Are free school meals going to be included in benefits cap?

DorsetGirl_2

MissMoneypenny wrote: »

I let my son walk to school without me and on his own, when he was 10.

My eldest son is 10, and he does walk to school by himself, although sometimes he likes to walk with us.

But my eldest daughter is 7 and I dont feel like she is responsible enough to walk to school by herself, which means crossing a busy main road and by a roundabout - that is the main difference between now and the 1950's which worries me

Which is why my children go to breakfast club - I can drop them off at 8.15 and then walk back with my 5 year old in his buggy and a walking toddler to his school and get into his playground by 8.50

MissMoneypenny

FBaby wrote: »

Oh dear, there's nothing left..... and that's already with a decent salary...

Why do expect to have something left when you have children? Most parents didn't have anything left when they had children in the 50s, even in the 80s; it's one of the things that was accepted when you planned children.

Those without children always had more cash and if those with children wanted more money, they worked more hours/took another job.

In the last decade, we have seen the "entitled to" class arrive - "everyone must provide for my children/give me free (insert whatever they want)" and "employers must fit around my children" etc. There seems to be very little financial planning before children from some parents now and the expectation from many that they should still have the latest phone, holidays, nice car and that others families should provide for their chilldren in some form.

FBaby wrote: »

Yep, it was easy in the 50s, when mortgage were peanuts compared to what they are now...

A lot of people in the 50s, couldn't afford houses; or cars.

When I bought my first house in the 1980 I had to have a 10% deposit, borrowed 5.5 x my salary and the mortgage rate was 12% (although I got a staff rate of 5%).

The overly generous welfare payments for parents, are ending; it won't get anywhere as near as bad as the 50s, but some parents are going to find that they have to work harder than they planned to and also go without things.

bored_at_home

miss moneypenny thank you for talking sense!
fbaby some families have 2 parents so could have 2 wages coming in if they wanted to have something left, yet the mortgage and utilities would just be the same.....
and that is my point.... i have no idea of your cirumstances so this is not aimed at you personally...but with the government handing out money in the way of CTC far too often the 2nd parent is sitting at home or keeping working hours to the absolute minimum and taking the handout for the extras that previously a 2nd parent brought in.

GobbledyGook

Dognobs wrote: »

People are missing my point, we managed without these clubs 20 years ago so why do we need them now?

I think the main difference is the number of households where the adults all must work full time. More single parents who work full time and need before and after school care to allow them to work and more two-parent families with such whacking great mortgages that both have to work full time.

There's not so many families now where one person works full time and the other does a smaller job or a couple of wee jobs to fit in around the kids. They can't afford it.

I'm now a single parent and I work in schools so I have the ideal parenting job - school hours and term time, but even I need the breakfast club (although mine don't have food there - just before school care) because for me to be at my school on time I need the girls at school slightly earlier.

The fragmentation of families and communities also plays a huge part in it. My parents were awful parents, but my family lived close by. We also knew everyone in our community. If my mother had to go to work then Mrs XXX downstairs would put me out to school or I could go to my friends house and we'd walk together. There's 8 houses in my street with primary school age children and the children go to 4 different schools because of the crazy system (actually it's 5, but 1 chose a religious school). The community hall was closed so the children tend to go to Brownies, Scouts and the likes near their school with their school friends. You just don't get the same relationships now which means people rely on paid help for the little things that used to be normal community life.

Parents drop the kids at school on the way to work so you don't meet other parents in the same way.


Although the main issue is, in my opinion, the expectation now to own a home. A home in which everyone has to have their own bedroom. I think that is the one thing that damaged communities the most.

GobbledyGook

Tax credits were initially supposed to bridge the gap when people when back to work from benefits. It was never intended that people would stay on them long term and that people in 'good' jobs would end up being able to claim. There was supposed to be a time limit. It was just to help people back on their feet so that childcare and the likes wasn't cost prohibitive.

It was a good idea. In fact a great idea. It was just implemented shockingly badly.

Instead of bridging the gap it's just allowed employers to keep wages low, people to keep low hours and, mostly, childcare providers to rocket their cost leaving people who'd never have been able to claim if it was implemented properly able to claim.

Even the small mistakes cost a fortune - no correlation between working hours/days and childcare paid being the obvious one. The fact that boarding school boarding fees are classed as childcare is the other one.

mirrorimage0

GobbledyGook wrote: »

Tax credits were initially supposed to bridge the gap when people when back to work from benefits. It was never intended that people would stay on them long term and that people in 'good' jobs would end up being able to claim. There was supposed to be a time limit. It was just to help people back on their feet so that childcare and the likes wasn't cost prohibitive.

It was a good idea. In fact a great idea. It was just implemented shockingly badly.

Instead of bridging the gap it's just allowed employers to keep wages low, people to keep low hours and, mostly, childcare providers to rocket their cost leaving people who'd never have been able to claim if it was implemented properly able to claim.

Even the small mistakes cost a fortune - no correlation between working hours/days and childcare paid being the obvious one. The fact that boarding school boarding fees are classed as childcare is the other one.

what you mean i can send mine to boarding school and claim for it:T


sorry am seriously joking it just made me chuckle.:o

Sixer

GobbledyGook wrote: »

Tax credits were initially supposed to bridge the gap when people when back to work from benefits. It was never intended that people would stay on them long term

That is complete rubbish. Tax credits were introduced to maintain households on low incomes and increase work incentives. They replaced earlier low income top up benefits such as Family Credit and were also intended to replace some income tax allowances (eg for children and married couples) which had previously been abolished.

I'm no fan of tax credits whatsover. And I don't think they've been particularly successful. But to suggest they were introduced as some kind of back-to-work temporary measure is just plain wrong.

FBaby

MissMoneypenny wrote: »

Why do expect to have something left when you have children? Most parents didn't have anything left when they had children in the 50s, even in the 80s; it's one of the things that was accepted when you planned children.

I would think anyone working and earning an average living would wish to have a little bit of income left at the end of the month to buy some clothes for themselves once in the blue moon, be able to afford to go to the dentist and a pair of glasses, they might want to furnish the house with essentials, and being able to replace defective items, be able to put some money aside for house repairs, they might also wish to, maybe buy a book, magazine,newspaper, or is that too much luxury....

FBaby

bored_at_home wrote: »

miss moneypenny thank you for talking sense!
fbaby some families have 2 parents so could have 2 wages coming in if they wanted to have something left, yet the mortgage and utilities would just be the same.....
and that is my point.... i have no idea of your cirumstances so this is not aimed at you personally...but with the government handing out money in the way of CTC far too often the 2nd parent is sitting at home or keeping working hours to the absolute minimum and taking the handout for the extras that previously a 2nd parent brought in.

My comment was purely in response to Dognobs who was on a mission implying that children shouldn't be put into after school clubs and one parent should be at home. I was trying to make a point that nowadays, without benefits, it is difficult for any families to make ends meet without the help of benefits. Most do rely on them, or parents both work and children go to childcare.

I agree totally with you, both parents should be working and earning money rather than relying on benefits.

My personal circumstances are what Dognobs thinks will lead to my children being deliquants... I've always worked full-time, even when I was a single mum, children in morning and after school clubs. I don't rely on benefits but for CB for the moment. As a single mum, though with a good salary, once I'd paid the mortgage and childcare (was only entitled to £45 a month TC), I did find it tight, much tighter than many of my single friends who didn't work and relied on benefits alone.

GobbledyGook

mirrorimage0 wrote: »

what you mean i can send mine to boarding school and claim for it:T

sorry am seriously joking it just made me chuckle.:o

It's one of the biggest farces in tax credits imo. You can claim for the boarding fees as they are classed as childcare :rotfl:

Sixer wrote: »

That is complete rubbish. Tax credits were introduced to maintain households on low incomes and increase work incentives. They replaced earlier low income top up benefits such as Family Credit and were also intended to replace some income tax allowances (eg for children and married couples) which had previously been abolished.

I'm no fan of tax credits whatsover. And I don't think they've been particularly successful. But to suggest they were introduced as some kind of back-to-work temporary measure is just plain wrong.

I didn't say they were introduced as a back-to-work temporary measure, but that is what the initial plan for them was. That was the initial idea. That idea then evolved into what was introduced. The intial idea was better, in my opinion, than what we got. When the idea of tax credits was first mooted there was suggestion of a 2 year limit. The original idea and the implemented thing were so different.

They were never originally intended to be so widespread. The increase in the cost of childcare meant that people who were never expected to be on tax credits ended up qualifying. That was something that was never thought of.