Another one of those benefits threads

Shakethedisease

I would second that...chatting to a nice young thing 'Single Professional (highish earner) female, non smoker, no pets, hates loud music and house proud...so parties away from her rental''....

She sound's a right bore. Live a little eh !

Unable to support yourself and stand on your own 2 feet is a major failing in life. It is certainly nothing to be proud about.

Well, only if you're judgemental enough to assume that this is a permanent and not a temporary situation for the person in question ?

The saddest thing is that these people are not living life to the fullest. They have little potential and hardly any control over their own lives. They're almost just filling in time until they die. What kind of a life is that?

Ditto, re assuming things are permanent rather than a temporary situation till they get back on their feet.

You two are a right pair of charmer's aren't you ?

Some of us have hit bottom and came back up again you know. Claiming benefits etc wasn't a 'life-style choice'..just a means of feeding and housing ourselves and/or the kids till we can study/get back to work/ and generally do what we can to get back out of it again. You're tarring too many people with the same brush.

SingleSue

mitchaa wrote: »

Unable to support yourself and stand on your own 2 feet is a major failing in life. It is certainly nothing to be proud about.

And that, in essence, is how I feel and why I respond as I do with these threads...even though events are out of my control.

Can't help it, it's a pride thing

Shakethedisease

even though events are out of my control.

You respond as you do because people like the above have absolutely NO idea what your life is like or the circumstances that brought you to it. You're a well known and very respected poster here. No doubt they'll pay a bit of lip-service to 'oh well we didn't mean people like you Sue' ..'of course not'.

But the reality is, they do. Failing to understand that most people on benefits and having their rent paid by the state ARE just like you in that events are out of their control...
Posters on threads like these tend to focus however, ( and you must see it too ).. on the minority that keep getting highlighted in the tabloids and the never ending anecdotal examples of 'well I know someone that..'..:(

Those of us that ARE there, or have been there in the past (me) know this isn't true. Most of us do NOT want that kind of life, and will try our very, very best to move heaven and earth to get out of it. If only for a better life for our kids.

But no, the accusations of 'workshy' , 'well you should've thought of that before you had kids' and ' horrified that I work and that someone on (gasps) housing benefits dares to live in a privately rented house at MY expense' keep coming. When I first came across this site I was appauled to read a new poster asking for help was told she should have 'shut her legs'..( her boyfriend ran out on her when the pregnancy test went pink).

It repeats ad finitum here. And as for your pride.. stop reading these sort of threads. They really ARE just designed to make housing benefits/LHA claimants feel like !!!!!! and feel good about themselves.

Truth is, and this is it in a nutshell.. if they lost their jobs and it was a choice between feeding and housing their families.. or taking the moral high-ground over taking benefits.. they'd be filling in the forms so fast it'd make your eyes water. No parent would ever let their kids starve or go without a roof over their heads. Or, well, themselves for that matter if no kids were involved.

To get back to the point. The rant from the OP is aimed at the wrong people. People claiming LHA have no control whatsoever over the monetary levels it takes to house them. Those levels were decided by the government based on market rates. If they don't like it.. well they should come up with some alternative solutions.. those which don't put people and families on the streets might be a good start ? Social housing is dead in the water. The only alternative is to pay market rates. Markets rates apply to EVERYONE no matter what the circimstances. Those working thus will pay exactly the same as those not. Like it or not.

That's how it is. Time to get over it. Or start building more social housing.

SingleSue

I would disagree with the comment about all of the other posters not caring or not knowing, I have found it is usually the minority in this section who really think that way (can't speak for other parts of the site, some bits are scary!)

It cannot be denied, the figures are an eye opener especially if you live in a high rent cost area...the money that can be paid out (even indirectly) to a claimant can truly be eye watering and there are still those out there who do think of it as a meal ticket and churn out child after child just to keep that meal ticket going.

I know when I was working, I hated seeing it, resented it even...all my hard earned pennies going to people who could not be bothered to get off their idle bottoms and pay their own way. I couldn't differentiate either between those who were there by design or by accident....work was the be all and end all to me.

What I am saying (in my usual round about way), is that my feeling of failure is not because of what people are writing on these forums about benefit claimants but is because of my own personal standards and upbringing...in my mind, my failure is in producing children who have differing needs and a failure to hold my marriage together which has meant I have been forced to claim benefits and not be working where I can hold my head up high.

Just to re-iterate, the people on this board have been wonderful to me, have been understanding, have been amazing with their support of me and my boys. The threads don't upset me, my own standards do.

silvercar

my failure is in producing children who have differing needs

I would say it is one of your successes in bringing up children with differing needs.

ILW

The bit I don't understand is why someone on LHA going into a private rental needs to be housed in a specific area of their choice. Most people who I know who rent privately choose an area to live in that fits their budget. It seems a little odd that someone on LHA can demand to be housed in say Westminster at a rent of £2 or £3000 per month when they could be moved to an outer London borough and get a similar property for a third of that.

shellsuit

sjaypink wrote: »

These stories / threads do annoy me.

The LPs are not better off on benefits than they are married/ co-habed. What they mean is they have less money in their accounts. The family still have more money, but, shock horror, some of it is earned and kept hold of (to pay rent bills etc) by the worker.

The LHA outrage is a non-starter really as far as it comes to LPs. Families of any type of set up, working or not, can claim LHA. As said only winners are the landlords who are having their BTL mortgages paid off by the tax payers..... so they can buy more BTLs...... Genius :cool:

They are ~ unless the married/co hab couple of both working full time on a good wage.

The rental prices now are shocking and I suppose that's all because a LL knows that if the person is entitled to LHA, they will have all that rent paid for them.

I know of LL's who, for example, have properties up @ £500 a month. But when they know the tenant is on LHA, the price goes up to £700, because they know LHA will pay that amount.

Rental prices stink for working people, and especially single working people.

mitchaa

Shakethedisease wrote: »

You respond as you do because people like the above have absolutely NO idea what your life is like or the circumstances that brought you to it. You're a well known and very respected poster here. No doubt they'll pay a bit of lip-service to 'oh well we didn't mean people like you Sue' ..'of course not'.

But the reality is, they do. Failing to understand that most people on benefits and having their rent paid by the state ARE just like you in that events are out of their control...
Posters on threads like these tend to focus however, ( and you must see it too ).. on the minority that keep getting highlighted in the tabloids and the never ending anecdotal examples of 'well I know someone that..'..:(

Those of us that ARE there, or have been there in the past (me) know this isn't true. Most of us do NOT want that kind of life, and will try our very, very best to move heaven and earth to get out of it. If only for a better life for our kids.

But no, the accusations of 'workshy' , 'well you should've thought of that before you had kids' and ' horrified that I work and that someone on (gasps) housing benefits dares to live in a privately rented house at MY expense' keep coming. When I first came across this site I was appauled to read a new poster asking for help was told she should have 'shut her legs'..( her boyfriend ran out on her when the pregnancy test went pink).

It repeats ad finitum here. And as for your pride.. stop reading these sort of threads. They really ARE just designed to make housing benefits/LHA claimants feel like !!!!!! and feel good about themselves.

Truth is, and this is it in a nutshell.. if they lost their jobs and it was a choice between feeding and housing their families.. or taking the moral high-ground over taking benefits.. they'd be filling in the forms so fast it'd make your eyes water. No parent would ever let their kids starve or go without a roof over their heads. Or, well, themselves for that matter if no kids were involved.

To get back to the point. The rant from the OP is aimed at the wrong people. People claiming LHA have no control whatsoever over the monetary levels it takes to house them. Those levels were decided by the government based on market rates. If they don't like it.. well they should come up with some alternative solutions.. those which don't put people and families on the streets might be a good start ? Social housing is dead in the water. The only alternative is to pay market rates. Markets rates apply to EVERYONE no matter what the circimstances. Those working thus will pay exactly the same as those not. Like it or not.

That's how it is. Time to get over it. Or start building more social housing.

SS cares for her sick children so it would take someone extremely bitter and twisted to gripe about that. I don't recall any threads on MSE where a carer of a disabled person(s) has ever come under any form of abuse. (Can you direct me to such a thread?)

Being a carer to sick children is slightly different to someone that chooses not to work. Please do and try keep up.

It is a massive problem not an isolated problem. I'm sure we can all name a handful of people who have chosen not to work. ('Single' mothers for example that do nothing whilst their children are at school)

Generally, if someone is to lose their job, benefits are the last thing on their mind. They get on the job sites, they hand out their CV's, they get interviews, they get re-employed. A redundancy serves a notice period, if it arrives on someone's desk, they should have a new job before they leave their redundant job. Some people just cannot grasp this concept so the rubbish about how we would all be filling in the forms at an eye watering rate are laughable.

Benefits are a last resort.

Shakethedisease

Generally, if someone is to lose their job, benefits are the last thing on their mind. They get on the job sites, they hand out their CV's, they get interviews, they get re-employed. A redundancy serves a notice period, if it arrives on someone's desk, they should have a new job before they leave their redundant job.

You're living in a dream world mate.

LydiaJ

SingleSue wrote: »

I would disagree with the comment about all of the other posters not caring or not knowing, I have found it is usually the minority in this section who really think that way (can't speak for other parts of the site, some bits are scary!)

It cannot be denied, the figures are an eye opener especially if you live in a high rent cost area...the money that can be paid out (even indirectly) to a claimant can truly be eye watering and there are still those out there who do think of it as a meal ticket and churn out child after child just to keep that meal ticket going.

I know when I was working, I hated seeing it, resented it even...all my hard earned pennies going to people who could not be bothered to get off their idle bottoms and pay their own way. I couldn't differentiate either between those who were there by design or by accident....work was the be all and end all to me.

What I am saying (in my usual round about way), is that my feeling of failure is not because of what people are writing on these forums about benefit claimants but is because of my own personal standards and upbringing...in my mind, my failure is in producing children who have differing needs and a failure to hold my marriage together which has meant I have been forced to claim benefits and not be working where I can hold my head up high.

Just to re-iterate, the people on this board have been wonderful to me, have been understanding, have been amazing with their support of me and my boys. The threads don't upset me, my own standards do.

Sue, I have been impressed for some time by your dedication, courage, humility and generosity, but in this post you demonstrate a grace under fire that takes my breath away. It is a privilege to know you.

silvercar wrote: »

I would say it is one of your successes in bringing up children with differing needs.

Yes yes yes yes yes. There's only one person on the planet who thinks you are a failure, and that's you. The rest of us respectfully disagree.