On tonights Newsnight, there will be a feature-report about benefit claimants being forced to either work, or lose their benefits. You can read about it on the BBC website as well.


Anyone up for a debate? Lol. Ive always said people who don't want to work, are entitled not to have to, but should also not be entitled to state benefits. Many have argued against this, with quite valid reasoning, and I accept its a tricky situation, but I do believe the current methods of looking after people and trying to encourage them to work, have been tried, and failed, many many times over the past few decades.

It appears the US system even got the teenage mothers/career mothers who feel in the UK, they can pop a kid out every 7 years and have a right never to work...


And then we have the folk who think its a human right, for some scroungers to avoid working, whilst hard working, honest and decent people, have to pay to keep them...


Excuses, excuses.

I think its about time we start making life very very hard for long-term scroungers and the like. Fused with todays report that upto 64% of people in Aberdeen and Burnley, claiming Incapacity/Disability benefit, have been found fit for work (some do require extra support and assistance), the like of which are costing the taxpayer £13 billion per year alone, I think we should start being more rigourous with checks for those who actually need it.

In one of my jobs, I reguarly see allsorts of scroungers and hear of all manner of stories of how people avoid working, and how people "dress up" for the disability claims etc, to ensure they continue to get the benefits, and effectively defraud the system.

I think those with genuine disability of incapacity, should get what they are entitled to, in fact if we get rid of those who dont need it, they could get more!! It angers me when I see folk with real, serious disabilities, having to fundraise in the local community, relying on charity support and having to go through allsorts of rigmarole, months and even sometimes years of form filling and arguing their case, just to get adaptions and other things they should be automatically entitled to, whilst people who need nothing and are quite capable of work, lie their way through tribunals and medical reviews, to ensure they get everything. As is becoming more and more noticeable, those who know how to "work the system" do very well out of a life on benefits, those in genuine need usually struggle and go through hell just to get the basics that they are entitled to.

Its about time we for once, changed tact on benefits claimants, scroungers who simply don't want to work, and fraudsters who pretend to have problems, not only robbing the taxpayer of money, but buiding a growing public resentment of the current incapacity/disability system.

It isnt often you will hear me say this, as I generally have little time for "the big I am" cousins over the pond, but bravo to the US for having the balls to force the change.

BBC Newsnight Report

Watch Lawrence Mead's film for Newsnight in full on Tuesday 15 February 2011 at 10.30pm on BBC Two and then afterwards on the BBC iPlayer and Newsnight website.

This should be interesting

If it wasn't for the unemployed, the DSS would be out of a job. And let us not forget that billions of taxpayers' money is wasted on rubbish such as "defence".

Leave the honest scrounger alone and target those who deliberately defraud the system by claiming for non-existent kids and such like. And certainly don't give benefits to so-called "asylum seekers".

Work kills. Do less. Live more.

That is not the attitude to have.
Work less, live more?
So were do people get the money for nice things, clothes etc?
My hobby is fixing up old cars, if I didn't work I wouldn't be able to do that, even on my day off I'm working on my own cars, I don't get how people can enjoy 'lazing around' at home.
I'm all for this.

I also think there should be a cap on scroungers having any kids!

"Money wasted on defence?" I don't think so. I was around during the Cold War and you wouldn't believe how vulnerable we would have been with our defence shield. Even now we can't do without our forces but it looks like we are going to have to. You really must think your argument through.

If i have to go to work Graft, and give up a third of wages to tax, i don't see why anyone else should sit on their arse's spending my hard earned tax contribution,

Doleites get on my nerves and take take from society. Unless their medically unfit they should get of their lazy arses and get a job
I haven't issue with Asylum seekers as long as there not scrounging and contribute to the economy and contribute to reducing our tax deficits that the clown in goverment have ran up.

People then moan about foreigners taking our jobs, fair play to them if there prepared to come to the country and do all the jobs the dolietes consider themselves to good for or too lazy to do their loss

They can't have it both ways

Speaking from first hand experience me and my fiance struggled to get a mortgage because the banks were being more stringent on money leading after having their fingers burnt by balloon heads overlending with no capabilities to ever pay the debt back. Again did it the hard way, went to work, saved my b*llo**s off to get a 20k deposit.

If there weren't so many scroungers the average joes tax bill would be less and there'd be more money to put towards NHS and youth schemes rather than reducing bobbies on the beat and closing youth centres

The country gets on my T**s

Well done on that netzy, hope you're happy in your gaff. You won't half feel the rewards later in life.
Agree on the out and out scroungers. Sometimes people need a lift up, was out of work myself in the 70's for 10 months, hated it but there were no jobs anywhere doing anything. We must get out of the Government will pay for everything mode. It doesn't matter what crops up the answer is the Government should pay. I wonder if the ones who say it even twig that it is the taxes that pay not the Government and the more the Government lashes out for nothing then the more tax are taken of the workers. I read it a nice way they other day, "If you have a goose that is laying golden eggs then it doesn't make sense to keep beating it with a blunt instrument."

he's the man.

Now I'd best et back to work before my boss catches me on my phone

WTF is an honest scrounger?

Nice one lads, Ste, likewise mate haha, were all entitled to a break us hard workers

Bandycoot wise as always mate, Thanks for the kind words mate, i'm starting to reap the rewards now, and as you said its a good feeling !

I agree with where your coming from, i haven't issue with those who are activley seeking work but are in the position where no job opp's are there, that is a shi**y situation to be in, and have been there myself.

Like you said it those that abuse the assistance that take the mick and us honest chaps suffer when the balloons milk the gov for all they can

Chris, spot on mate, i'll second that

The problem is the people who are playing the system. There needs to be a better system in place to see who is fit for work etc.

I have someone on my facebook, which Im unsure why I still have them there, but they make my blood boil!

Perfectly fit to work, but has 2 childeren, no job, and lives off benefits - their facebook status is constantly going on abotu PS3s, new 50" TVs, holidays, days out, and complaining that they cant afford better!!!

I have no idea why they dont work, maybe the childcare would come out of wages etc, but isnt that a consideration to take when you have childeren?

Maybe when they start school, they may have "time" for work, but I doubt it - it will be too much like "hard work!"

Noone would know who it was anyway

I love when we get a post about benefits, wikiwirral 4833 Members and nobody says they're on the dole lol, it's always I'm hardworking so hardworking that they've got time to come on here lol get back to work lol joke

Some know my situation. I'd love to know how some of the people who screw the incapacity system do it. I've been told to apply for DLA but even for me, the form is a nightmare.

I'd love to work - I hate having no money, scrimping to pay bills and try to work my budget out to eat a decent diet so that I can stay as healthy as possible. I get housing benefit and council tax benefit but I still have to pay some out of my benefit. Unlike those on JSA, I wouldn't get my prescriptions free. I do but that's because of a particular medication I have to take. I don't get dental treatment for free either. I'll happily give anyone a breakdown of exactly how much I get and what is paid out, showing what exactly is left over every month.

If I could find an employer that won't mind me having at least 3 days off every 3 months (I have injections every 3 months and can't walk unless absolutely neccessary for 3 days), a morning/afternoon off every week for physio, a morning/afternoon off ever 2 or 3 months for hospital appointments, 2 weeks off every 6 months or so for surgery and recuperation and a day or 2 off at the drop of a hat if I do too much and can't walk then I'd gladly take a job!!

I guess I could take that as holiday time, but I'd end up owing "work" time.

What I don't agree with is paying druggies and alcoholics to sit at home to do drugs and drink. They get more than any!! It's not an illness, it's a choice!! I had no choice with my accident or being subsequently made redundant.

I will fight for DLA - if I get it, I get it. If not, there's not much I can do. That's the system. I don't know how to "play" it and I wouldn't anyway. I've worked bloody hard over the past *mumbles* years and paid my national insurance, the key word being INSURANCE. I see it as an insurance that should I need help, I can get it.

If you've never worked a day in your life then you should be made to work for your benefits.

I lost my rag recently with someone who said I have an "easy life". That opinion soon changed when they put my brace on and tried to walk with it on and I explained that to give them a slight idea of the pain, I'd put a row of drawing pins on the floor and they could kneel on them for 10 minutes! That's not even the half of it.

They can gladly have the nights when I wake up screaming because the knee has dislocated in my sleep or I've torn the cartilage in my sleep (which is what happened a few weeks ago), the nights I can't sleep at all because the painkillers don't work, the leg that looks like a childs dot to dot puzzle with the injection and surgery scars, the days when the knee dislocates up to 6 times just because it can, the side effects of the painkillers - drowsiness, constipation, headaches, nausea, sickness...the list is endless. They can gladly have not being able to walk more than a few yards without wanting to cry, the name calling from chavvy bitches that think it's funny to point and call you a "spastic", the dirty looks from people on the bus because you ask them politely to give up their "for disabled passenger" seat on the bus because you actually ARE disabled, the tuts because it takes you a bit longer to get off the bus....

Shall I carry on??

wench your post has really hit a nerve with me...it is very sad that in this country that real ppl like you who have a disability have to fight for their benefit entitlements....it really is shitty....

i have seen this but with disabled children, how a parent can claim for a child with adhd full dla, and yet children with severe learning and physical disabilities have to fight and argue to enable their children to get dla....

it seems to me, if you play the system you get the lot...
if you dont you get fook all....

levels of disability should be tiered....i see no sense in paying dla to a child with adhd at the same rate as a child with sever learning and physical disabilities....

it makes my blood boil

Its amazing how many people label every single person on the dole as a scrounger i have worked all my life since leaving school and never once been out of a job so the way i see it ive paid enough tax in my time to be able to use the job seekers service now i require it.

Id love to have a job i would do anything that was offerd to me just so i didnt have to claim job seekers allowance.

i hate it with a passion im lucky enough to have only ever had to sign on oncr and thats since december due to losing my job

and im going insane sitting at home but on the other hand there are no jobs out there. i have counted since december i have applied for over 200 jobs all of them i am fully qualified and have relevant skills to do the job but i can count the number of jobs ive heard back from on one hand its hard to fine employment these days and i dont know how anyone can live of the dole £100 for 2 weeks is disgusting

I read that shit too Jackie and at first I never would have notice that you are one bit disabled, I can only imagine that the nights out in the calli and wiki meets must have been painful and you put on a real brave fave, or drank excessively to nullify the agony

Brave face Andy and I pay for a night out with not being able to walk for a few days - hence I don't go out very often at all.

I think you don't see me as disabled because you know me and knew me before the accident - I'm just Jac to you (and I mean that in a nice way). I like it that way my love

One day my fair jac, for when my eye sight is failing me, my mojo has deserted me, and my wheel chair has two flat tyres, then I will make yee my true wench and you can bare the mark of sanchez!!!!!!!

Pah, why wait, just get a room

2 flat tyres coming up my love - you already have poor eyesight and your mojo is on the bedroom floor in a pile of tissues and grey tinged white sport socks

The time is near my dear Andrew, the time is near you will then bear MY mark

Cheers for egging on her highness!

Jackie u got me down to a t.. but with one slight error. The jizz riddled socks on my floor are white, but with a grey band around the bottom to indicate where the toes sit. But what the hell, wheres ma wheel slashin knife and ma god dam wheel chair!!

When it comes to you, I don't need egging on I have loved thee from afar for many a year.....no-one knows my heartache and the unrequited love I have for the man known as Sanchez...

I have a choice of knives just waiting for your wheels

They can take my benefit...but they'll never take my sense of humour

ha ha, you should have posted that in my 'sayings and quotes' topic

The system isn't very good, I've worked for 27 years but am currently unemployed and off sick. I have put proposals to the job centre about getting me back in work because I am not capable of a normal 9 to 5 job at the moment. But the system doesn't let me do it and I would risk going bankrupt very fast.

All I'm asking for is a bit of short term flexibility and a bit of backup financial support should I need it, either way it would save them money and get me into work again.

My trade has died in this area, there are a lot of bits and pieces I could do on a casual basis at least on a temporary basis.

Rightly or wrongly (hard hat please) I don't want to move from this area.

Sorry to hear about that dd, it's bloody frustrating. I'm retired now but I know where you're coming from. The older you get the harder it is to get a placing as well, I ended up in a cooked meat packing plant and then a pork pie factory, gopping work but it paid the mortgage. You just then have to hope that something better comes along while you're there, it did with me after 12 months luckily. Hang on in there mate and good luck.

schemes like this are great , if they go after the lazy , workshy ,professional unemployed. But , and its only my opinion , it'll be the easy targets , the newly unemployed , the honest and genuine people , the ones that dont know the system , the ones that have possibly been taxpayers for many years , that will be picked on , cos thats the way it is in this country.....btw, i do have a job , same one for 13 years this year , been in work for 23 years , and im 40 ....so im not a lazy scrounger.

I find a lot depends on the advisor you get as well, some are realistic, some just go through the motions and some enjoy watching people squirm.

I think I've mentioned it before but I was told to FO and look after myself like I had been doing for the previous 15 years. The same git is probably sitting back on a big fat CS pension now but I'm hoping that he has gone to heaven with all the other lazy gits.

I watched this programme and yet again it would seem another great idea on how to get scroungers back to work, one of many that have surfaced over the years from whatever government holds the power, none have worked or are likely to without the main ingredient, jobs available. Yesterday, figures were released as to how many were claiming job seekers allowance, two and a half million or there abouts, they can't all be scroungers, so why aren't the people who want jobs getting them. Just before watching an interview with Ian Duncan Smith, he now reports there are 5 million people out of work, unemployed and sick, so now we have, if you believe what he's getting at, there are 5 million job vacancies in this country and there's no need for anyone to be unemployed or suffer ill health, he went on to say, they meaning the government want to help long term unemployed get back into work, nothing wrong with that, in fact he has my backing, but why can't he help the person who has just lost his job get a job, because there is a lack of job opportunities. If they are successful in getting only the long term unemployed into work, won't that create another generation of unemployed into long term unemployment. Before the unemployment problem can be tackled, there has to be jobs available, thats not rocket science, and yet government after government don't seem to see that formula. Repeatedly i hear an argument put forward that millions of foreigners can come into this country and find work, why is this allowed to happen when we have such a high unemployment rate, only when we have millions of jobs available and when the people of this country are fully employed should workers from outside be considered, its only when there is an abundance of jobs we can turn around and say to the scroungers, there's a job, take it or starve, i don't see how any other way it can be done, not unless as a society we are willing to see people living back in the conditions of the 19th century.

You touch on one aspect of the problem there Bert, how many illegal immigrants are employed illegally, usually for less than the minimum wage. Genuine jobs that are wiped from legal workers.

Estimates vary but even the most conservative ones show this as a substantial problem. How much does the government invest in getting these jobs legalised - virtually nothing. How much does the government invest in harassing genuine unemployed people - loads.

I cant work as im disabled, (arthritus in spine..in knees..in hands..angina..anurism on my heart) but apparently the new test (from what ive been told) is if you can pick a pound coin up your fit for work????? how can that be..someone with no hands can pick a coin up??? this bloody thatcher goverment is a joke...lie through there teeth to get in power then hit you with everything...crying theres too many people on benafits then start kicking people out of jobs....ERM you cant have it both ways cameron...

Most governments will spend huge amounts of money on the harassment of the unemployed because it deflects from them their inability to do the job they are suppose to, that is find and keep the population of this country in work. While successive spokespersons rattle on about, how there going to get people off their backsides and in to work, it gives the impression that there are plenty of jobs out there. Its an old ploy, pick on a scapegoat, hammer them and people will start thinking there are millions of jobs to be had. Hitler done it with the Jews, our unemployed and sick are Hitlers Jews.
I agree with what DD says about illegal immigrants, but should there even be legal immigrants working here when so many are unemployed, especially if we have the skills to cover such work.

The country needs workers to keep it going - good luck to the immegrants - at least they are willing to go out to work instead of lazying around complaining that there are no jobs! Puts our citizens into a dependency culture - depending if they can be bothered to get their arse out of the bed in the morning to go and find work. I have been made redundant at least 4 times and went out to find work - there ARE jobs and you can always apply for them until something better comes along. Our country has become so lazy that it takes foreigners or EU citizens to prop up the economy. Where has peoples' self respect gone these days? What message is this sending out to the younger generation? Not all jobs are advertised so the true figure of vacancies is yet to be determined.

copy n paste every reply to this lol uk's youngest grandad from news forum xxx

The majority are school leavers...(national service comes to mind)Then theres the goverments mess up ie TUITION fee's that will put more on benefits..then theres job cuts ie more on benefits... and he (cameron) say's there's too many people claiming benefits ??? ERM hellooooo thanks to you cameron there will be more on benefits....Get a grip and while your at it stop the bloody immigration crisis....before you know it there will be more foreign people than british people....i know ill get stick for this but everyone is entitled to there opinion.

The latest thing in the jobcentre is advertising the same job multiple times to make it sound like there are loads of jobs available to choose from. For example, there is a job ironing for 3 hrs a week advertised 9 times. Add this to other non jobs ie .. agency jobs advertising jobs that dont really exist just so they have your details and the real jobs advertised are practically zero.
Then there is the scam of putting you in a new deal ..
i read they pay the company thousands of pounds if they get you off the dole.(was it £24000 )
Jobcentres are a joke.. im not laughing.

New deal had cost up to £31,000 per person. I don't quite know how because it subsidising your wages by £60 a week for 6 months plus a £750 training allowance.

Flexible New Deal was also brought in which capped the income above JSA

Its all getting scrapped and replaced by "Single Work Programme" this summer. Full details of this aren't fully known other than it looks like it has additional flexibility to be self-employed or work with a sole-trader.

It annoys me that they have loads of schemes that keep on changing names and conditions that go round in circles. Typical modern management crap - any changes to make it look like your doing something good - Bovine Excrement!

I know I'll get flamed for this, but if they want to save more money, they should scrap child benefit too. Procreation should not be rewarded - it's a privilage, not a right. If you want children then you should pay for them!

There's far too many who see children as a cash card and as a way of not working.

The only reason im unemployed is my CPCS card (construction driver)expired after 3 years and they want me to pay around £1000 again to renew it which i cant afford to pay. However, the jokecentre will put me on a hopeless scheme costing many thousands
trying to get me a minimum wage job im not suited to. Where is the sense in that eh?

Does seem to be a crazy situation
Good Luck

well said ste

i don't understand this------work for your dole---but were are the jobs? if they can create jobs for working for your dole,why can't they create jobs with a decent wage so you can come off the dole? what this country wants is slave labour! work for a pittence!!think i heard once that these employers who take on people who work for there dole get a payment for doing so.
i say if they can create jobs for dole money then they can create proper jobs!

Its creating jobs to help the community and gets people back into the swing of doing a days hard graft. How many people on the dole actually spend the whole day averyday searching for work?

There's three different types of dolites in my view;

1. Genuinely can't find a job;
2. Don't want a job;
3. Can't work through no fault of their own i.e. disability/illness.

Those that fall into category 1, I'm sure, could try harder.

Those in category 2 should be sent to war/castrated/put in a bad with bricks and chucked in the Mersey.

Those in category 3 who are less able and therefore have been dealt perhaps a poor hand in life should be helped by those of us who have been fairly lucky in that we're able to work.

through the recession we have gained a lot of your number 1
the people in category number 2 are the only people who have not been effected by the financial meltdown
and people in number 3 like you say its so hard for them and do need more help as they are genuine.

my son for one! he sends application after application,phones,emails, and half of them don't even reply!some say he needs a driving licence,how is he supposed to get one if he has'nt got a job to pay for the lessons? or they say need experiance,how do they get it if they can't get the job? what ever happened to learning on the job? the only way to get experiance is to get the job?

there is courses available and people to support job applications has he looked into this, i no how hard it is not to have a job, being in university at the moment im pretty limited to what am allowed to do as employers want a permanent role to be filled which i can not offer at the moment

I agree with you, its a catch 22 situation. What sort of job is he looking for? How old is he? And what job experience has he got? Sounds to me he is trying very hard indeed. Tell him to E-mail a cv to [email protected]

There are plenty of people out there with both experience and a driving license and in this climate employers have their pick of the bunch. I agree it sounds like a vicious circle.

Tell him to join the army and learn a trade, that's where it's at.

My son had a job in admin till the goverment came up with all these cuts, and made more people unemployed.

I agree with you, its a catch 22 situation. What sort of job is he looking for? How old is he? And what job experience has he got? Sounds to me he is trying very hard indeed. Tell him to E-mail a cv to [email protected] [/quote]

he's 34,has been on courses that the dole have sent him on,which were gardening,painting and decorating etc,etc,can't remember how many he's been on! but never a job at the end of them,and he was always told there would be a job at the end,he does'nt want factory work,which i don't blame him,he wants outdoors.

I applied for a driving job last week by email. The next day i got an email reply saying that they are receiving over 300 applications a day for the one job.

At least the guy was thoughtful enough to email me.

The week previously i applied for a temporary driving job for xmas. I was suprised to see many other applicants at the interview dressed in suits / ties looking more like they were attending a wedding rather than a low paid temporary job interview.

Times Are Hard indeed !

What surprises you about that!?

I'd never attend an interview without being fully suited and booted inc. tie, anyone who does is an idiot.

There's no such thing as being over dressed when it comes to an interview. Self respect.

ive been at an interview were someone turned up in a sports shirt haha

One less competitor for the job then.

Also shows respect fot the potential employer, I would not offer a job to anyone who turned up looking casual!

Thing is most employers don't like taking on ex army people now sad but true

thats not quite right 8bitguy plenty of job for ex forces folk the likes of Eddie Stobart prefer ex forces.
the Army is gearing up to be 60/40 TA/regular (cut backs!)
but they are training leavers to civilian quals these days as military quals dont cut it in civvy street.

This goverment is a joke, cameron says theres too many on benefits yet he is putting more people on benefits ie councile have to finnish people up, police losing jobs, fire services losing jobs, the armed forces losing jobs.....he cant have it both ways.....Even people like myself who are disabled have now got to have medicals that make no sense, i am disables and i have the proof, ive had lots of scans etc which prove im disabled yet i still have to do these stupid medicals which leave me in agony and you still fail....this country is going to hit rock bottom with this bas*ard in power....god help us.

Every time you say the Government should pay for, it is not the Government that pays it is the ordinary tax payer. The Government as individuals pay nowt, it is you and I who pay. So, every time you bark that the Government should pay for think about it because you are only digging a hole in your own pocket. Benefits are meant for the needy not for the greedy. If you still smoke, drink, go on holiday and can't get off your fat arse and get a job then you don't need benefit. It's self defining.

Are your comments directed at Brady or just towards the unemployed in general?
Telling a disabled guy to get off his fat arse and get a job is bollocks !

I can tell you without fear of contradiction that Bandy is generalising and most definitly not directing his comments at anyone disabled.

he would not of told somebody disabled to get off their ass it will be to the benefit spongers who can not be arsed working. we have disabled friends on here so we would not say anything to offend them