Cutting the Welfare Bill

purch

Wookster wrote: »

Last time the Lib-Dems ever get my vote.

...as if they ever did

purch

Generali wrote: »

I think a lot of posters are missing the point.

Did you really expect them not to ? :eek:

There is an investing truism that every now and again you should look at your assets and ask yourself, if I had the money instead of the asset would I still buy? If not perhaps you should sell.

Perhaps we need to grow up politically. If there are policies that we wouldn't choose if starting from scratch, why should we peruse them?

Yes. But trying to get Investors/Traders (private or professional) to follow or understand that advice is often impossible, so I doubt very much that on the subject of Government Policies anyone will be able to take such a leap.

kabayiri

purch wrote: »

Yes, not only did Nuevo Laborismo devise the most deviously complicated and in many cases unequitable benefit possible, they also failed to give it an accurate name :eek:

It's pretty good going to create a money giving scheme which is despised in some form by all those connected to it.

It's name doesn't reflect it clearly, and the advertising campaign didn't really clarify matters despite costing a packet.

It isn't a loved system by the IT suppliers (one of them was fined over a million quid for it's poor performance at one point).

It cost far more to run than was envisaged. This can't really go down well with the department lumbered with those costs.

It overpaid by more than £2bn in it's first few years of operation, and surprisingly claimants were upset and unwilling to pay back overpayments! Some people eh!

When I glance over the NHS IT debacle, the still birth that was ID cards , CTC/WTC, and the pathetic cancellation of the newly built rate rerating system for political reasons, I am left with the feeling that Labour don't really do big projects well.

I think the recipients of the MP Expenses system were fairly happy for a while though.

StevieJ

Kennyboy66 wrote: »

The reason why I think it will increase the burden is this;

The triple lock means that pensions should increase by the minimum of CPI, avaerage earnings and 2.5%.

I appreciate that CPI is not normally as high as RPI, however, take any reasonable period and average earnings normally increase faster than RPI (otherwise we would all be getting collectively poorer).

In addition there are likely to be years when both RPI and CPI are below 2.5%.

I still think that the govt intention was to reduce future costs by introducing the triple lock, maybe average earnings have reached a paradigm shift (downwards) at least for the foreseeable, and anyway they have proved that they can just change it, if it becomes a problem.

dtsazza

Generali wrote: »

There is an investing truism that every now and again you should look at your assets and ask yourself, if I had the money instead of the asset would I still buy? If not perhaps you should sell.

Perhaps we need to grow up politically. If there are policies that we wouldn't choose if starting from scratch, why should we peruse them?

I wholeheartedly agree, and it makes me sad to see both politicians and voters who wouldn't act like this.

Any form of leadership/decision making should have two steps:

1. What is the ideal state of the world to be in?
2. How do we get there from here?

The current state of affairs is only relevant in so far as it affects the initial part of your plans.

purch

a paradigm shift

That's easy for you to say :eek:

pqrdef

bob_a_builder wrote: »

Can't understand how or why this proposed cap is being set an 26k, which is equal to earning a salary of 35k - which as far as I know is not the UK average pay - 26k gross is the average (isn't it ?)!

Well suppose you earn the average, £26K gross. On that you pay tax and NI, but then you get child benefits, tax credits and housing benefit. What do you end up with?

Methinks they lied about relating the cap to the average wage, they've actually set it lower.

chris_m

Kennyboy66 wrote: »

The triple lock means that pensions should increase by the minimum of CPI, avaerage earnings and 2.5%.

Unless I've missed something and Google was not my friend, the triple lock guarantee is the greatest of CPI, average earnings and 2.5%, not the least.

The_White_Horse

pqrdef wrote: »

Well suppose you earn the average, £26K gross. On that you pay tax and NI, but then you get child benefits, tax credits and housing benefit. What do you end up with?

Methinks they lied about relating the cap to the average wage, they've actually set it lower.

it should be MUCH lower. remember, these are layabout scum getting free handouts, not decent people earning a salary.

if the average worker get 26k then some workers get much lower, and the scum on the dole should get even less.

chris_m

Wookster wrote: »

And the Church & Lib-Dem peers have blocked it.

And the Commons have reversed all the Lords' amendments, and will be using the "financial priviledge" rule to prevent the Lords passing the same amendments back on the Bill's next reading in the Lords.