MSE News: 'I'm on benefits but I'm no scrounger'

Flyboy152

Paul_Herring wrote: »

Stop being professionally offended on behalf of others.

A significant number of posters have pointed out, for example, that if £11K is all he's getting at the moment, then he's probably not getting all the help he's eligible for.

It would help if some stopped being professionally offensive.

Paul_Herring

Flyboy152 wrote: »

That said, do really expect anyone to accept what Richard Littlejohn writes about anyone on benefits?

Flyboy152 wrote: »

And you really believe what the Daily Heil says about anyone who has brown skin, a beard and is suspected of being a terrorist?

Since both items have been reported widely in various parts of the press, and the DM links just happened to be the first that I found using a quick Google search, what parts of them do you find particularly unbelievable?

Or are you just a DM hater, for the sake of hating, who refuses to even believe anything they report as being true, even if it's reported exactly the same elsewhere?

Flyboy152

smk77 wrote: »

Just a question - would that affect benefits? I'm not saying that people shouldn't go self-employed in fear of losing benefits but would it be possible to end up worse off by being self employed?

I wonder if Ross has been on the 'Up Your Income' forum?

Yes, because you lose your entitlement to most benefits.

Flyboy152

libertyuk wrote: »

Not everyone scrounges, I live on 80 pound a week. I always worked as did my late husband. When he died suddenly I was told I could have no help as he should have provided for me, he did not plan to die at an early age. I have to pay council tax out of that and normal household bills and try to eat. But as its a occupational pension I cannot claim benefits.My husband and I paid our taxes and national insurance all our lives and I get no help, I dont work as had three major back ops in the last two years. Whilst I feel sorry for the man that only has 11 thousand to live on I cant help but feel the whole system is wrong and if I had that amount of money I would feel very rich indeed.

How many children do you have to provide for?

Hang on....

£80 per week? What happened to your state pension?

Flyboy152

smk77 wrote: »

Not exactly. They wouldn't be treated any differently from another individual who is also consider as in 'priority need'.

If I sold my house tomorrow and had nowhere to live then the council wouldn't help as I had made myself intentionally homeless.

Indeed, so prisoners are not being treated any differently than anyone else who is homeless.

The point of this conversation was that Susiesae59 was complaining that ex-offenders get better treatment than anyone else in similar circumstances, when clearly they don't

Flyboy152

Paul_Herring wrote: »

Since both items have been reported widely in various parts of the press, and the DM links just happened to be the first that I found using a quick Google search, what parts of them do you find particularly unbelievable?

The fact they are in the Daily Heil and it is written by Richard Littlejohn is enough.

Or are you just a DM hater, for the sake of hating, who refuses to even believe anything they report as being true, even if it's reported exactly the same elsewhere?

No on hates the Daily Heil just for the sake of it and for no reason. There are a good many reasons to hate it.

zigzigzag

I love how real events and people's real experiences get written off as 'Daily Mail propaganda'; such an easy way to avoid actually engaging with the facts and issues.
Some of these posts are very rude - the forum rule is 'even if you disagree courtesy helps'.

susanmaustin

[FONT=&quot]After nearly 20 years, I have found myself out of work. I finally got JSA payment, 2 months later, of £67.50 a week. I have still heard nothing from Council re: benefits. No one has told me what my entitlement is. I have only just found out I am entitled to help with my mortgage, but no mention of where I get this help. Despite substantial NI contributions over the years, my Contribution JSA entitlement is only for 6 months. Why? I am not entitled to free prescriptions. Why not? How am I supposed to pay for five lots of medication? How am I supposed to live on £290 a month when my outgoings are over £800? The only "luxuries" I can cut down on are TV, phone and internet.
The majority of Job Centre staff look down on me, some of them to point of being rude. I am supposed to know where I am going in the Job Centre from the outset. I must sign on at their allotted time I am "not allowed to deviate from this in any way, signing on takes priority over everything else".:mad: I am not allowed to undertake any training, to make me more employable; I am not allowed to partake in any voluntary work to help my job prospects.[/FONT]:(

saffrongirl

I am really dismayed at some of the nasty vindictive comments made about people who claim benefits.
Some of you posters seem to forget you are talking about human beings here. Human beings who have feelings.
I am one of the so called 'benefits scroungers'. I had worked for 25 years before I claimed benefits and my husband much more.
I didn't ask to be on benefits but I am. I am a single mum, I have a nine year old daughter. My husband was a serious alcoholic. I lived with his problem for many years because I didn't believe it to be a big problem. He managed to hold down a job and I worked too, part-time, because I have a serious back problem caused by congenital defect. After my daughter was born things started to go downhill. He's drinking got so bad that he was retired on 'medical grounds'. I was still working part-time and for a while we managed on his medical pension and my wage. After a couple of years of this I decided enough was enough. I couldn't leave my daughter in his care, I couldn't trust that he wouldn't drink whilst she was in his care. I don't have any parents or in-laws to ask help from.
My daughter at about the age of 4, started to ask me why daddy slept on the floor in the hall and not in bed. Why he came home with cuts and bruises from falling in the street. Why we had to keep going to the hospital to bring him home, having ended up there in an ambulance. I couldn't explain these things to her. He was also becoming extremely verbally abusive. I decided it was not what a 4 year old should be seeing or hearing. We separated and, as my daughter was about to start school I carried on part-time with the assurance that my partner would pay maintenance for her and contribute to the rent. He never did. The CSA as it was then, was not interested. He told them he couldn't afford to pay anything. I phoned and wrote to the CSA on several occasions but never got anything from him. I was getting into arrears with the rent and I had to ask for benefits. I had no choice, I had a daughter to look after. By this time my back had deteriorated so much that I was told by the people I worked for that I wasn't fulfilling my contract because I couldn't do what I had been employed to do. I left my job, that I had been doing for 10 years, hoping to find something else but I haven't as yet been able to. When you go for an interview as soon as you disclose you have a disability you know that you won't get the job. They won't say it officially because they cannot be seen to discriminate but employers are not stupid. They know it will cost them time and money to employ me, a disabled single parent. So here I am, disabled and unemployable apparently. Oh lets not forget my age too. I am now 49 so I am in that horrendous age bracket too. As I get older my job prospects get less because my disability and age will increase.
I now claim DLA after being told by the Jobcentre that I would probably be entitled to it because of my back and increasing mobility problems. It was a degrading process and I have to go through the same thing every year. Now it seems to be being made even more degrading with the likes of Atos. The problems will get worse for me as I get older. Even now I have to ask my daughter to help me to wash and dress myself and help clean the house. A child should not have to do that.
So, according to the 'Daily Mail' and it appears many posters on MSE, I am officially a 'benefits scrounger'.
I did not choose to be on benefits, I had to go on benefits to survive. I would rather not be. The media and the government attack from both sides. A single parent, disabled and on benefits. I cannot win.
I don't buy newspapers anymore because it makes me ill when I read what the nation sees me as. It made me feel ill when I read the comments on this forum about people you know nothing about. Picking at every little thing that Ross wrote. You never know when fate will deal you a serious blow, you may end up in the same position. Think on that.
Do not judge me. Don't think because I have told you this that you know me. You don't.

Flyboy152

zigzigzag wrote: »

I love how real events and people's real experiences get written off as 'Daily Mail propaganda'; such an easy way to avoid actually engaging with the facts and issues.
Some of these posts are very rude - the forum rule is 'even if you disagree courtesy helps'.

That's because anything written in that rag is propaganda and is mostly devoid of any fact.

It has even won awards for having so little fact.