Illegals - such a lovely description, don't you think?

I can't believe I'm reading this. So, some of us are living out our lockdown life with our internet, freezer full of food, tv's, dvd's, Netflix, hot and cold running water etc etc thinking to ourselves 'just imagine what life would be like if it was like this but without a home and all of our creature comforts'. And others are just fretting about all those bloomin 'furriners' arriving on boats....….

I taught an adult asylum seeker. She was a teacher hoping to retrain to work here. Her young children were not given places in school. Her husband, a professor of medicine, could not even work as a volunteer porter in a hospital.
Asylum seekers are an untapped resource under current legislation. What a waste.

I’m friends with a family of asylum seekers. The mum in particular. They’re lovely people. Very gentle and kind. We became friends long before I realised they were asylum seekers.

They would be a credit to any country.

I didn’t say I did vampirequeen

Both groups are a hazard to any country on lockdown.

Has anyone ever met an asylum seeker, refugee or 'illegal'? I've met people who fall into a these categories. You need to listen to their stories before you judge. You need to comfort a child who's family has been told they can no longer stay even though the children were born here and know no other life, or a child who is coming to terms with seeing her mother gang raped on multiple occassions, or a child who saw scars on my arms and thought I'd been attacked with a machete. You need to see a parent's terror when they're told they have to take their child back to a place where they're not safe. When you've seen someone in fear for their and/or their child's life you may see refugees, asylum seekers and 'illegal' immigrants in a different light.

Jennifer Eccles...why do you fear a handful of immigrants more than a plane full of ex pats?

If you know of someone who is cheating benefits or tax then you have a civic duty to report that person. It's no good complaining on a forum like this whilst doing nothing about it. You can report people anonymously.

well, I must lead a very sheltered life, all of these GN members surrounded by benefit cheats......

A well thought out and researched response JE, as always.

Regarding " scroungers" I know of one who has had hundreds of thousands of tax payers money in grants for a community group. The things she bought languish in the back of a cupboard, while she claims everything she can.

This is a complete disaster just waiting to happen.

How many of the migrants could be carrying the virus? Judging by the fact that they were standing bunched up in a line, the number could be quite high .

They are in Calais for one reason only - to try their luck in getting here illegally, and obviously some will succeed.

Witzend Sat 11-Apr-20 13:27:53
Not so long ago, I read of a disabled women whose neighbours reported her for putting her bins out. Apparently, to the neighbours that meant she was fit enough not to be claiming benefits. An investigation ensued.

What if that was the only exercise she could physically do in a week? What if she had to go and lie down/take painkillers before or after her exertion? What if she just wanted to try and feel/be normal...? What if she was following doctors'/OT's orders to gently stroll out now and again?

My point is that no one except the disabled person, their friends and family, doctors and the assessment people know the exact extent of disability/illness.

I guess the same goes for other people who claim benefits. You just don't know what their actual circumstances are.

Couple of years ago, I heard of a man bragging to neighbours about getting lots of food off the local foodbank here when they'd spotting him going in there, whilst apparently going off to work everyday. It later turned out that he was actually sacked for being genuinely ill and was on benefits desperately job hunting every day. He'd just been acting all macho. Some people make up stuff because they're just ashamed to be claiming anything. Which is how those who judge benefits claimants as 'scroungers' make people feel.

vampirequeen Sat 11-Apr-20 13:17:13

Thank you very much for finding those figures VQ.

£2Billion (at least) unclaimed. I bet those people could really do with that cash.

Another £2Billion in errors and fraud. So, given the system's unwieldiness, at least half is errors. So that leaves about £1Billion in fraud. That sounds like a huge amount.

What if the fraud component is, say, £1/2billion or less?
Because they're not publishing the actual figures for error and fraud separately because they want to perpetuate the hatred of claimants and make themselves look good?!! (It's all political, don't forget!)

We could probably double the £35Billion tax evasion by companies. Thus £70Billion (that's based on figures from 5 years ago).

So, actual benefit fraud may turn out to be around 1% of everything else that the Treasury loses out on?

For another perspective on this we can look at what UK retailers call 'shrinkage'. That is losses from supermarkets and shops.

In the UK in 2019, stores lost a total of £4.8Billion from shoplifting, employee theft and supplier/warehouse theft.
Shoplifting accounted for 34.6% of this figure, staff theft for 22.1% and warehouse theft 18%.

In other words, staff theft alone at £1.3Billion was likely more than DOUBLE the amount of benefits fraud.
www.retailresearch.org/crime-costs-uk.html
(Another report from a few years back says that this adds £73 per customer per year to our shopping bills.)

So why do people feel the need to pick on people claiming benefits?!
Why not pick on store staff , shoplifters and warehouse/supplier staff? Because they are actually and directly costing us each much more.

Ellen and Hetty, having recently, last week flown into HR I can reliably assure you that there is hardly any information about isolating. I noticed 2 posters but as we were all walking, at a reasonable pace, we didn’t really have time to read them. No leaflets, nothing.
We have been isolating but apparently didn’t “have to”.

GillT57, because I know them personally. It isn't something they keep secret.

FYI, I am a Guardian reader. I wouldn't touch the Daily Heil to wipe my bum on.

My brother in law was the worst kind of benefit cheat/fraudster - when he died he left £500,000 - he claimed every type of benefit under multiple aliases- ostensibly to be utilised to care for my niece who has Downs/multiple attendant illnesses/an is an amputee. He had 3 cars yet still claimed DLA. They both lived in abject squalor and not one of our niece’s needs were met - quite the opposite. He considered himself a pillar of the community and was a Knight of St Columba - oh the hypocrisy and irony - Jesus wept. Fortunately one of our niece’s carers or social worker who realised the extent of the impact on her informed the relevant authorities.

You can be sure most of the would be illegals are economic migrants they all claim to be asylum seekers, very few are, life as an illegal here is far better than the life they had at home.

12 flights are being chartered to bring back 3,000 Brits back from India next week. Will they be isolated when they land at Heathrow ? This is no worse than immigrants coming in unchecked is it ?

Anyone crossing the channel is not escaping war or famine; they are coming from France, a place many go on holiday to frequently! When the Romans and Vikings landed on our shores uninvited, we called them invaders.

I do not know any 'benefit cheats'. I am interested in how so many on here do; how do you know that the owners of the big house are claiming benefits/understating income/not declaring true income? Are you party to their bank accounts? Are you their accountant? Or just spending your period of self isolation reading the Daily Mail online?

Same goes for tax dodgy Witzend.

People often say that benefit fraud is only a tiny percentage of big business/rich people’s tax dodging, etc. Which may well be true.
However I don’t see how anyone can actually know with any accuracy the level of benefit fraud. By definition, the only cases that are known about are those that have been found out. Usually after a lot of investigation by under-resourced and probably hard pressed council staff.

Judging by fairly frequent MN posts on this topic (Should I report my neighbour?’ etc., the overwhelming response is nearly always, Don’t! It’s none of your business, etc.
So how often it’s reported, even when it’s known about, I do wonder.

Rules are not much use unless they're enforced, though.

Just to give this debate some perspective.

2018/19 Benefit fraud and accidental overpayment (mistakes made by the DWP) cos the country £4.1billion. However they managed to underpay some people by accident or the person not claiming £2billion. The total cost of the fraud and errors was 1.6% of the benefits budget.
assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/801594/fraud-and-error-stats-release-2018-2019-estimates.pdf

Post 2015 Tax. Tax avoidance/evasion/mistakes cost this country £35billion or 5.6% of the total tax bill. However this doesn't take into account the £billions that are going unpaid by major companies so the figure is really much higher.
www.independent.co.uk/voices/hmrc-tax-gap-avoidance-billions-pounds-a8968591.html

2019 Illegal immigrants e.g. overstayers, trafficked sex workers, spouses, children and desperate people who try to cross the Channel in inflatables and dinghies. Between 800K and 1.2 million people (1.2 to 1.8% of the UK population). Over 98% of the people in this country are here legally.
www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-50420307

We have rules for a reason. All countries do.

The mayor in Calais has been trying to get as many of the migrants as possible to move to temporary shelters so that they can at least have access to sanitation, hand wash, showers etc, but very few have taken up the offer because they want to continue trying to get to the uk. But when, not if, COVID breaks out in the Calais migrant camps, the mortality rate will be enormous.