Another rant...sorry!

[Nomada]

Oh Dominic, you're so full of bitterness.

[Rosendula]

Oh Dominic, you're so full of bitterness.

I agree, not just from this post, but from some of Dominic's previous posts. As a person who felt bitter for most of my life, but have now found peace and happiness, I urge you, Dominic, to have a look at your life and see what needs to change to make you happier. Smile and the world smiles with you....

I somehow have to find the money to pay my mortgage in January, I'm lucky, I still get paid for 35 hours a week, even if I'm really working 70...

Perhaps if you are finding it difficult to cope with your financial situation a little help may be in order. If you have debt problems, the Citizens Advice Bureau can help. If you don't have debts (other than the mortgage of course) and would like an Excel document to help you organize your finances better, just PM me and I'll send you one with all the formulas in and everything.

Peace

[Eigon]

How does Dominic know that "the vast majority" are abusing the benefits system? Can he produce any evidence to support that sweeping generalisation?

And I think these figures came from Gingerbread, the single parent charity - they've stuck in my head, anyway. They said that 10% of single parents were teenagers; 10% of single parents were single fathers, and the rest were divorced, or widowed or on their own for some other reason.

If the State doesn't pay benefits to single parents, or the unemployed, or disabled people, or penisoners, what is supposed to happen to them? Do we bring back the workhouse, or what?
I've just spent two years on the dole, and I'm now working again. Would it have helped anyone if, during that time, I'd lost my home because I couldn't pay the rent and ended up sleeping in shop doorways? It certainly wouldn't have helped me back into work.

[contadino]

leaving aside the poor grammar and witless insults (something I hope the mods will be picking up) we didn't vote in a socialist government in the last election. We voted in a big state, pro capitialism government. If you think this mob are socialist you need to read up on your politics.

New Labour claim to be a socialist party. Read their manifesto.

[Bluemoon]

Does anyone actually know someone who ..." just [has] kids like others have cups of coffee.." ? or who "... just keep having kids to get housing and money off the state and keep themselves in fags and booze." ?

Personaly, no, I dont associate with such people, but I'm aware a great mny of them exist.

As a former single parent, (first husband knocked me around so much I'm now deaf in right ear), I often wish the people that condem should, as the Native Indians put it, "walk a mile in my shoes" before sounding off.

Gladly, after you walk a mile in mine.
I somehow have to find the money to pay my mortgage in January, I'm lucky, I still get paid for 35 hours a week, even if I'm really working 70, several hundred thousand others are going to sacked and be left with nothing.
But hey, your husband was abusive, so you deserve a home more than the people who's taxes pay for it.

Before we get the usual rants of racist, which in this context I just dont get, my mum was a single mum, dad just buggered off one day.
She worked and raised three kids.

At what point did she say she was given a house at the expense of those who pay taxes? At what point did she say she was on benefits? Who mentioned racism? The 'several hundred thousand' who are going to be sacked will not be left with nothing, they'll have benefits, that's the point, a safety net. Finally would you remain in a situation where your health or even life was threatened on a daily basis by someone physically stronger than you and in the very place where you and your family should feel safest? My mum also worked and raised three kids at a time when there wasn't even the tax credits that are available now, just child benefit which everyone got. She paid her mortgage and put all three of us through university. Do I resent the fact that more help is available today than was given to her? No, I'm pleased we live in a civilized society that puts the weaker members first (I'm talking about the kids here, not the mothers) But the current obsession with forcing these mothers to work will impact on the children not the parent and is a step backwards. Yes there are career claimants, but they are few. Most people on benefits leave them as soon as is possible, and everyone's situation is different so can't be legislated for at a blanket cut off age. Suppose the woman has no family nearby, suppose the child is disabled. An 8 hour day usually entails at least a couple of hour's travel so equals 10 hours in childcare, the jobs which pay sufficient to cover this are few and far between and I fail to see how this amount of time with strangers can help the child.

[dawnmc]

Don't usually join in with this kind of topic, cos it can get a bit heated. I believe the idea is to stop women (why do we blame the women) who have multiple kids to multiple men. Eg Shannon Mathews mum. Only trouble is when they take one child away it gets replaced by another.
I'm a foster carer and take some of these troubled kids. Some kids never know who their father is nor ever will. It all sounds a very simplistic way of dealing with these families, however I believe they are trying to do the same in Holland.

[ajs88]

when i was 12 my single farther lost his buissness and his home of 21 years, the site of the buissness and our home had been picked for redevolpment. the buissness shut down after a bad saftey report, it took four different inspectors untill the council could get a fail. he spent a year paying rates and charges that buissness encure even if not operational for a year while fighting the closure with no income ie. he used up all savings and got into debt.

when the eviction notice came he found a house to rent, we moved in and my dad signed on, housing benifits paid for half of the rent and the other half was paid for by the compensastion money (he was awarded £20,000, rent for one year alone in South East London is £10,000). he continued to live on the dole untill I was 19, between 18-19 he was on job seekers, before getting a job as a caretaker.

i used to be ashamed that my dad was on benifits and thought that he should get a job, money was extremley tight and we lived under a ticking clock of the compensation money running out, and had to move a couple of times after leases ended. but i can see now that although i thought i didn't need to be looked after, it was a differcult time for me and i really did benifit from having my dad at home. i hated school and my dad really had to struggle to keep me there, i don't think he could have done this had he been working all day.

he did finally get a job, he was forced to rather then choose to, it was very hard to clean toliets after running his own buissness, expeialy when previous clients saw him and asked if he was running the place. he since quit that job and retrained as an IT tutor and is looking foward to starting work, i am now a graduate with a job and a tax-payer.

from this i conclude that sometimes families need a parent at home inorder to stay togther (i went of the rails a bit) and to keep there children in education, and that teenagers need parenting as well as babies. but also that it is benifical to push people into work once their children no longer need them at home

[ajs88]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/7816500.stm

this is quite an intresting story, the couple seem to controdict themselves some what, but a theme of either no funding for adult education or no awarness of funding seems to prevalent

[Annpan]

Would you employ someone who kept saying 'there's no point' I know I wouldn't.... I know it is harsh but there are people who try really hard and are not picky and would rather support themselves than anything else - but there are others that 'aren't that bothered'..... *sigh*

[flyonthewall]

I can see both sides of this. I don't have any kids, and I'm sorry but I do resent paying taxes for some people to completely abuse the benefit system. I've been responsible and waited until a time when I could afford to start a family, through working hard, and it annoys me to see young women getting pregnant so they can not have to work. My OH's ex did that - pretty much as soon as his daughter was born, she was off with someone else. She makes sure that OH can't see his daughter too much, because she might get less maintenance, and there are a lot of mothers who cut the fathers out of their kids' lives but are happy to take the £££ in child support. Don't get me wrong, I think BOTH parents should be equally responsible for their kids financially and in other ways, but there are so many kids that get deprived of, or restricted from having a decent relationship with their fathers simply because it isn't convenient for the mother, oh but yes, they still want the father's money.

Clara is right, GOOD parenting isn't valued in society as much as it needs to be, and nobody wants to see a situation where girls are forced into giving up their babies. I don't think that parents should have to go back to work until their children start school, however I don't think it's a bad idea to help some of these single parents learn some new skills and get some training that they might not have had through school, which will then help them to be able to work later on, not to mention building self esteem and confidence etc. It's not a good thing to foster long term dependency on the state, but I do think that the state should be supporting both the mums and dads of little ones to spend as much time with their kids as possible and not have to be working long hours with the kids in daycare. A lot of stay at home mums effectively are single mums because these days, the fathers often have to work every hour sent by God in order that the family can survive on one income and afford to have one parent at home. I would like to see more paternity leave and a better attitude towards flexible working for men. My dad was a stay at home dad until I was 4, then he worked part time, and when I think of all the times I had with my dad growing up, I feel sad for all those kids who are missing out on their dads.

The times haven't evolved, the old woman staying home and man as breadwinner ideal just isn't real any more, and we're still trying desperately to cling to it as a society.

[Brij]

Just to add my experience, at the age of 7, my parents split up, so my mum was left with myself and my two sisters who were only toddlers. When I was around 11 my (half) brother came along. His father has offered little emotional or financial support, despite my mum trusting him to start with (no-one could blame her for hoping!).

Although my mum would probably not have put us into child care for a prolonged period even if she could under a certain age (I'd guess around 5), as she felt that she would rather see that we were brought up as consistently as possible, she probably would have worked a day or two a week, but for a young woman with few qualifications, it's obvious that that wasn't an option.

Especially since we have been older, she has always encouraged us to earn our money, and though my brother is still young, she has also been unable to work due to health problems.

So she really has been stuck on benefits. Money has always been tight but she has coped incredibly well, and I would say that we are all grown into responsible, grounded adults. She has also been studying as much as possible with the OU to try to get qualifications which I guess will help her find work as soon as she is able.

Now personally I would rather pay taxes to support the few people in that situation despite all of the others that may or may not take advantage of the system.

[ajs88]

it does not matter if the circumstances are moral or unmoral, a child has been created and that child needs to be loved and looked after. if a single parent working can achieve that then go to work, if a single parent staying at home is best then stay at home.

i am a tax payer and i believe that my taxes are for the purpose of increasing the quality of our society. i can see no better use of them then for them to be spent of the raising and educating of our children.

currantly there are plenty of breadwinners with morgages looking for work, so i think the push to get single parents back to work should at least be put on the back burner for now.