Panorama Britain on the Fiddle

tottybum

gravitytolls wrote: »

Or a bloke with a spinal injury, arthritis etc. Advice is always to keep active, partake in some form of exercise, move the joints. Now, if you can manage 18 holes daily, you're probably not disabled, but once or twice a week? Who's to say the following days are not spent eaten up with pain? Which is why some on I B can do some work, but probably not full time.

So presumably using that argument, you think that those that were caught on camera and prosecuted (the referee guy, the guy playing football, the guy carrying furniture to a removal van etc) were wrongly convicted as they are entitled to carry out some forms of exercise?

snoopy89

Maybe the program makers should look at artos medical and the problems there and the problems the disabled are having when they are taken of esa, and dla due to the !!!! ups of the box tickers. That would make a good program. Maybe the government could watch and learn of that one;)

GlasweJen

I've won national awards for dancing, I work full time, I enjoy hill walking and I'm planning on getting to the stage where I can take part in the transplant games.

Ive never made my own dinner, I need someone to help me bathe (because I'm at risk of drowning), I'm not able to go out on my own.

Active and disabled isn't always a contradiction.

ddraig1

I watch programmes like these and sometimes read headlines in the tabloids all alluding to how many million people are cheating on ESA and DLA etc. It makes me sick! When did it become socially acceptable to bash a minority, with the use of lies, half truths and under hand reporting, just so that a corrupt government can save a few quid in their budget, by harasing and bullying people who are genuinley in need of help and fiancial support.

I would not mind but even the statistics the government ministers are quoting are missleading at best and quite obviously masked to suit their own agenda and when the actual truth of what they say comes out it is roundly ignored by everyone in the media.

No one is saying that there are not benefit cheats. The problem is that ATOS are currently ignoring sound medical evidence during their so called assesments to allow them to judge people to have less than the required 15 points for ESA and then are using that same flawed reasoning / evidence? to refuse DLA. Fortunatley people are appealing these dodgey decisions all the way to tribunals and the majority are having their benefits re-instated, but the fact that this is happening at all is unacceptable and its sad to see that many people are to worn out by the whole process and do not follow through to tribunal and are therefore losing out on the help they are entitled to.

margaretclare

This thread has taken off in a completely different direction from the main thrust of that programme. IIRC it was mainly about people having a council flat that they don't live in because they live on a farm and/or a boat in northern France. In one instance, a police officer had a council flat and was renting it out while living somewhere else. Housing benefits/council tax benefits were also being claimed and this is recognised to be far more costly than any of the other forms of fraud. Using someone else's blue badge, using a disabled parking space you're not entitled to, is reprehensible because it prevents a genuine person from using it. Whether you 'look disabled' or not is not the point.

Richie-from-the-Boro

ddraig1 wrote: »

I watch programmes like these and sometimes read headlines in the tabloids all alluding to how many million people are cheating on ESA and DLA etc. It makes me sick! When did it become socially acceptable to bash a minority, with the use of lies, half truths and under hand reporting, just so that a corrupt government can save a few quid in their budget, by harasing and bullying people who are genuinley in need of help and fiancial support.

I would not mind but even the statistics the government ministers are quoting are missleading at best and quite obviously masked to suit their own agenda and when the actual truth of what they say comes out it is roundly ignored by everyone in the media.

No one is saying that there are not benefit cheats. The problem is that ATOS are currently ignoring sound medical evidence during their so called assesments to allow them to judge people to have less than the required 15 points for ESA and then are using that same flawed reasoning / evidence? to refuse DLA. Fortunatley people are appealing these dodgey decisions all the way to tribunals and the majority are having their benefits re-instated, but the fact that this is happening at all is unacceptable and its sad to see that many people are to worn out by the whole process and do not follow through to tribunal and are therefore losing out on the help they are entitled to.

What ? - a state sponsored and paid for program called ATOS to reduce or deny benefits to anyone in the UK that is unproductive, that's bordering on eugenics isn't it ? Are you suggesting there is some sort of parallel between the current CONdem's Government attitude to disability and the early days of the Nazi regime in 1930s ?

I mean yes .. .. propaganda was widespread at the time, put out by a [STRIKE]Nazi[/STRIKE] German political party to stigmatise disabled people at a time when there was real economic fear in order to propagate the myth that the disabled were a drain on society. I agree that in this country at this very time there ia a relentless, bucolic smear campaign against those who are ill and / or / disabled. My god does that mean the UK government will doing compulsory sterilisation next or worse still a T4 programme.

You may be right my friend, maybe, just maybe there are parallels between Fascism where people were judged purely on their ability to contribute to the goal of German imperialism and its genocidal savagery and the current ATOS / Governmental relationship.

tottybum

Richie-from-the-Boro wrote: »

What ? - a state sponsored and paid for program called ATOS to reduce or deny benefits to anyone in the UK that is unproductive, that's bordering on eugenics isn't it ? Are you suggesting there is some sort of parallel between the current CONdem's Government attitude to disability and the early days of the Nazi regime in 1930s ?

I mean yes .. .. propaganda was widespread at the time, put out by a [STRIKE]Nazi[/STRIKE] German political party to stigmatise disabled people at a time when there was real economic fear in order to propagate the myth that the disabled were a drain on society. I agree that in this country at this very time there ia a relentless, bucolic smear campaign against those who are ill and / or / disabled. My god does that mean the UK government will doing compulsory sterilisation next or worse still a T4 programme.

You may be right my friend, maybe, just maybe there are parallels between Fascism where people were judged purely on their ability to contribute to the goal of German imperialism and its genocidal savagery and the current ATOS / Governmental relationship.

Whilst I can fully understand what you are saying, there has to be some truth in it.

As most accountants know (George Osbourne), that to run a sucessful buisness you have to balance the books - what goes out, must come in.

If what comes in is less than what is going out, or vice versa, the end result is either bankruptcy or liquidation.

You either increase income (Tax receipts) or reduce expenditure.
Now to increase income you have to pay more tax. That is political suicide.

If we have more people taking out than putting in, something has to be done.

First stop - who isn't putting in? Those on benefits and OAP's.

What do we do? Get them to put in. However there isn't much we can do about the pensioners so we let them fester away and hopefully they pop their clogs pretty quick. Maybe don't feed them in hospital, cut back on medication or maybe reduce their money so more die in freezing conditions.

Then we have the jobless, and malingerers. Either cut off their supply of money and make them contribute or maybe do both.

Am I wrong or am I wrong?

moose1982

tottybum wrote: »

First stop - who isn't putting in? Those on benefits and OAP's.

Both of those groups do put in, not as much as employed people I'll grant you, but when those groups buy something from a shop or buy a service, they pay a tax which goes into George's coffers, I think it's called Value Added Tax (VAT for short). Plus they help keep companies going which might mean they can employ more people, thus bringing the total unemployed down.

tottybum wrote: »

Am I wrong or am I wrong?

Yup, as above, pretty much wrong.

margaretclare

moose1982 wrote: »

Both of those groups do put in, not as much as employed people I'll grant you, but when those groups buy something from a shop or buy a service, they pay a tax which goes into George's coffers, I think it's called Value Added Tax (VAT for short). Plus they help keep companies going which might mean they can employ more people, thus bringing the total unemployed down.




Yup, as above, pretty much wrong.

Yes, wrong. DH and I are pensioners but we still pay tax on our pensions income. In addition, we pay VAT on everything else, petrol, utilities, you name it. The only thing which is VAT-free is fresh food - all processed food carries VAT.

tottybum

moose1982 wrote: »

Both of those groups do put in, not as much as employed people I'll grant you, but when those groups buy something from a shop or buy a service, they pay a tax which goes into George's coffers, I think it's called Value Added Tax (VAT for short). Plus they help keep companies going which might mean they can employ more people, thus bringing the total unemployed down.




Yup, as above, pretty much wrong.

Maybe I could have worded it a little different then seeing as you enjoy picking little holes in things that in the grand scheme of things aren't important.

First stop - Who isn't putting in as much as they should be when compared to others.

Besides which you know exactly what I mean. There are certain elements of society that have a negative impact on the economy.
How long do you think a company could survive if the the price paid for something at the till (Income) is less than what it actually costs to produce that item (Expense). That is exactly what is happening with the Welfare costs - more going out than is being paid in!