Friday, Jun 25, 2010
Newsnight / The family who live entirely on state benefits
Newsnight: Repost : BBC newsnight - The family who live entirely on state benefits
Repost of yesterday's article. To respond to Pdeh. Apologies for duplicating.
Posted by alan_540 @ 06:59 PM (1718 views) Add Comment
20 Comments
- If you do not have an admin password leave the password field blank.
- If you would like to request a password allowing you to add comments and blog news articles without needing each one approved manually, send an e-mail to the webmaster.
- Your email address is required so we can verify that the comment is genuine. It will not be posted anywhere on the site, will be stored confidentially by us and never given out to any third party.
- Please note that any viewpoints published here as comments are user's views and not the views of HousePriceCrash.co.uk.
- Please adhere to the Guidelines
1. alan_540 said...
Yesterday, Pdeh said :
"First, let me state my politics are non-partisan. Nothing like dole scrounger stories to whip up public indignation. And rightly so because this is exactly what the government wish you to believe.
This is a return to the 1970s 80s. Thatcher bashed the poor using the same tactics. Eschewing logic for gut emotions is a ploy as old as civilisation. Yes, of course there are people who will abuse the system.
The poor on benefits, the ill and infirm on benefits, large banks, corperations, the man in our street who fiddles his tax returns; the fact is dishonest behaviour is rife. If government want to curb such behaviour then let them call all sectors of society to task or risk looking like bullies. Economic crises engenders stress in our lives. We ought to be careful though. That tension build up stemming from financial pressure in our lives deserves noting. A healthy strategy to offload life pressures is a much better option than allowing spin doctors channel that negative energy toward one section of our community.
Nat West ruined my business through nefarious means knowing I cannot fund a protracted court case. Taking the view that re-establishing a moral connection between the individual, the law and institutions, who rely on our trust for survival, is a civic purpose, why then are we avoiding the real issues? Why are we not uniting to express that as a people we are bored and depressed at the shabby, mediocre performance of those in power?
Four years ago an accident nearly ended my short life. Now, still a young man. I battle through life with horrendous spine injuries. Without
disability living allowance I could not have coped. Indeed being disabled is bloody expensive. There is no fat to trim where I am concerned. Living month by month in fear of the lowliest bill is discouraging. The worries mount up. My health, the future, finances, not forgetting the constant struggle to remain an entity in others' lives. Without the society of friends we are sunk.
As for the figures alan_540 posted. While I acknowledge his position £3000 he talks of it the gross payment including rent and council tax. I say to him do not undermine your position with this flagrant abuse of accounting. The depressing truth is that alan_540's response is mirrored by the majority in society. I bet people country-wide are doing specious sums and this phenomena is not peculiar to this sole comment above.
We must be clear about the facts. Even the BBC slanted the package on a right leaning bias - odd - and remember the Beeb is under attack too. THis may just be an editorial policy change designed to engratiate the old girl to her new owners.
Roussu, the early Utilitarians covered the ground of which we speak two centuries ago. Many great minds have added to their contribution.
finally, the lamentable aspect of British society is that we seemed to have mortaged education for the right to be a nation of home owners.
Far better to enjoy the fruits of a well educated country than pay homage to the division betweeen those who pay mortagages and those who pay rent. Of course Victor Hugo made a very appropriate comment on this very subject. But then as a nation of shop keepers ar heart we determine value by the profit at which something can sold."
2. alan_540 said...
@Pdeh
I fail to understand your criticism of my "accounting".
This family are paid £3000 per calender month, their rent and council tax are free.
If I exclude my mortgage and council tax costs, my budget is £600 per calender month.
This family spend, therefore, circa £2400 more than me per calender month.
Neither of them work.
My wife and I both work full time.
My questions to you are :
1) How is that fair and equitable?
2) What would happen if everyone who worked decided quit and started to scrounge on this massive scale?
3) Why are the figures I state a "flagrant abuse of accounting"?
I look forward to your reply.
3. Tommy said...
Not quite sure what Pdeh calculation was, but you are paying your mortgage - some of which is not going to interest but to pay off a debt so you are accumulating capital. This is a bit like me saying after saving £x000 / month, my budget is £600.
You are comparing your post-mortgage costs, but part of the £3000 they get is £90 / week for housing / council tax benfit. So if you want to compare rent costs you should remove this.
4. montesquieu said...
@ alan_540:
No right-minded person could fail to be disgusted by the bunch of scroungers shown in the clip, and policies over years which have rewarded this sort of fecklessness, but on the abuse of figures point, PDEH is spot on .... the £3000 figure INCLUDES rent and council tax, and is surely the bulk of it, therefore your assertions of them having £2400 more disposable than you is totally suprious.
These imbeciles may well still have some more disposable than you even on the correct numbers - but surely the twist is that it it sounds like your mortgage is on the larger side of sensible for your income if the numbers you state are true.
(My suspicion is though that you are counting rather more than your mortgage and council tax in your deductions to arrive at your £600 - perhaps utilities and any other regular bills which I certainly count before I arrive at my own figure for disposable income).
5. smugdog said...
I look in now and then, just to see how my old friends are holding up.
Quite a pitiful sight to behold to be truly honest.
I'll just close the door behind me, just pretend I didn't call.
6. alan_540 said...
montesquieu & Pdeh, you are quite right, my mistake, their benefits are £2000pcm (ignoring the rent & council tax benefit of £90pw).
So the figures are not quite as bad as I first thought but still obscene.
Therefore they spend £1400pcm more than me.
They have no savings therefore they spend up each month (or year - they pay for Christmas after the event so connot have any savings).
This means they are spending £1400pm more than I do.
My £600pm is what I need to run my household per month, not my disposable income which I have not quoted.
Benefits should be a bare minimum not a luxury.
Still speechless (but not quite as much as yesterday!)
7. alan_540 said...
Bad dog!
8. markj69 str05 said...
Most sensible people, when entering the responsible world of adulthood, would strive to get a good job, earn some money, enjoy themselves a bit, and look to the future - Car, home, holidays, and maybe a family.
When people are going throug education, knowing there arn't any good jobs around for them, i'm sure they get disheartened, and opt for the easiest way forward.
When people see that an affordable property is out of their reach for perhaps a decade, i'm sure they get disheartened and opt for an easier way forward.
It's a moral injustice that enables people like this to do what they are doing. But it is a poor government with inadequate systems which allows people to do what they are doing.
Bring on the change. I'm fed up of supporting these scrougers. I'm fed up of paying banker bonuses, i'm fed up with not having affordable housing.
And normally i'm quite a happy chappy. Honest!
9. Open Minded said...
@smugdog et al - it's a sad day when the the biggest bull in town can't muster up the energy to bait the hungry bears. I don't like benefit scroungers either, but this is nothing more than a rehash of a previous post, to let those with a chip on their shoulder (the haves v the have nots) a few more cheap shots in at people in society who, rightly or wrongly, are doing better than they are.
10. Tennouji said...
Spending 2000 quid on Christmas! That is insane. You can have just as nice a family time on a fraction of that: when my dad was out of work my mum explained that we couldn't afford presents so I'd only get a bathset or a book or something, but we would still have a great family day eating together and watching movies all afternoon.
It is a shame that people who can't afford it are trapped by the "desirability" of brands. These days if I wanted to spend 300 quid on a handbag as a treat, I could, but the thought of it makes me sick so a ten or twenty pound one is fine for me.
(Part of the recaptcha is "lazy"!)
11. nomad said...
Smugdog @4.
Exactly right! If ever a site needed some light relief, it's this one :-)
12. sneaker said...
The family who live entirely on state benefits ... who, the Cabinet? ha ha
Captch: Cabinet delve
(LOL - just had to record this)
13. the number cruncher said...
The biggest scrounger on the stater? that would be the Queen
Followed by her family an then by landed aristocracy - lets start with the biggest free-loaders and work our way down
14. sneaker said...
@10
alas not quite true - the royal family are a net earner for the UK
cost: the public list - runs into millions
benefit: tourist revenue - runs into billions
love em or hate em, they make us money
Captcha: not defaming
(are these brilliant or what?!)
15. wanderinman said...
@ sneaker
Very true. And don't forget the income from the Crown Estates which goes to the taxpayer in return for the Civil List.
16. uncle tom said...
The core issue here is that we have a large contingent of the population who can find themselves financially worse off if they are in work, compared to being out of work. That is a crazy situation.
The structure of the benefit system needs to be changed to ensure that it always pays to be in work.
There is also a good case for creating state funded jobs paying the minimum wage, as a default option when people are unable to secure other forms of work. Most employment blackspots have significant environmental issues, so cleanup gangs would be one obvious use for this pool of labour.
Requiring claimants to report for work would also serve to flush out the real scrounchers - those who are both working and pretending to be out of work at the same time..
17. the number cruncher said...
To get people back to work:
1. remove all taxes and NI on jobs paying less than the average (modal or median) wage
2. Put up the minimum wage
3. improve eduction
4. close the gap between rich and poor
5. create a society that people find it hard not to be disenfranchised from
simples (oh for that matter get rid of all income tax and move to a LVT (georgist) tax system even more simples
11 & 12 - sorry I think you are far from the mark:
1. The queen cost a lot more than the civil list
2. they land is our land, so its our profits not theirs (crown estates)
3. Most of the tourism has nothing to do with the queen - its heritage, but the royal family has a role which I admit is important - But ask yourself the question; "if we took all there lands away and turned their homes into tourist attractions would we improve our tourist revenue" - I think it a safe bet to say it would.
Sorry they are the biggest parasite as are all the Norman landed gentry sponging of the hard work of the majority of the country. These 'land parasites' cost us far more, and are a far bigger drag on the productive economy than the 'dole scroungers'
18. alan_540 said...
@14
Are you Gordon Brown?
You spout the same cr@p as him.
19. the number cruncher said...
15
Gordon brown is a puppet of the bankers, but at least he had a intellect to waste, unlike your good self
20. Bigbadbob said...
"The structure of the benefit system needs to be changed to ensure that it always pays to be in work."
I know this is radical beyond comprehension but what about structuring the working system so that it always pays to be in work?