Forums Forums General Forums A - Z Lifestyle The Benefit Cheats / Cheaters

Everyone has their viewpoint, according to their perception of the matter.

I somehow think that this all has a wider picture, eventually for the benefit of others.
There are 15 people living in houses in other parts of the country, all claiming benefits (possibly illegally) Public don't like the idea.
In London and possibly other places, people are building sheds and rooms in their backyards to house immigrants,of many. You've seen it on the news etc. and many a person complained about such.
There are 4 students paying £200 per month or more for a house share of 2 bedrooms plus a boxroom, so one of the downstairs rooms is classed as a bedroom.(which it isn't)

These are the situations arising to overcrowding living conditions.

There are people who claim benefits and the same week seen doing extensive building work at a neighbours property. (they got reported)
There are people who claim benefits and always carry a wadd of notes in their back pocket.

They could be the ones seen as the benefit cheats. Not the genuine who seem to be taking umbridge and think the finger is being pointed at themselves.

All these things need to be tackled and how else (suggest) could it be done. At least with the bedroom tax, their is possibly more likely hood of a true headcount on claimants on benefits.

So far as the media etc and the points raised aout that. The last 15years encouraged a culture which was happy to find the loopholes and make megga fortunes at whatever cost and that plonker

Whoops.....got cut off.

That plonker Mandelson and his remark about having no objection to people getting 'filthy rich' as he said.

Well they did get filthy rich and then the big arm of control came out to play. So here we are..........up shit creek without a paddle.

The only issues I'd have with the vouchers are:

1 How do I pay my gas/electric/water rates/tax underpayment from when my employer did the tax calculations/my rent & council tax excess etc?

2 How do I pay for the bus to get to the shops to buy food & pay for the taxi to get back (hard to carry shopping bags when you need your arms to use crutches/stick/wheelchair) or buy online so you don't have to (in my case) take 10mgs of morphine to go shopping & another 10mgs when I get home (then not be able to walk the next day).

3 How do I pay for the bus to get to hospital appointments/physio etc?

4 How much abuse will I get from the members of the public that will see me as a scrounger & second class citizen? It will be like school dinner tokens in the 80's.

5 Will ALL food shops have to accept them? What if your bill comes to less/more than your vouchers?

6 Will they only be for food? If so, what will ladies have to do about buying tampons/towels etc? Will there be a separate voucher for nappies? How am I meant to pay for toilet rolls, cleaning products, a whole other host of necessities such as clothes?

I'm sure there would be a fair few more questions about them if I really sat & thought about it.

I agree that they shouldn't be used for nights out, alcohol, drugs etc but I can't see vouchers being the way to stop that.

Great points wench . It shows that vouchers are only part of the answer . Havent a clue what the whole answer is though.

some good points wench, but there are alot of people out there who do not need to claim, its a bit hard to digest when you see these scroungers who do go out and spend benefits on beer and drugs ect, and then i see people like you have mentioned, people on crutches ect and yes they do need financial help, there are people who live by me and i see there kids dressed in all the new football kits ect, thats what gets under my skin, hence the vouchers, and as for tampons i think they should be free im sick of paying out for them for the wife

Would you not qualify for a free bus pass?
http://www.merseytravel.gov.uk/Site%20Documents/Free%20Travel%20Pass%20Information%20Booklet.pdf

Maybe it should be based on whether or not you own a tracksuit and have a Sky dish...

Hopefully, yes - forms have gone off this week. Still wouldn't help with paying for a taxi though. It was more of an example if that makes sense?

Yes, I saw that but was just hoping to give you an idea to help out.How about when you go shopping then you get the shop to deliver free,some of them (Iceland/ Co-op/Cool Trader) do that if you spend over £25 or if you shop on line with Tesco/Asda/JS the delivery charge can be £2.50 which could be less than a taxi.I know that is only the grocery but that tends to be the heaviest stuff.

I'd just take issue with the view of those who say "I've paid into it for xx-something years so I'm entitled to get some of it back". No, it's not an investment account! That is neither the intent nor the purpose, of the benefit system, surely!
I'd have said it was meant to be more like insurance, where although you pay in (premiums), your fond hope is that you will never have to claim (because that would mean you now have a problem!)
Benefits are there to help those people who CANNOT provide for themselves, not for a return on investment for the people who have paid into the system. If you think that way then you're just a part of the problem!

Wench can't you go in for this hun link I know it's for London but I don't, know if they do something like it up here.

I have renamed the topic. I was looking for a more suitable Name.

My Take on this is its like the Prison Service?
Or as they say, if you didn't come in to prison as a criminal then you will leave one trained and more knowledgeable.

With Regards to Benefits when i was out of work 6yrs ago you get dragged into the how to cheat the system, or as it was described "What your entitled too" and at first your shocked but then when its explained that half the country can get that benefit you become a number and a insignificant number. Then after receiving the Money all guilt is removed because you now believe that half the country is getting the same benefit and the spot light is no longer on you.

The Truth is that Benefits should be on a case by case or Means tested. The System back then was open to abuse, and even encouraged to get what you could. But there is a darker side where the Benefits system has failed people and families. As i say above once your in the system like a prison you get to know just what and how you can claim for.

The Benefits System is to blame for its own mess not the people as a whole, its allowed its own system to be abused with too much paper work and red tape.

Meh, it's your forum chief, but I wish you wouldn't change it after the event. "Benefit Scroungers" sums up nicely the opinion of alot of posters in this thread, on this website over the years and indeed alot of the public at large. You changing the topic title seems to justify some of the back peddling that's gone on in here when, from the outset, it was clearly another transparent attack on the the poorest members of our society, in one of the most deprived areas of the United Kingdom, in the midst of what is being called 'The Great Depression' and perpetrated by people who could literally be neighbours.

I don't fear censure for refusing to give money to panhandlers for I have neither the powers of observation nor intuition, to make a distinction between the poor and the feckless.