How bad could things get after six more years?

Anniebach I don't if it means that the majority of claimants manage without foodbanks but the family I know say they don't qualify so I guess there is much more to this than makes the newspapers

tickingbird.....sorry did not realise you meant money to spare as I do know some people but not many, on benefits and they only have a basic lifestyle.
I am puzzled by those with all the extra money and wonder if they claim for illness and disabled . I have known of families doing that and they are the ones where there is money to spare if the child isn't really disabled.I have known older couples do this as well. ex neighbours of mine. It is not fair.

Most people on benefits are only on them short term and many of them have cars, bought when they were in work and needed to be able to get to and from interviews and job, once they are back in employment. Having a driving license and car is essential if you want to work in many rural areas or towns with a high level of unemployment when public transport is minimal and you have to travel to work.
A single person gets £73 a week plus Housing Benefit and Council tax benefit and that sum has to cover everything. Some people on benefits are tempted to work on the black. I do not mean those holding full time jobs and claiming benefits, but ones who will do the odd day here and there as opportunity to get an extra £100, cash in hand and not report it. And who can blame them. Apart from anything else, the benefits system is so cumbersome if the worker reported it, their benefit would be stopped and it would take weeks to get it reinstated - all for one days work and £100.

There are lots of urban myths about 'benefit scroungers'. There are relatively few of them, but those that are make good media.

If the majority of those who use food banks are working in
The low paid gig economy this can only mean the minority using food banks are on benefits so those on benefits are not
struggling to put food on the table.

Pinkquartz I didn’t mean anyone was given free driving lessons and cars. My point is they can afford them whilst on benefits. Benefits shouldn’t give you a great life. It should enable you to live and house and feed your family. Instead it’s become a lifestyle choice and in cases where children are involved, it’s a pretty good lifestyle too.

Who gets free driving lessons and cars???

I don't know any scroungers myself, but yes I know they exist
and I also know that many of the 800 Peers in the House of Lords get a lot of money for doing absolutely nothing.
So clearly there is greed and dishonesty at both ends of the financial scale......
But not everyone on benefits is a scrounger .

It upsets me to see the hatred and resents towards the poor when we know that the rich are just as "bad".
We are living at a time when people are mean a lot and that is sad.

Also regarding working, it would be much better if people were paid decent wages and given decent hours. I have read many times that the majority of people using the foodbanks are working...yes working, but in the low paid gig economy that is so loved by our Govt. ( I see no difference between Labour, Tory or Lib Dem)

There’s rarely anything at all ‘in proportion’ on GN.

People in poverty are no more typical of the population as a whole, than are those who are rich.

What we need to do is concentrate on helping those in poverty, open up new opportunities for those from disadvantaged backgrounds.

As several posters have pointed out many people in this country are comfortably off, while not being wealthy. Most of the new estates around us - and thousands of houses are being built each year, seem to contain many large 4/5 bedroomed houses, - and they are selling. The rest of the houses on each development is mainly 'affordable' houses, the current euphemism for public sector housing.

I think we need to see things in proportion,

MPB I totally agree. I know some younger people in benefits or single parents working a small amount of hours per week and receiving top ups. They are raking it in. Driving lessons, cars. The children have every expensive toy going. Mobile phones, sky tv. Ipads, tv in each bedroom. Each child with their own Amazon firestick. And yes, the smell of weed emanating from these areas. Obviously there is poverty but I don’t see it as Ne Corbyn and cronies would have us believe and if he gets in he’ll give them more and more and make no mistake, the Tories will get back in and more austerity! Look back and you’ll see. Labour mess up then the Tories get in and have to sort it out.

Grany I have empathy/ sympathy for those who are in desperate need of benefits i.e. disabled whether that be mentally or physically, long term illness and those who have been made unemployed by no fault of their own.

I am still totally sure that there is an “underclass” of society that are boastful of not working and claiming benefits.

I was responding to some posters who say that a lot of people on benefit are scroungers work shy. And the link says it all sums it up neatly in reply.

I dont work for any-party-but-the-Conservative-Party Labour is my Party.

There is no magic money tree or magic wand?

I think you will find Labours polices in their manifesto have plenty of compassion to make a fairer more equal society. There would be a crack down on tax avoiders that would be a good start and many others. What better polices could you want? Take a look.

What are you doing Grany? Working for any-party-but-the Conservative-Party?

Finding bits of anti UK/Conservative propaganda and giving us links? You are transparent.

How about some of your own opinions?

UK austerity has inflicted 'great misery' on citizens, UN says

This is the result of nearly 10 years of austerity lays it out bare.

www.theguardian.com/society/2018/nov/16/uk-austerity-has-inflicted-great-misery-on-citizens-un-says

I was a Health Visitor for 12 years then a HV manager. I visited families from the wealthy to those living hand to mouth and telling me just how much they struggled. However I could guarantee nine out of 10 of these families had Sky tv and a television so large it almost covered one wall. And don’t get me started about the parent(s) who smoked, usually at the same time as bottle feeding the newest arrival. Some families just don’t prioritise and expect everything to be handed to them on a plate, and some were. Free nursery places or childminding when the couldn’t cope with the little darlings. The majority of families accessing food banks have at least one adult who smokes and not just tobacco. If it’s been a good week and the “fag house” has plenty of cheap cigarettes then they will buy a few bottles of Lambrini. Not all families are like this but you speak to any HV and they’ll agree with me.

it’s just that the well off don’t see the plight they are in and choose to close their eyes to the hardships of others

I think you presume too much!
I have been poor, I have struggled financially and known hardship but I DID NOT resent people who had more than me.

I got on with my lot. Not a lot else you can do except strive and that is hard. Now I get by, I manage thanks to a lifetime of hard work. As mentioned earlier in the thread, the OP is a worse case scenario (a pensioner in candlelight.)

If that IS the case there are advocates galore to intervene, and to assist. We live in a place where we do care about others and have a welfare state to aid the poor and frail. (Of course, to the OP, this is broken and does not work...sigh)

Anyone would think from the (project fear?) OP that we lived in a third world country. Most of us have a good standard of living whether we work or not. I'd rather be poor in the UK than anywhere else in the world.

I am not apologising for working hard and having a decent life. I have paid my NI and taxes and continue to do so.

Oh, and in my lifetime (60+) not one government, Labour or Conservative has eradicated poverty.

Do carry on Tory-bashing but you know as well as I do that there is no magic wand, or no level of compassion that can create a level playing field for everyone. Never has been, never will be and you are deluded if you think otherwise. Can you not see the levels of corruption that particular engineered socialist/communist scenario would create?

I’m too dim to work out whether:

“The euro is a Bad Thing....”

is you being tongue in cheek, or not MD.
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At times, Dr Gill seems to assume that Governments can borrow money endlessly.

It doesn't have to 'borrow' money from anyone. The state which has sovereign money can issue as much money as it likes. We've had over £200 billion of quantitative easing over the last 10 years. It wasn't borrowed from anywhere, it was 'created' by the BoE by entering numbers on a computer.

Is that really so? Greece has shown that countries too can go bankrupt.

Greece does not have a sovereign currency. It uses the euro and is constrained by the ECB. It cannot issue extra money in the same way that the UK can.:-)

The euro is a Bad Thing....

There is no decent minimum wage zero hours contracts

Poorest Brits bear the brunt of Tory benefit changes as incomes continue to fall

welfareweekly.com/poorest-brits-bear-the-brunt-of-tory-benefit-changes-as-incomes-are-slashed/

I don't understand the constant hating in this country, on anyone who has done well for themselves or has money. It is like we are all meant to hate anyone who has money! Like it is a bad thing! I completely agree that people who have true disabilities or temporary issues should get more help, but when a couple claiming all benefits gets £15,000 or £23,000 for a couple, and people are telling me they are struggling needing food banks, etc. I am afraid I am not as sympathetic as I could be! I know people on benefits and people with money. I have been poor and I have been very comfortable. I think there is a lot of "woe is me" these days, rather than people actually trying to improve their lot. If I suggest that they have less takeaways, eat cheap, less sweets, ditch the car, ditch the Sky, I get abuse. I only have money because I lived on next to nothing, worked 3 jobs etc. I am not complaining, many many people do the same.
But when people say they cannot live on £50 a week for food, or cannot afford £50 a month on Sky, I just don't get it. To me, being poor means either having no food, losing drastic amounts of weight, and/or having no roof over your head.
I know the official term of poor is 'relative to others', but from what I see all the time, all around me, there are far too many people who don't want to work and are milking the system.
People bringing kids into the world, who cannot afford them. I am not saying you have to be rich to have kids, far from it. My own family were poor, but the difference is they saved like crazy to get some money behind them and planned ahead as to how they could afford a child.
I get sick of people blaming everyone else. All those unemployed but fit people get out there and volunteer! Go help the NHS! Go help out others who are poor. It seems like community has disappeared - used to be that families would help each other out, and neighbours, but these days people would rather just claim every bit of money from the government they can and then complain about the government.

Hi Margaux

Blair New Labour Tory lite. brought in unessary PFIs creating massive debts paving the way for privatisation. The NHS did not need PFIs just funded properly. Government finance is not run like household finance that's a lie being sold to the people.

Greece

Yanis Varoufais the finance minister said the harsh medicine of austerity prescribed by Brussels and Berlin was killing the Greek economy rather than curing it. Neo-liberals.

rosecarmel

The US is the wealthiest nation on earth on many criteria - although it is also in debt, I believe?

I was under the impression however that there is a large gap between the rich and the poor. The rich are certainly hugely wealthy - more so maybe than the rich in the UK. But aren't poor Americans all the poorer relatively and by comparison?

At one time, the minimum wage in the UK was more generous - I haven't looked up the position now.

Grany,

Thanks for the links. You will have noted that Dr Gill criticises both Labour and Tories for PFI - repayment of debt is a problem, and a very real one. But would many hospitals have been built without the advances/ 'investment' from the private sector? At times, Dr Gill seems to assume that Governments can borrow money endlessly. Is that really so? Greece has shown that countries too can go bankrupt. And who suffers? The people. And the poor more than the rich.

Thank for the links. Just my view. Different people see things differently. I respect your opinions.

Urmstongran it is definitely not anecdotal it is a “close” family member their partner and children.

I am sick of this ‘class war’,

some cheat on benefits, some cheat on paying tax. Some parents work their socks off to help their children go as far as they can in education , some can’t be bothered to turn up for a parents evening.

Always been so.

GG13 there will be others along soon to put this down as anecdotal nonsense - it doesn’t represent the bigger picture. Which it doesn’t. But it exists. I do agree with the Conservative government that people who can work, should. Life on benefits is a lifestyle choice for some. I have knowledge of people who choose that. But again ...
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