General Chat

Sharron, I am not saying the poor shouldn't have children, just that having made a mistake by getting this girl pregnant at 15, the lad should have had more sense and their parents should have talked to them more about waiting and working to get themselves set up a bit before going on to have more children. This girl was obviously determined to have a big family but should have worked for a while first when her partner became ill and unable to work, before getting pregnant to plan time and again. There are many people who would love to start a family or have more than one child but are responsible enough to wait and get established first with a home they have worked for and paid for. I would imagine this family got help with cheap or free furniture etc etc while they were young and to me it sends out a message to young people that it is ok to start a family before you are old enough in law to have sex legally, and you will get all the help in the world. No wonder there is this idea that young girls get pregnant to get a flat, when this is flaunted all over the paper.



Lizx

No children for the poor then.

Whatever the social arguments for and against a certain number of children, I can't get my head round the logic of a system that pays out more in benefits than the parent or parents could earn by working.

£500 a week tax free is worth £800 gross. Then there's the house at £15 a month which would cost you or I perhaps £150 a week. Then there's free health care, free schools meals and so on.
Tot it all up and it equates to a gross earned income of maybe £1,200 a week.

OK, benefits need to be there as a safety net, but you'd have to be an MP or a highly qualified professional to get that sort of money.

Just curious.

Once someone gets cut off benefits for having eight children she (and he?) hasn't paid society for, what happens to the children?

A life of foster homes, at taxpayer expense, with an increased risk of being problem children and problem adults?

There's a wise social / economic policy, I must say.

Does anyone really think that a threat of being denied benefits is going to stop a 15-yr-old from getting pregnant? Lordy.


I've never seen a prison cell equivalent to a luxury hotel, myself. In fact, I don't actually think anyone has.

Why must there always be scapegoats?

On way to catch plane but thought about this whilst we were out at the shops.

How much taxpayers money goes into providing prisons with cells equivalent to luxury hotels? I am sure when I was on benefits with my kids there were far more luxuries in prisons.

If kids are raised right they will benefit society in some way. This Mum and Dad in question seem to be raising loved and well cared for children. There are cases of abuse & neglect in duel income families too; Mum and Dad both out to work and kids coming in and fending for themselves.

Sorry but I think the state should make it feasible for 1 parent to stay at home to raise their children IF they want to.

I'm with Purple Sparkly Diamond - The police do need to get tough on underage sex. I work for the police and the only way to investigate a crime is if a complaint has been made. The rules need changing so we can investigate an obvious incident, in that she's pregnant, without a complaint being made from parents, social servces etc!

I also agree with Gail - I think it should be law that you can only withdraw from the state if you have paid in. Exceptions apply of course in obvious circumstances like serious disability for example but beacause you have 8 babies isnt one of them.

If she only has 2 young ones at home during the day why can't she work! Be a child minder with her qualifications! or get out into a job...Mr C seems capable of looking after 2 babies despite his back.

The A grade exam was achieved when she was around 16/17 and only had the one child, it says during her pregnancy with N. (2nd child) and she would have still been in study mode from school at the time. I am not knocking the fact the children are loved and wanted and may well grow to be wonderful hardworking people but it is very obvious she has children because she likes being pregnant and having babies, so yes, her self esteem probably needs working on. I am very surprised they are prepared to bare all to the public and have their photo shown, the children may well get problems from other children whose parents read the article and are struggling to pay their way from their meagre wages or whatever. It will be interesting to see what local people think as there are sure to be letters to the paper about this.

I would add that in Norfolk there is not much work around that pays well, mostly minimum wage stuff. My son works two jobs to pay his way and rent etc, should he want to settle down and raise a family he would be hard put to afford to and would get little help unless he lost his job.

Lizx

Claire, Hiya, thanks I am ok

If she has the eighth child she wants as much as the others she will only be in her early thirties when it starts school,a time when many people begin or change careers.

If that woman can get a good A level grade while bringing up a multitude of small children she will cope with whatever discipline she goes into later.

As for the police prosecuting young lads for under-age sex.Where's the benefit? I think that law is meant more to protect young girls from exploitative older men.More as a shield than a weapon.

Why is it that only 'poor' people who can afford to have large families?

Anyone of us undertaking family history research will find, in many cases, that those 'with money' tend to have fewer children - or none at all.

Hmmmm can't think of any wealthy people who have more than four children, but then I don't inhabit their world.

We had three, wanted another but health issues stopped that :-((

Until the youngest was almost 5 we both worked full time, yes we had a nanny (or mother's help as I prefer to call her) but as one or other of us was at home during the 24 hour period we didn't miss out on their childhood at all. OH worked permanent nights, I ran businesses from home for 2 of those years after youngest was born. OH worked two jobs and commuted 80 miles each way to work.

I can understand and sympathise with couples who fall on hard times through illness or redundancy but to choose to have more children whilst receiving benefits is, in my view, totally irresponsible.

I wonder whether anyone here has ever considered what the cost to society is when RICH people have eight children.

Who pays to run the airports they use for their jet-setting lifestyle? I wonder whether it might be the taxpayer.

Who suffers the environmental costs of the excesses of their lifestyle (like the damage done by all the jet-setting, just for starters)? I think it's humanity.

Who supports the universities their children go to? The taxpayer? How many ordinary taxpayers' kids go to university? How many children of people receiving benefits go to university? The ordinary taxpayer pays for the universities that rich people's children go to, and that the children of people on benefits don't go to.

One could go on and on and on. The costs to society of rich people having large families are hugely higher than the costs of a few years of benefits paid to people who don't work and have large families.

And hey, that's even without mentioning the damage that all those rich people do to the economy that ordinary taxpayers make their ordinary living in. Anybody on benefits ever brought down a bank? Crashed the stock market? Taken million-pound/dollar bonuses while their employees' pension plans went bankrupt?

I think anyone who has more than their 2.4 children is behaving unforgivably, myself, when we look at the unsustainable way they and those children (all of us) live in our societies. All of those children place heavy costs on their society.

I don't think that people who do it on benefits are any more worthy of public condemnation and vilification than a whole lot of other people.

I think this couple's behaviour is inexcusable, but I'd rather direct my anger and insults at people whose behaviour is multiply more selfish and more destructive.

And sorry, Sylvia, but I don't know what this issue has to do with migrants of any kind. Seems they just get to be dragged in whenever some moral indignation is called for.

The fact that she has an A level and that her kids 'might' go to Uni doesnt alter or make up for the fact that she sponging off the tax payers,
If hubby has a bad back and cant work she should get a job and help keep them all.
No doubt she wont earn enough and will have to be topped up by the state financially but at least she will be helping herself..
And you never know,,going out to work may be an excellent contraceptive,

Well, I have one 5 aside team with 1 sub.

Unfortunately they cant play together as a team because 2 are in Uni both paying their way through. They have all worked and bought their own laptops, cars, insurance, driving lessons etc etc. At 20, 18 & 17 the eldest three havent perpetuated the cycle and followed in their mothers evil footsteps and spawned more children.

Maybe the younger ones will, who knows. You cant predict for the future, you dont know what your grandchildren will do.

Like I said, 'there but for there grace of God......'

One A under the new A-levels does not impress me, no were in the article does it say she was not a good pupil in school or lost the ability to learn when she gave birth, clearly she's learnt how to play the floored benifits system.

I don't get annoyed at girls who get preganant young, just the ones who opt of the easy way out, but maybe thats because the young mums I know made the effort to stay in education and are now employed, also learnt form their mistake the first time and only had one, not aim for a five aside team with subs.

I read all the thread with great interest and was boiling at the same time , it makes me so mad , to think that both my husband and i have worked so hard like many people on this site and when he was made redundant in Sepember last year we had to wait 13 weeks for some money we used every bit of money we had luckly we had just paid our morgae we had to fight for his redundancy we were told that because we had no children we were not a priroity i dont work due to the job i did as i have ostioprosis in my back so i am on a benifit ,and at the time that is all we had to live on and have also just become a senior citizan plus because i was so stupid to have a private pension i have to pay tax ,
We even thought of selling the house something we had worked so hard to get , when i read of the ammounts people like this are getting from the system , a young relation of ours was even taught how to fill forms in to claim benifit , oh dear i would go on forever so i have said my peice
Love to you all Margaret nice to be on here again

I've just been to visit a youngish couple who have 7 children. I'm disgusted that the mother who has cancer now has to have her husband home to care for her - what a drain on the tax payer. How dare she be sick, how dare her husband stay home to care for her and the children and how dare he expect to get a carers' pension. The children are going to grow up to be real bad 'uns I should think.

And I've heard people who frequent this board complain about people on Chat.

S

It is that A grade A level that swung it for me.You don't get one of those without putting in a lot of effort,and having the right support.

She is not the young mother who churns out children by passing friends to keep from working.She seems to be taking the job seriously.He sounds like more of an enabler than a doer and if he can do that for those children.like he has for her,then there is hope for them all.

Sharon,

I like your style.

I suppose as someone who had 4 children by 3 different fathers by the time I was 24 I cant really comment. But I have taken to heart some of the comments made. I went on to have 2 other children (the 5th when I was 26) with my now hubby (biological Dad of no 4 and adoptive dad of no3). Unfortunately the men I chose were narcisistic and although they promised to protect me they didnt.

I didnt work until after no5. So yes claimed benefits and got a council house.

As for being a perpetuating scenario, I think not and refer back to Sharons comments.

My eldest 2 are in Uni, no2 went at only just 17. My 3rd is doing 'A' level (equivalent) and my 4th is just sitting her GCSE (equivalent).

I dont know the circumstances of this particular family, they may be involved in community work but the papers love a negative slant.

I used to go up to the school with my kids and be 'judged', no one knew about my involvement in community works.

I am sure my ancestors didnt think there would be someone quite so 'naughty' as me amongst their decendants. BTW I am now doing my degree!

'There but for the grace of God'

Sharron,

Have to disagree I am afraid.

I had a long discussion with a police officer about families like this and with his knowledge (he didn't reveal names BTW) he insists that it's a self perpetuating scenario.

Children of young mothers usually have children very young themselves and the ethos of not working seems to be passed on also.

Sue x

I think this family may well repay much more than they are taking.

Those children are being brought up in a stable,loving family unit with support from the extended family.They probably won't cost much in police resources.No doubt they are also getting much more interest and attention from their parents than many children do.

That A level is extremely admirable.She evidently means to do the job of child rearing well to take a A level course in it and to gain an A grade as well shows dedication.

The state is spending about four hundred pounds a week on my dad and me and we are not likely to be putting much back into the kitty so all those children being shown the example of their mother buckling down to study and work when she could might well produce a formidable group of little grafters who will pay back in spades.