jSA CHRISTMAS 2012 PAYMENTS

Horseunderwater

FleetFanatic wrote: »

It beggars belief that this country couldn't even expect the poor, deserving, unemployed of this country to get off their backsides & sign on over Christmas & New Year.

Meanwhile, a lot of us, myself included, were back at work on the 27th. Some people even had to work Christmas Day/Boxing Day.

Nice.

It was not the above who could not get off their backsides - it was the gov't who closed the benefit offices on the 24/25/26th Of december who made it impossible to do just that, so arrangements were put in place as they are each year to sign people early or later and interim payments made to cover. And were I still able bodied and not so ill, I'd have been back at work too! I did not ask to get a rare incurable illness, but I have one - perhaps you'd like one too. No thought not. Happy new year.

Trialia

Parva wrote: »

Have you ever been on the receiving end of having to rely on such a measly payment of £71 to live for one week in accomodation that requires payment for the roof over your head, gas / electric / council tax and finally food? Just wondered.....

Ummm, yes, actually I have. What the heck gave you the idea I hadn't???

FYI... I grew up in a family in such poverty that while we did manage to get a council house, I had to go to bed in winter with three layers of clothes on including my coat (all secondhand apart from underwear, mind you, just as they all are now), sharing that bed with my younger sister, just to be warm enough to be able to sleep because we couldn't afford to have the heat on and we only had single-glazed windows in our house and lots of draughts. Oh, and I mustn't forget the decisions we had to make during between paying bus fare to school and actually being able to eat something.

I basically lived on my EMA during college because I had to give just about all of what benefit they did give me for having no income to my family for rent and utilities when I lived with them (the rest went to bus fare to get to college at all). So that's £25 a week. Think about it.

Frankly, I really didn't mean what you appear to think I meant with the post you quoted! If it helps you think about it, what I did mean was that I tried to use the word in question in my previous post and the forum filtered it. I wasn't talking about the quality of anyone else's posts, which is apparently what YOU think!

You know what, I don't even know why I'm making this post to justify myself, you obviously have no clue what you're talking about, but what the hey, I'm not going to waste the time and pain I just spent writing that.


And Sandra... did you ever think that perhaps these people were frustrated, and sometimes people get so hungry they struggle to concentrate to find this kind of thing? I don't think you did. Try a bit more compassion, perhaps, please?

SandraScarlett

Trialia wrote: »

And Sandra... did you ever think that perhaps these people were frustrated, and sometimes people get so hungry they struggle to concentrate to find this kind of thing? I don't think you did. Try a bit more compassion, perhaps, please?

And Trialia ................. did you ever think that although, according to you, these people may have well been frustrated, and hungry, that it takes a nano second to press the thanks button?

And instead of requesting that I try a bit more compassion, did you ever think that I am showing compassion by answering the requests for information, at no benefit to myself, but because I'm trying to be helpful?

Frankly, the number of troll posts of late, together with the lack of common courtesy, makes me reluctant to offer any help in future. I've read your story of how you spent your childhood, and it doesn't vary greatly from that of many of my generation, including myself.

As far as showing compassion goes, my elderly husband has Alzheimers, and I am his sole carer, 24/7 for 365 days a year, so I really don't need any lessons in what being compassionate means.

The situation that I'm experiencing, as the carer of a 74 year old toddler, easily makes people so introverted that they are only interested in what help they can get, and they certainly don't spend what little precious spare time they have, helping others. But I did.

xx

Trialia

Sandra... just one thing. I'm not a part of your generation, remember. This shouldn't be happening to people my age - not that it should have happened to any of you either, but things were supposedly(!) different then - but it especially should not be the status quo in one of the richest countries in the world toward the close of the 20th and the early years of the 21st century.

Why are we having a sociopolitical debate in a thread about JSA payment dates anyway? It's not the place.

Look, I didn't say that you're not being compassionate at all. I do appreciate your helping people out - but I don't appreciate the passive-aggressive response to the feedback you got, because it negates the effect of your previous behaviour by making you look like you're only doing it to get thanked. Do you see what I'm saying here?

I understand your point, and I know how much it takes out of someone to be a carer, particularly unpaid - I did a greater part of the caring for my mother while she was fighting cancer through most of my childhood and teens, and that was not easy - but I don't think I will ever understand why you (plural) can't try to look through others' eyes a little more often, and maybe refrain from sniping when you (again plural) don't get the response you wanted.

It feels very weird for me to be saying that, since I have Asperger's, but I meant it all the same, and I do my best to do it myself.