General Chat

Putting my non political Devil's Advocate hat on.

What if the 20,000 about to become homeless because of the "Bedroom" tax were encouraged to share their homes with the 20,000 who are about to become homeless due to the benefit cap?

That way the 20,000 who were about to be made homeless because they could not afford to fund an empty bedroom themselves and similarly the 20,000 about to become homeless due to the benefit cap would all have somewhere to live so nobody needs to become homeless after all.

Simples ;-)

Remember 93.17% of all statistics are made up. :-D

I agree that the benefit system needs to be reformed, however this cap in my view has nothing to do with cutting the benefit bill as it will not make any real savings to that, this cap is politically motivated and based solely on this governments ideological views.

In a recent interview on BBC Iain Duncan Smith said that he did not believe the governments policies had forced people out of their homes and that all the reports about thousands being made homeless was not true and he said the homeless figures had hardly moved at all.

This was despite figures from his own department showing a 10% rise in statutory homelessness in the last year alone and that the homeless figure in England, according to the House of Commons Library, has risen by around 27% since this government came to power.

It has also been reported that a leaked letter from Communities Secretary Eric Pickles's office warned the cap would leave 20,000 households homeless, on top of another 20,000 made homeless by the bedroom tax.

So Iain Duncan Smith does not believe the governments policies have forced people out of their homes as his figures say otherwise, but why should we believe a man who has, on more that one occasion, been accused of manipulating statistics and making misleading statements to the media and parliament.

In my opinion the only way to reduce the benefit bill is to generate growth to create jobs - proper jobs and build more affordable houses.

The government should be concentrating on this instead of concentrating on creating lucrative opportunities for their friends in the city and they should stop designing policies that appear to verge on what is called social cleansing because some in the government consider all ordinary working people are layabouts and scroungers which is far from the truth.

Well, £350 a week is more than I bring home, for paying full rent, single person council tax etc.
I am left with £200 a month - that's £50 a week after rent, council tax and utilities have been paid.
With that, I need to feed and clothe myself - and they prefer me to wear smartish clothes to work, if I wasn't working I'd live in jeans - and bus fares.
I WAS in a decent paid job in local government. Thanks to various governments deciding
a) Civil servants earn too much (some do - head of Hampshire County Council is on £245, 000 a year - that's with a £45,000 pay rise THIS year
b) we can now, apparently do the work of 2 or 3 - which has led to over half our team suffering workload stress.

Quite frankly, I don't earn enough to justify ANY stress.

Looks like I'd be better off - and my health would improve if I wasn't working!!!

I believe (someone correct me if I am wrong) that the £500 per week benefits is all non-taxable.
To earn £26,000 pa net requires a gross salary of something in the region of £35,000.
And someone working and earning £35,00 pa would be expected to support themselves and their family.
So a £500 pw cap may not be that unreasonable after all.

Sue..............phew, slightly less shocked, but that is still a huge bill for a one bedroomed flat!! :-0

Blimey Sue, I am glad it wasn't the first figure you posted! :-0 but it's still horrendous.

Kitty it does all good to have a good grumble now and again.

:-D

Sue.................I am truly shocked :-0

That seems extortionate to me.

I will stop grumbling now............well try to anyway. :-)

Council Tax is £1370 at least it has been frozen this year.

Mr Micawber's maxim does not apply to government finances - the UK has not recorded a budget surplus in 400 years. Indeed the Bank of England was created in order to finance government debt without which the England would have gone bust.

A "balanced budget" is a sure fire recipe for economic and political disaster. A good example is the US under Pres. Hoover and of course the EU's unfortunate pigs..

On the other hand allowing any sort of bubble eg housing, in the private sector or committing to large scale government expenditure and liabilities which cannot be funded from taxation is just another primrose path to perdition.

Unfortunately Geo Osbourne has espoused both crazy public expenditure - windmills and such, HS2 and many more together with deliberately stoking up a property bubble with which he hopes to please the Daily Express and get re-elected.

Aren't you lot lucky with your water bills..
1 bedroom flat and I pay just under £450 a year.

Yorkshire Water,,,,,,

Edit..got the amount wrong....lol

Jax..............ours was £378 per year before the meter, it is a worry especially for a mum with a baby, they create mountains of washing don't they.

xx

Thank you Rose my husband says "cheers" too <3

Good luck with it Kitty :-)

I have a meter two adults only use shower not bath think the bill is approx. £300 for the year

Daughter moves into her own two bed tiny bungalow this week tells me her water will cost £40 a month £480 a year (not on meter) just her and a small baby...she hasn't even got a washing machine yet

Rose...............I have been consulting my husband and he is getting a plumber friend of his to call in at the weekend to see what he thinks:))

Thank you, I will also ask Southern Water to have another look at the meter for us.

xxx

As Glitterbaby has pointed out, this isn't 'money in ones pocket'... it is a variable figure.

eg one gets X amount 'personal allowance' ..but that £350 is not what YOU get, it is what you 'may' get including rent...the rent is not money in your pocket as such you still only get the personal allowance whatever the rent is ( in fact you don't nec get all of that if you are making up a higher rent than is paid for by housing benefit)

Bloke on the news said he would love to get £350 a week...but he was obviously thinking 350 to spend...not £70 dole for all your other expenses and the rest going to a landlord.

My water rates are nearly £400 p.a.

Kitty I still think it may be worth checking? my annual bill comes to about £236 ( that's the last year) . I know when we were in Wales the bill halved after we got the meter and Welsh water was one of the highest priced water companies.

I know there's only two of us, but I wash clothes every day, and Dan has deep baths lol.

Wilkins Mcawber expressed it perfectly:

"Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure nineteen pounds nineteen and six, result happiness. Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure twenty pounds nought and six, result misery."

That applies to governments as well as to individuals. If there is less coming in then less can be given out. We all must live within our means. There are far too many who expect others to give them whatever they desire.

I am certainly not advocating a return to the days of the workhouse but when you think about it, the basic principle of not allowing social care to be viewed as an easy option, was and still should be a sound one.

As far as a North/South divide is concerned which came first, higher Southern wages or higher Southern house prices/rents? Which ever came first originally it has over the years become a money chase with either even higher wages or rents causing the other to be increased as well. Money is only a way of keeping score.

Well where can I claim £350 per week from ?

Being unemployed I get less than £3700 per year and still have to pay part of my council tax

The charge for my gas has just jumped from £24 to £38 per month