For Newsnight: should we end universal benefits for better off pensioners?

Too much whingeing!

Bad-tempered whingeing!

Petallus - have I been whingeing? I was afraid that people might think I was smug because I am happy with my lot!

Deserving thanks for you your reply. I would have appreciated a bit more on the rug pegging and less on bossy pontificating on universal benefits.

Agreed Greatnan. Obviously I was referring to some posts only.

Good - I have agreed with all your comments about the benefits system and how much people can suffer if it does not work efficiently.

So almost all of us are 'better off'? I suspect a large percentage of pensioners have more than the state pension, either a pension into which they have paid or savings they have accumulated. In that case I do not think our 'benefits' should be means tested! It seems dreadfully unfair that people who have provided for their old age should be penalised.

I also had a sister who received all those benefits but she had chosen not to work when she was quite capable of doing so. In her late 50s she divorced her husband and was kept by the state from then on. She did become disabled and then, rightly, received a lot more benefits. I cannot see why she should have received more from the state before her disability than someone who had worked and saved.

I asked, Greatnan, because you said you didn't grudge your sister any of her benefits, but went on to list the reasons why.

I see - a case of wrongful extrapolation! I don't think you will find any post of mine begrudging anybody anything - it is not my style. I refer again to the parable of the workers in the vineyard - I am getting everything to which I am entitled so I have no interest in grudging others their benefits. I have no way of knowing who has chosen not to work, who has been unable to work, whose husband forbade them working, etc. so I am not prepared to be critical.

I meant to add that my final remark was for the benefit of those members who might begrudge my sister her benefits!

I don't think I've ever been accused of wrongful extrapolation before!
(That's not to say that I've never deserved it, of course.)

petallus,
I am ashamed to have deviated so much already, the "subject" is still, supposedly, universal benefits, and the proposal to means test them and stop some from getting them.It would be difficult for someone reading the last few pages to guess what the actual subject is.
Far from pontificating, I thought I was stating the glaringly obvious.Some of your remarks recently, as relating to Greatnans sister have been oppugnant, obviously I'm referring to some posts only.
Obviously no one thinks this disquisition has run its course yet, nor will they with so many deviations, so on we go, we are ever likely be described as gossips, can someone suggest a change of title to the thread, to justify its continuance?

deserving of what are you deserving? Does you normal style of conversation carry such a pedantic and verbose attitude?
I am just politely enquiring out of mere curiosity?

Oppugnant, now, as well!

deserving It's a hiding to nothing if you hope that posters will keep precisely to the topic with which the thread began. Conversations seem to range over a wide range of apparently unrelated subjects, sometimes returning now and then to the original one. This kind of forum is not a formal debate, but more like a chat over a cup of coffee or in the pub. That's just the way things turned out.

anagramR U saying I'm opugnant? Which my iPad says should be opus ant?

Probably because I only put one p in it?

No, jeni!
I was not referring to you!

I think calling someone opus ant would definitely stop them in their tracks...and now I'm really deviating

I didn't find any repugnant remarks about my sister - have I missed something?

The word used was oppugnant not repugnant!

It's not in my dictionary!

But it is on google! Apologies due to deserving - it means hostile! I still didn't see any oppugnant posts about my sister. I have learnt a new word today - great!

Looks a good one for scrabble or acrostics!

Politely replying.A bit like saying," respectfully yours,or with all due respect" or as mentioned previously, putting a line through the remark,we all know what it really means. Call a stick a stick. As for verbose, It seems that insufficient words have been used, or is it that people are uncertain whether they are arguing about something or explaining something?Often the same words are used.As for curiosity, we all know what that supposedly did, in relation to the cat.
Some of our greatest disputations were carried out in coffee houses, over a cup of (tea probably), and were probably regarded as a chat, but in reality were an exchange of intelligence, rather than ignorance.Pity we can't filter out some of the more specious remarks, and return to, "some subject or other' rather than personalities, enough, do not wish to appear disparaging.(suffice to wander off on another tack perhaps: not wishing to mix metaphors)?