Should the tax and benefits system prioritise families? poll discussion

scaty wrote: »

had the children and they were my priority. ONLY TROUBLE IS THEIR CHILDREN are becoming my priority.

I think there are a lot of people in your situation. I'm often considered the responsible adult by a number of people I know - even by people much older than me.

It can be very wearing, but I do take consolation from the fact that at least I am helping.

And good advice is worth more than money, well applied. This site proves that!:D

well i dont want children and i think that the government should pay out for families with 2 children only but if YOU decide that you want more kids after that then you as a family must be able to afford them and the government should not pay for anymore, this will stop the drain on big families and the benefits they recieve and force people to think b4 they want anymore kids there are too many people sponging off the government system with their big families thinking that producing more kids will get them a bigger house more benefits etc ( and it works). so if this was to be put in place everyone would have a fair system.... why should the people who work and pay taxes all their lives get less than families who claim loads of benefits ...its their choice yet the hard working people who dont want kids never get any help with anything!! so if you havent guessed it my answer was no the families should not be prioritised.. they already get child benefits,tax credits,probably ct and hb, childcare benefits,flexible hours at work thats more than someone working hard at a full time job...plus most single parents will get csa payments too!!

And I can't recall where but someone was moaning on the radio that buses only allow two prams on at one time. Can't they make up their minds? They whinge about how they are not capable of bothering their !!!!!! to collapse their push-chairs (unlike generations of parents before them) and then, when their uncollapsed buggies occupy the space that eight collapsed ones would fit and so only two buggies are admitted they turn round and still continue to whine!

I haven't voted yet - not sure where to put my mark so to speak. We are a family of 5, who do rely on benefits, so to us it's important that we get all the help we can. But at the same time, I recognise that there is a lot of help out there for us, and not so much (if any in some cases) for those without children (my parents for example, who struggled their whole lives on just above the cut off levels for any help, so were never able to set up pensions or savings, and now they're coming up to retirement are worrying about how they'll manage).

Could I put one angle on this discussion that doesn't appear to have come up yet. Most of those speaking against the help families get seem to be assuming the benefits came first, then the children, and I'm not disputing that this does happen - but what about those families for whom it happened the other way. My husband didn't ask to be invalided out of work, I didn't expect to become his full time carer along with 3 children - before we started our family we both worked 60+ hour weeks and had never claimed a penny between us in 23 combined years of employment, and I fully intended to be back in the workforce by now.

Life doesn't always go the way we plan - and that's why the benefits system is there - to keep you above water until you can get back on track. The unfortunate fact of the matter is there are too many ways some people can fiddle the system.

stogiebear wrote: »

Originally posted by [B]Kim Yeovil[/B]
But the difficulty is that the attack on and the poverty of 
the childless poor is so very savage. And nothing is ever 
suggested to alleviate this.

Well how about this suggestion...

Instead of scrounging from tax payers how about asking your family?

Why the hell should single people be summoned to cough up a cushy lifestyle for the crappy poor people who have more kids than they know what to do with.
If you can't afford to have your kids then put them on the doorstep of a church or something. Stop hounding regular folk to fund your ineptitude.

Falsely, falsely quoted.

I am confused.