Does anyone else think that at the next General Election...

Many of them won't even be eligible for Universal Credit. That's why they're receiving absolutely nothing.

Oops! Dinahmo Sorry!

Dunahmo Thank you for confirming in more detail what I had written about my own situation. There are about three million of us who have fallen through the net.

maddyone

I understood that the self employed were entitled to government help during the Covid19 crisis so long as they could provide sufficient evidence of tax paid for the last year/s. And provided they didn’t earn too much. One of my son in laws couldn’t get anything at all as his income in the last years was too high. If a person is self employed they need to provide evidence of earnings and tax paid.

HMRC will have the 3 years' tax returns so that they can see exactly what income the tax payer has. Nevertheless, the self employed still had to apply for the grant. Quite why I do not know since it would be easy enough for them to contact every single self employed person who qualified.

MMaddyOne The amount of tax paid is irrelevant. The requirements are:

(a) that you have to have submitted tax returns up to 2019.

(b) that 50% or more of your taxable income is from self employment

(c) your total taxable income is less than £50,000.

To clarify:

(a) if you were only self employed for the final year (2018/19) or for two years (2017/18 and 2018/19) then the amount of grant receivable would be time apportioned.

(b) this doesn't take into account those who have spent large sums on capital equipment or rent for example which reduces their profits to less than 50% of their total income. They could be in receipt of only the basic state pension and they have started a business in order to increase their cost of living.

(c) those whose total TAXABLE income exceeds £50k probably don't need much assistance.

This does not take into account those people who, back in 2019 decided that they would like to start a business. They may have been unemployed or decided that they would like a change. Whatever their reason, they are not able to claim the grant.

Under normal circumstances one would assume that they had sufficient funds to see them through the initial stages of their business. However, these circumstances are not normal and the only support that they get is universal credit. As most of us are aware, this is not enough.

There are hundreds of thousands of people out there who have fallen through the net. It may well be that after this is over, they may well not be able to get sufficient work.

Just wanted to add that I am lucky that I do have savings, although was hoping to have a holiday soon. There are millions of people who don't have any savings and have nothing. Protections for tenants are about to stop, so there will inevitably be many evictions over the coming months. It's almost certain that many currently furloughed employees will be made redundant.

Those people have been forgotten, which is one of the reasons I'm so mad that money is being handed out like smarties to the government's cronies.

maddyone I have been self-employed for six years, have declared all my earnings, paid any income tax due and even paid voluntary National Insurance Contributions.

The problem is that I also have pensions. They're not much, which is why I have to make up my earnings to a level I can live on with self-employment. My self-employed earnings have been approximately the same as I would have received if I had started receiving state pension at the age of 60.

A bigger problem is that three years ago, my mother was dying and I was in quite bad health and I earned very little. My pensions exceeded my self-employed income and I supplemented living costs with savings.

The rules for help in the current crisis state that self-employed income must exceed income from all other sources, which in my case they haven't. I earned quite a lot in the tax year 2019-20, but that year doesn't count.

As a result, I have received absolutely nothing and my total earnings mean that I am over the £73pw threshold to receive Universal Credit.

So I'm afraid your information is wrong. I most certainly don't earn too much and HMRC already has all the information it needs. I'm not eligible and that's all there is to it. I live extremely frugally, but I've had to dip into the few savings I have to pay rent, council tax and essentials, such as utility bills and food.

I no longer live in the north, but I think you’re right Iam, I think Corbyn was a big vote loser. But I also think Brexit was an issue, judging from the coverage I saw on television during the campaign. It was both of these factors in my opinion.

Thanks Galaxy - I sometimes feel I'm a lone voice from the Red Wall!
What a way to describe us

Yes I am in the north east, it was the same here.

ladymuch - where in the north has Starmer not made a good impression.
It also isn't as simple as suggesting "the north" put Brexit before the traditional anti tory vote.
I live in the north west. "The North" is much more than the small town I live in. Though we lost two good labour mp's as did many other poverty stricken, deprived towns in our region.
I know it's like banging the head on the brick wall for some here but - here we go. What we were told when we were phoning or knocking on doors wasn't that it had to be Brexit Brexit Brexit. The first response was usually something like 'sorry love, I can't vote Labour with yon mon in charge".
Simple really. AND it isn't that our constituency I full of stupid people, too dim to realise the tories never did anything for us. It's that the LP no longer represented our areas.

I understood that the self employed were entitled to government help during the Covid19 crisis so long as they could provide sufficient evidence of tax paid for the last year/s. And provided they didn’t earn too much. One of my son in laws couldn’t get anything at all as his income in the last years was too high. If a person is self employed they need to provide evidence of earnings and tax paid.

'The North' is a big area, ladymuck. Which bit are you talking about?

It's hard to say at the moment, everything could have changed by then. One thing I do know is that Starmer hasn't made a positive impression up here in the North, where so many voted Conservative. I think the Labour party thought that all they had to do was get rid of Corbyn and they would get their voters back.
They need to look at the reasons why people voted Tory if they really want to re- connect with the working classes.

The interview with Sunak on BBC Breakfast left many viewers appalled at his responses to a man who had no money for his children as he had been left out, along with many other self-employed, of the payments that others had.

Some say Boris is fine, sitting tight as Sunak who is viewed as a benevolent Santa Claus at present will, by necessity, become Scrooge-like further down the track ...

Sunak didn't cover himself in glory over the forgotten self-employed.

He had said he would leave nobody without hope. There are many who have been left without hope and no income at all.

Although I think Sunak would make a very able PM ( and obviously many on GN think so too) this may not translate to the country at large when it comes to votes.
Boris Johnson was always a popular figure right across the board.Am not sure why some think he will leave office before (over four years) his time? Once PM, nobody wants to step down.
The next election is so far off we can’t even begin to know the result, anything can and will ?happen before then.

No political headaches from me. I'm not in the UK :D

This just popped up on my twitter feed, looks like the Government is still more popular than Labour.

We haven't been anywhere near self sufficient in food for the past 100 years or more, qq. We couldn't even manage it in WWII with as much land as possible put down to growing vegetables etc and an only 45 million population. Plus food rationing and really boring food...

I'm all agog to see how we manage to expand our manufacturing base from next to nothing to supplying the needs of the UK. Most of it was destroyed 40 years ago when the emphasis turned to financial services and we were set for a bright future as part of the EU Single Market which our government had initiated and developed.

That's all upscuttled now, of course...

I think most countries will be in the same boat as the UK financially. Personally, I would have no objection to Rishi being the next Conservative leader even though I'm 'marked' as being one of the biggest racists on this site.

We should begin with nationalising all companies owned by China for a start- this should happen worldwide to have a real effect as they are the biggest threat to the world and not just from diseases - and put our emphasis in being as self sufficient in food and manufacturing as much as possible.

And the election before that when corbyn failed to win? That will have been someone else's fault as well. It wasnt just about Brexit in the north, time and time again on the doorstep it was about corbyn. Thankfully Starmer seems to understand this.

I agree with Grandad. The last election was about Brexit. At the moment it’s impossible to say what the next election will be about primarily. It’s too difficult to tell, it depends which way the cookie crumbles. Rising taxes, unemployment, Covid19, the economy, Brexit; its all in the mix. Anyone could hazard a guess, but that’s all it can be. This time next year it could be clearer, but who knows, it might not be.

I think everyone was so sick of the stalemate with any move stymied in parliament that they just voted for the one party who seemed likely to actually move things on.

Grandad And they'll live to regret it