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[pscocoa]

My Polish friend tells me that he knows a fellow Pole (and does not agree with his behaviour) who is a self employed tradesman, comes over here very occasionally, has a UK address - AND claims and gets UK child allowance for the whole year.

What are our Border people/Social Security doing?

Where does correction of this outright scam feature in reallocating funds to the needy?

[Selseybill]

That's the EU for you. Herd a lot of Eastern block members do this. What they get in Child benefit is sometimes more than they earn a week at work.  This is the type of "travelling benefit is the one that needs to stop

[r1]

the proplem is years old
is it right that someone who has lived in a council house all her life,now her husbands dead and the children have left now lives by herself in a 3 bedroom house with a garden?
while theres familys in bed and breakfast?

[Selseybill]

No it's the fault government for selling off all the council houses in the past. There's just no places to move to if you need to down size. My mothering law after her youngest moved out asked the council for smaller place to down size but all they have is 2 and 3 bedroom places.

Bedroom tax is the new window tax of the 17th century.

[dbdb]

I have to say everybody sits and moans about cuts but nobody ever comes up with an answer as to where the money is coming from to if the cuts are not made!

Get the money from the 1% not the 99%.  The 1% only hoard it or spend it on high added value low total labour trinkets that don't help the economy.  Give some money to the 99% they'll spend it on high labour items and create jobs, virtous circle.  Or at least invest in some infrastructure like roads and houses.  Austerity on the 99% is a vicious circle, reduces demand, reduces jobs, that reduces demand, reduces jobs etc....

[TheBoy]

Sadly, although it will affect a proportion of deserving people, this is the only way forward.  The system as it previously stood is not sustainable. The country simply cannot afford it. Borrowing yet more, Labour style, is not even an answer, let alone a viable or realistic one.

Something has to give. It just happens that this month, its the benefits system.

To give some idea of the current problem, closing the NHS completely would not solve the outgoings > income problem that the country faces.


As said, it will affect some genuine claimants, but benefits has become a bloody career for far too many. And for too long. Even in the 80s/90s when I did phones, those on benefits were the ones with the big cars and satelite TV, neither of which I could get close to affording at the time, so I put up with either no car, or a small car, and just the 4 channels on the telly.  Go into Bletchley post office before the benefits were paid directly into accounts, you'd see the career slappers (teenage mums, 3 kids) cash their giro, then go an buy a load of lottery scratchcards and fags from the post office's mini shop counter.

Sorry, it has to change, so I applaud the governments attempt. Flawed? Undoubtedly. But its a step in the right direction.

[ozzycat]

Thinking along the line of the Top Gear ones

yup thats the one ive got

[omega3000]

Yes agreed its got to change but they are tarring all with the same brush and thats where its wrong ... labeling genuine people in need with people like this 

The latest figures from the Department for Work and Pensions show that 1,830 incapacity benefit claimants are obese, 42,360 suffer from alcoholism and 37,480 are listed under ‘drug abuse’.

Plus all the ones that have just given up the benefits as they know they wont pass the new medical 
Its a disgrace , i see it every day people on DLA that walk around with a walking stick on their arm not needing the use of it but getting all the benefits , new cars and holidays 3 times a year  these are the ones that have lined their pockets for years that have now just handed in their entitlement 

[SIR Philbutt]

Poor ian is being picked on for opening his mouth      Do a refresh/reload  supporters amount moves so quick

http://www.change.org/en-GB/petitions/iain-duncan-smith-iain-duncan-smith-to-live-on-53-a-week

They've just upped the number required from 300k to 500k - #waraswizz

[SIR Philbutt]

Sadly, although it will affect a proportion of deserving people, this is the only way forward........

... trimmed

Have to agree but do feel for those that are affected by the unilateral approach being taken.
I do hold some hope though that those truly deserving ,especially as stated on here, will see this re-addressed in the near future.
Write to your Councillor, MP, local and national press and go blogging. It would appear that public opinion is having some effect on policy as we head towards the next round of local, European and general elections 

[tunnie]

Sadly, although it will affect a proportion of deserving people, this is the only way forward........

... trimmed

Have to agree but do feel for those that are affected by the unilateral approach being taken.
I do hold some hope though that those truly deserving ,especially as stated on here, will see this re-addressed in the near future.
Write to your Councillor, MP, local and national press and go blogging. It would appear that public opinion is having some effect on policy as we head towards the next round of local, European and general elections 

Have to agree as well, it's the way forward, we cannot afford the system we have now. Too many people try to screw as much as they can

[ozzycat]

i just wish i could tell them to stick it up the0r arse

[Vamps]

Yes agreed its got to change but they are tarring all with the same brush and thats where its wrong ... labeling genuine people in need with people like this 

The latest figures from the Department for Work and Pensions show that 1,830 incapacity benefit claimants are obese, 42,360 suffer from alcoholism and 37,480 are listed under ‘drug abuse’.

Plus all the ones that have just given up the benefits as they know they wont pass the new medical 
Its a disgrace , i see it every day people on DLA that walk around with a walking stick on their arm not needing the use of it but getting all the benefits , new cars and holidays 3 times a year  these are the ones that have lined their pockets for years that have now just handed in their entitlement 

Where on earth do you get that from?  Comments like that do not help at all....   I am amazed that in this day and age people still assume that a disabled person with mobility difficulties should be in a wheel chair or even use a walking stick, if you do not understand why people get 'Mobility' then imho you should not Judge..................

[dbdb]

TINA was crap when it was first said and it's crap now. Don't believe that austerity for the poor is the answer.  The answer is a modest redistribution of wealth.

[Rods2]

TINA was crap when it was first said and it's crap now. Don't believe that austerity for the poor is the answer.  The answer is a modest redistribution of wealth.

That's been tried Labour put the top rate of income tax up to 50%, the number paying the top rate has gone down from 16,000 to 6,000 with a massive drop on that collected, so you can't you will just collect less, it is the same with fuel, booze, fags, stamp duty, flights etc they are all the wrong side of the Laffer curve, so Government tax targets have been missed. Once taxes are too high people, many through necessity, will change their lives and lifestyles to pay less. Governments have always found it very difficult to get percentage of taxes collected in the UK above 38% of GDP, they have currently got it up to just under 43% of GDP, but are spending a disgraceful 49% of GDP.

Interest payments were £16bn in 2008, they are now £44bn and will rise by 2016 to £64bn a year. £64bn is 50% of NHS budget which is the second largest budget after Welfare at about £220bn. Now you can do these changes now and hope the economy grows enough to survive (it probably won't) or the IMF or Troika will do it for the UK, which if like Greece will wipe out 25% of industry and GDP, with 25% unemployment so your welfare, interest and debts are even more onerous, with many hard decisions forced by the IMF and Troika. This will see an explosion of beggars, soup kitchens and food parcel charities. There will be across the board welfare and pension cuts of 25-50% and many more pensioners dying through illness, winter fuel poverty and when the wind doesn't blow power cuts, so the lifespan for UK citizens starts to drop.

Many unemployed in Greece have gone back to their traditional village smallholdings that they left to earn more money in the cities. I hope many of you have this luxury of a smallholding so when you are unemployed and the benefits are £25 a week and it doesn't cover your food bills you have land to grow crops on.

Eastern Europe and to a lessor extent Southern Europe have much lower population densities than the UK and until very, very recently had a large percentage of the population working the land, many with village smallholdings, which they still own.

I wish I could see a good outcome for this country but I can't, which is why I'm one of the rats leaving the sinking ship, while the Government is busy spending most of its time rearranging the deck chairs on the deck.

Before you say I'm being pessimistic, it is happening around us already in the PIIGS and Cyprus, with more European countries lining up to join them.