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

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.

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.

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

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

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.

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.

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 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.

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.

Oops! Dinahmo Sorry!

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

BTW HMRC did contact ever self-employed person who qualified.

Several of my clients didn't receive letters or any other communication from HMRC. Or, if they did, they didn't tell me.

And now, finally, from the London Economics

Boris Johnson “deeply regrets” going down Brexit route close sources reveal
Boris Johnson has admitted he “deeply regrets” going down the Brexit route according to sources close to the former Foreign Secretary. Matt Kelly, editor of The New European, revealed on Twitter that someone who knows Johnson very well said he now wishes he had sent the other letter. The source said: “He knows he’s fucked […]

Dinahmo

Several of my clients didn't receive letters or any other communication from HMRC. Or, if they did, they didn't tell me.

Were they eligible? I read that everybody would be contacted if they were eligible. I didn't receive anything, so rang HMRC anyway because I thought I could be wrong. I was told that I wasn't eligible and that I would have received an email if I had have been. HMRC is usually good at sending relevant emails, so I had no reason not to believe what I was told.

biba70

And now, finally, from the London Economics

Boris Johnson “deeply regrets” going down Brexit route close sources reveal
Boris Johnson has admitted he “deeply regrets” going down the Brexit route according to sources close to the former Foreign Secretary. Matt Kelly, editor of The New European, revealed on Twitter that someone who knows Johnson very well said he now wishes he had sent the other letter. The source said: “He knows he’s fucked […]

He most certainly is and the country's going to go down with him.

It does indeed seem that the system of communication wasn't perfect. HMRC thinks there a million more people who could claim:

www.gov.uk/guidance/claim-a-grant-through-the-coronavirus-covid-19-self-employment-income-support-scheme.

Boris won't be PM in the next election, well thats what I think and we won't leave the EU without a deal. I think he will cave in on the fishing industry and except a deal that is worse that Mays. It will be a complete mess next year and I think times will be extremely hard, we will have a second wave of the virus over the winter along with a terrible exit from the EU. I really fear for this country and people losing their jobs, there will be a great deal more poverty.

Also a bit about being self employed and getting help, it would seem that you can't apply if one of you in the family is working.

I'm hoping Scotland will be out of the UK and back in the EU before then.The EU has said it will welcome Scotland but wouldn't take England back in ..if Scotland leaves England WILL be bankrupt as we have been subsidising WM for decades and more .This will shock many who believe the opposite to be true.Maybe now you've witnessed the lies that flow from WM daily you might believe what we've been saying all along.Lets face it a government who wont support a family who need an extra bedroom without charging for it is highly unlikely to support a whole country !!

growstuff and Dinahmo
Thank you for the information, it does explain things more.

maddyone

growstuff and Dinahmo
Thank you for the information, it does explain things more.

You're welcome. TBH it concerns me that you didn't realise the true situation. You're obviously intelligent and well-informed, but you weren't aware of the plight of so many. It must mean that the message hasn't been getting out into the mainstream.

Just over 200 MPs from all parties, including some who might surprise you, signed a letter to the Chancellor a couple of days ago and have formed a group called "Excluded". I wrote about it on GN, but people didn't seem to realise the significance. Martin Lewis has reported about it on TV and in the media.

It just goes to show that unless an issue is pushed by lobbyists and the main stream media, it gets overlooked.

The situation is very real. I've been reading about the £190 billion, which has been spent on various schemes and I thought I was just unlucky that I'd fallen through all of the nets. Then I realised just how many of us there are and, not only that, but billions of pounds has probably been claimed fraudulently.

My head is spinning at the incompetence, the corruption and those who really couldn't care.

Barmeyoldbat I think your reference to the self-employed not getting help refers to Universal Credit. It has always been the case the joint household income is taken into account for UC, so it's almost impossible for one of a couple to claim UC if one of them should become unemployed.

The "conditionality" for the self-employed to claim UC is very strict and complicated anyway.

This is different from claiming the Self Employed income support, which was set up specifically for the Covid-19 crisis.

It has to be faced that this "Conservative government has carried out policies that are the most " socialist" in their application since the Labour government of 1945.

As someone who has been a continuous subscribing member of the Labour movement for fifty-five years, I never believed that such policies that has seen a British government pay the wages and salaries of millions of UK workers for now over four months would ever be carried out in this country.

It was always stated from the start of lockdown that some would fall through the net due to the complicated nature of their income. However, the vast majority of those that witnessed their employment taken away overnight have been helped to an extent those persons never could have believed would happen at the start of this crisis.

I say huge THANK YOU to all in the government and Civil Service who brought that about, no matter the colour of their politics.

A Britain to be proud of in the midst of this worldwide crisis.

How do work out that it's "socialist" three million people have been left on the scrap heap? Sorry, but I despair that it's been so easy to dupe people.

Hummm - what’s socialist about the billions given to firms based in tax havens? Many other countries limited financial help to countries registered and paying taxes in the country giving out the money.