Disabled Parking Bays

Poppy9

£711 per week income in benefits.

Food for young family say £200 per week.
Nappies £20 per week
Clothes £50 per week
Fags £140 per week
Heat & Light £50 pe week

That accounts for £460 leaving £250 per week over for leisure. If they didn't smoke they would have almost £400 per week to play with. 2 weeks they have a plasma telly.

Remember they pay no rent or council tax

lisyloo

OK - I agree that this particular family which is unusually large with a rather unlucky collection of illnesses can live a good life on benefits.
I agree that some people can work the system and do this.

But I do not agree that the majority can or do.

Most people I know who try to claim benefits have great difficulty in claiming them, get the spanish inquisition and end up with not much to live on.

It isn't a fair system - there are winners and losers.
That's wrong and it's really bad for those of use that pay taxes.

What I don't agree with however it's that it's dead easy to do this and that there are huge communities doing it.
I firstly think we'd all be doing it if it was that easy.
Also we simply wouldn't be able to support it if it were more than a small minority.
Think about it there has to be a number of tax payers working to support that £37K family.

Mosts of us simply wouldn't be "lucky" enough to fit the criteria to get all those benefits because we don't have asthma etc.

Do you have a suggested solution?
Have you put it forward to anyone? Like your MP for example?

Poppy9

As previously mentioned I advocate the replacement of all benefits/tax credits with 1 single benefit. It should provide enough for everyone to live on giving them means to a decent roof over their head, decent food and heat and light. I always make Local Councillors talk about local & national issues at election time even though they just want your vote and don't really want to be tackled on issues. I have also corresponded with my Local MP on many occassions expressing my dissatisfaction with the current situation - not just with regard to benefits but Council Tax (a local income tax but not based upon ability to pay), Child benefit (which is paid to everyone - even the royal family can claim it). The cost of Social Sercurity benefits is rising so fast that income tax needs to rise to meed the demand. I think I read an articale in Pulbic Finance that less people are claiming benefits (which if I remember rightly Asylum seekers were exlcuded from the stats) but they were claiming more. You are quite welcome to visit S. Wales and see how people are living. I think Merthyr Tydfil tops the league as it has high unemployment but you will find these people in all welsh towns.

lisyloo

I visit S. Wales occassionally as I have relatives there.
Looks like a complete dump to me and I wouldn't want to live there.

Good for you for doing something about it.

I don't think 1 benefit would be flexible enough.
There are people who genuinely have additional needs for heating, transport, living costs or medical costs.
I don't see how one benefit would work.

I think this will become an increasing issue as ordinary hardworking people get fed up with the situation, especially if we have tax rises.

Why don't we put these people to work in our public services?

Who do you think is the bet party to vote for to get radical reform in this area?

Quackers

Without wanting to offend anyone I just thought i would give my two pence worth.

Also places like Ice rinks and bowling centres which are generally for able bodied people still pack in the disabled bays, why? they never get used.

Although you say you dont want to offend and do use the term 'generally' I cant help but be a bit offended when you think these places are for able bodied people. It's takes me forever to persuade my disabled 12year old to try something new as she always feels people are watching (they usually are ::)). She had a stroke so has very limited use of one side of her body. Bowling is perfect - you only need one good arm ;D

Why are these places 'generally for able bodied people?'a person in a wheelchair also (sometimes) has arms with which they can bowl!!

Maybe we all need to be a little more open minded?

Oh, we dont have a blue badge - my daughter isn't disabled enough - whatever that means ???

Poppy9

I visit S. Wales occassionally as I have relatives there.
Looks like a complete dump to me and I wouldn't want to live there.

I would never call South Wales a dump. It has the first British area of Out Standing Natural Beauty - The Gower Pennisula. The sea side is a fantastic place to be in the summer months. With good weathe its like the South of France. What we do suffer from down here is low wages - which was ok when house prices were low. Now you have a two bed starter box home cost £130k but wages have risen to match. We also seem to have a big problem with the benefit culture. Its sad to see but we have a generation who have never witnessed parent/(s) working and they have no aspirations in life. They thinks its ok to nick from shops as "they are not stealing from anyone".

alanobrien

Hmmmm healthy people taking up disabled parking bays and lazy good for nothings taking up parent and child bays.

Best reason i have heard yet for wheel clamping.
Make the lazy sods pay then they may thing twice about being so selfish

Fran

A friend who worked for a while as a Housing Officer and had to visit the so called 'Sink Estates' said you wouldn't believe how some of these so called poverty stricken people are living. The houses inside are immaculate with laminte flooring throughout, widescreen or plasma tv's, surround sound systems, sky dishes, dysons, leather sofas, marble ash trays, fully fitted kitchens and outside a brand new car complete with blue badges. Cars are on Motobility - which means they get the higher rate of disability allowance but often these people are just suffering depression or have a bad back.

People are not either "working" or "unemployed", there are people who have just been working but are now unemployed due to any number of reasons. They might have been given some items by family or they might have accumulated them over a long period of time. It seems to be so easy to jump on the anti-benefiters bandwagon and deride people without actual factual firsthand knowledge. The "quote" from a housing officer doesn't necessarily mean all the things were in the same house either. Also fitted kitchens are standard nowadays, so that doesn't mean anything. This Marble Ashtray can be bought for £4.70, so what exactly was the point there for example.

Figures provided by the Daily Mail

. Figures by a newspaper?! Oh they must be right then! ::)

£711 per week income in benefits.

Food for young family say £200 per week.
Nappies £20 per week
Clothes £50 per week
Fags £140 per week
Heat & Light £50 pe week

That accounts for £460 leaving £250 per week over for leisure. If they didn't smoke they would have almost £400 per week to play with. 2 weeks they have a plasma telly.

Remember they pay no rent or council tax

This is not a comprehensive list of outgoings for a family and is misleading.

You cannot live this kind of lifestyle on benefits alone.
Anyone who thinks it's that easy is living on another planet.
We'd all be doing it, if you could have that kind of lifestyle for free.

These people must be either
1) defrauding some insurance company
2) working cash in hand in addition to benefits
3) involved in some kind of criminal activity

It's very easy to make assumptions about where people's money come from.

While I agree with what you say about people on benefits, it does seem a contradiction to then say that if they have a number of items that appear to be expensive that they must have been acquired by some fraudulent activity!

Perhaps the furniture and housing comforts were acquired by people getting into debt. Is it ok for people in work to do this then without any problem, but not ok as soon as you are unemployed?

Pat__3

You can't get the higher rate of the mobility component of DLA (the kind you can get a car on Motability with) if you have only been diagnosed with depression and don't have other disabilities or health problems, as far as I know.

I agree with crana99 above. It is a very hard to get the higher rate on any of the components in the DLA, I have known many people get turned down, and they have had a lot more than depression. So I think it is not as easy now as people may think, whether thay have made it more strict I see nothing wrong with that as at least it will hopefully sort out the actors & fakers.

Pat__3

This link is the actual site for Disability AllowancesHERE

Theses are the money sectionsHEREANDHERE

I have found these as I think they are more use than what the Daily Mail may has printed, even though I do like the paper

These are Income Support ratesHERE

These are for Incapacity BenHERE