was 9months old?
I don’t have an issue working more hours, I would like to be off benefits ideally but unfortunately I don’t and probably won’t earn enough until LO is in school full time but at the moment it’s childcare that’s almost non existent that is my issue. I live in a rural area and don’t drive and all childminders and pre school are full, so I’m on waiting lists and had to take the hours I could which was 2 mornings a week at 3 hours until more become available if other children leave

It depends how low. It wouldn't unless it is very low, because a mother going to work plus a childcare worker in work is much more productivity. And the UK has a chronic productivity problem, which is one of the main reasons for our standard of living droppjng like a stone (lower GDP per capita, lower value of GBP and therefore higher inflation especially when so many essentials like food and energy are imported). There are many economic structural issues but this is a key one.

And, all of the evidence from abroad shows that child wellbeing, sex inequality, living standards, health outcomes, mental health etc are far better in systems where the norm is for most women to work and services/ benefits for families such a subsidised childcare are universal. Societies where all people to contribute to the greatest extent of their abilities and all oay decent levels of tax rather than always expect "someone else" to fund it. And that way there is money to provide a decent living standard for those who actually can't work/ work more than minimal hours, rather than those who would prefer not to but could taking much of the money that's available.

And, if they did that, one would have to replace the other as you said. So then those who are working would get no support with childcare, just this lower means-tested amount. And therefore they are likely to work even less. So less tax revenue. So less money to fund this... and so on.

Eventually people are going to have to accept that if they want decent services and decent provision for those truly in need who have no options, then those who CAN do something/ more than they are will need to start pulling their weight. That's what a society is. Some collective responsibility as well as entitlement.

Also means-testing of anything is pretty much always a negative. The way you maintain high support for public services - whether it be education or healthcare or childcare funding or state pensions etc - is for them to be universal. Those who earn more pay for themselves and for everyone else. If you means test it you end up with one group funding things for others and not being eligible for it themselves. Therefore no vested interest anymore in the quality or level of provision. Socially divisive. Before long, always, the threshold for the means-test that once appeared to most people to be "fair" is subjected to fiscal drag and downgraded/ cut until effectively the service no longer exists or is abysmal or hardly anybody qualifies for it at all. Means-testing a service is the fastest route towards seeing it effectively absolished entirely: a warning many should heed as people seem to fall for this trick again and again!

Anyway, all of this is rather off topic: apologies OP. Quite happy to discuss it on a separate thread though if somebody wants to set one up.

Plus means-testing almost always costs more than it saves! Child benefit is a great example here. The administrative process, setting up the IT, employing more HMRC staff to process it, chasing up people who have got it wrong/ avoided repaying, investigations, prosecutions, more tax returns required etc etc.... it has meant we have less tax revenue left, and are spending more on HMRC staff but giving less to children.

I really wish more people in the UK would engage with rational policy making and look at the effects of proposed policies, rather than view things purely from a "does this benefit me directly?" or "why should X person get any help when they earn more than me?" perspective. Not only is it a sad indictment of UK social attitudes but it is also very short-sighted because people seemingly failed to consider the knock on effect of policies that create perverse incentives or lower overall tax revenue so that there is less available to help them: they'd rather burn down someone else's tree even if it sets fire to their own house, than live with the envy of their neighbour having a nice tree.

@Kafkaland The childcare worker would still be in work and productive, just not working in childcare. Or working in childcare for those parents who don't want to stay at home. (I use the term parents since, hypothetically, a parent of either sex might want to be the primary caregiver.) Parents who want to work can still receive subsidised childcare from the government. Parents who want to stay at home can receive this small benefit.
Productivity is not the only measure of a country's well being. There are arguments that being in child care from an early age is not good for children, and it could be said that raising happy children is important to the country.
You seem to be saying that caring for children is not work and that it has no value. It can be said that mothers who stay at home to care for small children are actually doing real work. Why is it only work that should be paid and has value when a stranger does it instead?
Another option to consider is a loan, available at low interest and deducted from future earnings, enabling parents to stay at home with children for longer.

Or why not just give parents the choice , so work and have up to 85% of childcare paid or don’t and you don’t get sanctioned. Childcare is extortionate so the government paying 85% for someone to work is going to cost then a lot more than if someone isn’t working so why begrudge those who want to look after their pre school age child (I do think once a child is in full time school they could work but before that it should be a choice and not to be punished if you chose to stay at home

The wait times for CAMHS would support what you are saying - a child’s mental health and stable early years with a caregiver are key

Sounds reasonable to me! I don't mean to suggest that putting pre-school children into nursery is always damaging. It really depends on the parents, the nursery, the child and the amount of time. I am sure CAMHS know what they are talking about, however, and I just don't think it's necessary to force parents and children into this situation if it's not what they want.

OP, as you are currently living rurally, is there a decent sized town nearby which you could move to, with more job opportunities and childcare? What is your housing situation? Obviously you can't move immediately, but maybe going forward it could feature in a long term plan?

Just a thought, as It can be tough living rurally with no support and not being able to drive.

No. If parents are working that is creating goods or services, they earn and spend that money, and this multiplies as it is spent across the economy: creating more jobs and goods and services for others. It generates wealth. Plus the childcare worker is also in work. Again earning money, and both paying tax that can be used to fund services.

If neither the childcare worker/ parent of the child work and instead the parent receives money from the taxpayer, this a net cost. Even if the amount given to parents was equivalent to the cost of childcare, it would still lower productivity, therefore the wealth of the nation, therefore lower GDP and GDP per capita further, lower tax revenue, and create the negative spiral I set out above where it becomes ever harder to fund.

It's just not realistic, from an economic perspective. Not atm anyway. The UK is part of the global economy and simply can't afford what you're suggesting. Our GDP per capita (even including all of the very wealthy people) is now 31st in the world, and falling fast. Overall GDP is fairly irrelevant to living standards so the often trotted out stat about being "the 5th wealthiest country" is irrelevant. By the way we are 6th already and will be out of the G7 before long if things continue on the current trajectory. The UK is not "rich" anymore, it is highly indebted, has an enormous trade deficit it can't fund, high taxes, terrible services and crumbling infrastructure and - crucially - not serious cohesive plan to fix any of this. Hence the "moron premium" being charged by the market now on Government borrowing and their desperation to get inflation down so that rates will fall because they are now (due to mismanagement of issuing gilts based on RPI+% 🤦🏻‍♀️) not inflating away debt, rather spending nearly double the education budget just on interest payments.

I don't disagree with you at all that the current social structure and tax and benefits structure and structure of work is very far from optimal economically, socially, or financially, for a great number of reasons. This is just one facet of it. And yes of COURSE I'd much rather have been able to spend more time with my children when they were tiny and not to have to go back to work at 6 months. Wouldn't everyone? But we also have to ask ourselves what kind of lives we want for our children as adults. And do we want them to have decent funding for education, and healthcare, and a functional economy when they want to start work?

If people want a decent standard of living for themselves and their children they will have to accept that the reality is that productivity in the UK has to rise. Otherwise they will continue to get poorer every year. This is a basic fact of the global economic system and a UK Government (of any colour) will have no power to change that. Societies in which everybody focuses on entitlement and there is no collective responsibility to also contribute to the greatest extent of your ability do not thrive.

We could change a great many things which would also help to prop up GBP, support growth and therefore make more money available for services, but neither the current Government or the opposition are proposing any policies that will make any significant difference to those things. So I suspect we'll carry on as we are, with managed decline and every-falling living standards and politicians tinkering around the edges with irrelevancies whoever is in power.

Again OP - sorry because obviously this is not the subject of your thread, but trying to answer the questions that have been put to me.

I am sure CAMHS know what they are talking about

Sorry, but 🤣🤣🤣🤣 comedy post of the day!

I am looking to exchange but nothing has come up in the last 2 years that suitable. I have looked into moving as it would make life much easier for me to live in a city or town but I’m lucky to work just round the corner from my house. It’s just the childcare or lack of that’s the problem for me