[Archived] The General Election 2015

[Gav]

If by the "less privileged" you mean the workshy then you are probably right. Personally I want to see people rewarded for working and not for being part of the benefits brigade. The Conservatives are the ones to do that for me and UKIP will get me out of the federal Europe.

By less privileged I mean working people currently using food banks Al.

[thenodrog]

Do you believe the austerity cuts would have been worse felt in the North had labour been in power? and especially in the North West and North East?

I read recently that the cuts meant around £500 per person around here, Merseyside was more like £800 compared to SE and London which was £300, how can that possibly be right?

Call me naive but I really believe Labour wouldn’t have done that if they’d been in power.

All right gav.......... You are naive.

You don't half set yourself up you know. Just how poor is your memory?

http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2010/mar/25/alistair-darling-cut-deeper-margaret-thatcher

[thenodrog]

£140bn represents an increase of just 0.5 per cent a year - miniscule in overall terms. The SNP also made clear how the money would be raised, matching Labour's policies on the 50p tax rate, mansion tax and bankers bonuses.

As someone who despises the Conservative party and everything it stands for I'd welcome a Milband - Sturgoen govt with open arms - this country needs radical change and they would deliver it. The 30-year free market Chicago Business School inspired neo-con policies have enriched the few at the expense of the many. It's time the left wing made a comeback.

Yesterdays man. You are a hang over from the Commie 70's brigade. The split up of the United Kingdom? The loss of our strongest defence against our enemies? 50m English cow towing and tugging our forelocks to 5m Scots! Ever more stupidly bankrupt political thinking on the economy...... And you would welcome all that????

[thenodrog]

By less privileged I mean working people currently using food banks Al.

Food banks again. They are only increasing cos word has got around that there is something free being given away for nowt. They are just a political football, very very few will really need them cos basic natural food is cheap as chips.

[jim mk2]

Yesterdays man. You are a hang over from the Commie 70's brigade. The split up of the United Kingdom? The loss of our strongest defence against our enemies? 50m English cow towing and tugging our forelocks to 5m Scots! Ever more stupidly bankrupt political thinking on the economy...... And you would welcome all that????

Thatcherite dinosaur speaks on hoof.

[yoda]

Thatcherite dinosaur speaks on hoof.

Going to ask this again because some people like to brush it under the carpet,

Have Labour ever left government with the economy in a better shape than when they entered gorverment ?

[Gav]

Food banks again. They are only increasing cos word has got around that there is something free being given away for nowt. They are just a political football, very very few will really need them cos basic natural food is cheap as chips.

Google the trussell trust, you might learn something.

[Al]

By less privileged I mean working people currently using food banks Al.

If working people are having to use food banks either they are not being paid enough (part time maybe) or they are trying to support too many people on one wage. These are the people who need help from the community not the ones who consider benefits to be a way of life but The current generous allowance for children should really cover them.

[Gav]

All right gav.......... You are naive.

You don't half set yourself up you know. Just how poor is your memory?

http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2010/mar/25/alistair-darling-cut-deeper-margaret-thatcher

I asked you a question Gordon, be good to hear what you think.

[DannyKeg]

"Balancing the books, on the backs of the poor"

"It’s a moment many of us who oppose this government have had: something that powerfully crystallises just what is at stake. For me, it was on 17 July 2014. Sue Jones tweeted me: her disabled daughter had died; thus she had a spare room; thus she had to pay the bedroom tax. “It’s been an epic nightmare,” she wrote. “Shameful and cruel.”

It had been “like dealing with robots”, she later told me. “No room for discussion. Their answer was, pay or move.” I felt fury – cold, seething fury – but I also had a moment of panic. A cruel, remorseless society was being built where predominantly poor people with a disability or a close family member who was disabled were being forced to cough up money they didn’t have or downsize to smaller properties that didn’t exist; where instead of building desperately needed council housing, we balanced the nation’s books on the backs of grieving, impoverished parents.

What if it wasn’t a passing nightmare, in which poor mothers lost their beloved children and had to contribute to the exchequer while the richest avoided tax on an industrial scale? What if this was a new normal, and we were on a permanent journey towards ever greater callousness and selfishness?"

An interesting perspective on life in the UK today.

[Gav]

If working people are having to use food banks either they are not being paid enough (part time maybe) or they are trying to support too many people on one wage. These are the people who need help from the community not the ones who consider benefits to be a way of life but The current generous allowance for children should really cover them.

Food banks

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-32406120

[Al]

I know very little about this "food Banks" thing. How does one qualify to use it? Is it just the real needy who benefit or is it the "something for nothing" brigade benefitting again.

[Baz]

I know very little about this "food Banks" thing. How does one qualify to use it? Is it just the real needy who benefit or is it the "something for nothing" brigade benefitting again.

Guess you didn't read the link by Gav?

[Biddy]

and then read this http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2608606/No-ID-no-checks-vouchers-sob-stories-The-truth-shock-food-bank-claims.html granted it is only the daily mail and hopefully things have changed in a year.

[Baz]

and then read this http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2608606/No-ID-no-checks-vouchers-sob-stories-The-truth-shock-food-bank-claims.html granted it is only the daily mail and hopefully things have changed in a year.

So the food bank offers support and training to agencies in order that abuse of the service doesn't happen, then journalists lie and get free food. What does the Mail expect, that the food banks hold their own records of peoples benefits etc?

The last sentence of the report is the response from the trust.

"the Trussell Trust said it would investigate allegations of abuse, adding: ‘There is no evidence to suggest that awareness of the food banks is driving an increase in visitors, rather that food bank use is meeting a real and growing need.’"

[thenodrog]

Google the trussell trust, you might learn something.

No need.

[Biddy]

So the food bank offers support and training to agencies in order that abuse of the service doesn't happen, then journalists lie and get free food. What does the Mail expect, that the food banks hold their own records of peoples benefits etc?

Actually I think that is what is meant to happen. I think they are meant to track that someone has only claimed 3 times etc. What the Mail set out to do was to try and see if you could abuse the system, which it appears they did. It showed at the time of the report that they could get food for nothing which is what a lot of people are questioning about the food banks. Are there really that many people who need them to survive, or is there a large proportion that use them because it's free food?

I am 100% certain that there are a lot of people who do genuinely need the use of food banks which is disgusting in a country like ours. I am also 100% certain that there are people paying a lot more money on beer, fags and a full Sky subscription who are also claiming which would skew the figures.

[thenodrog]

Food banks

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-32406120

How come half a dozen years back the country wasn't knee deep in the rotting corpses of the starving?

We've simply created a need where there wasn't one. Works right through nature, chuck food left overs at the bottom of the garden everyday and pretty soon you'll be overrun with vermin. No such thing as a free lunch so if anybody wants free food they must be required to do some sort of community service in return. Otherwise you can feed em if you want Gav.

[Gav]

More wise words from the leader of the 'I’m alright Jack brigade'

Cameron had bugger all to say on the matter, he was made to look a fool, your not far behind him

[Gav]

Actually I think that is what is meant to happen. I think they are meant to track that someone has only claimed 3 times etc. What the Mail set out to do was to try and see if you could abuse the system, which it appears they did. It showed at the time of the report that they could get food for nothing which is what a lot of people are questioning about the food banks. Are there really that many people who need them to survive, or is there a large proportion that use them because it's free food?

I am 100% certain that there are a lot of people who do genuinely need the use of food banks which is disgusting in a country like ours. I am also 100% certain that there are people paying a lot more money on beer, fags and a full Sky subscription who are also claiming which would skew the figures.

Goodness me Biddy, spoken like a true Tory, hope Dennis doesn't get wind of it!

[Biddy]

Goodness me Biddy, spoken like a true Tory, hope Dennis doesn't get wind of it!

Not at all spoken like a Tory, spoken like someone who questions what the mass hysteria is saying and wonders if there is more to it. It's called common sense. Can you say I'm wrong and that 100% of the people using food banks actually need them?

[Gav]

Not at all spoken like a Tory, spoken like someone who questions what the mass hysteria is saying and wonders if there is more to it. It's called common sense. Can you say I'm wrong and that 100% of the people using food banks actually need them?

It's like anything designed to help the less fortunate in society, people will abuse the system.

But when you break it all down its usually a very small number that abuse the system, and thankfully food banks are mostly being used for feeding hungry people.

I feel strongly about it because I worked with vulnerable people until January this year, I saw hungry people on a regular basis for a variety of reasons and its simply not acceptable in this day and age that we have people close to starting on the streets whilst Miliband has an extra kitchen built for his nanny and Cameron and Osbourne have little or nothing to say on the subject, almost denying its happening.

[jim mk2]

Right wing hysteria about food banks is the same right wing hysteria that has fuelled tabloid (and even broadsheet) excesses against immigration and benefits. Keeping matters in perspective and retaining a sense of proportion ought not to blind us to the reality that food banks are a blight on modern Britain, that the vast majority of immigrants to this country are here to work, not to exploit “the system, and that benefits help the most needy and are not a "way of life" as some of the more frothing-at-the-mouth right wing commentators would have you believe.

[yoda]

Right wing hysteria about food banks is the same right wing hysteria that has fuelled tabloid (and even broadsheet) excesses against immigration and benefits. Keeping matters in perspective and retaining a sense of proportion ought not to blind us to the reality that food banks are a blight on modern Britain, that the vast majority of immigrants to this country are here to work, not to exploit “the system, and that benefits help the most needy and are not a "way of life" as some of the more frothing-at-the-mouth right wing commentators would have you believe.

Another way to view this is on the premise that work expands to fill the time allotted,

What is your opinion on the SNP candidate that thinks the English are quizzlings ?

I only ask because the SNP can't wait to get into bed with Labour

[Biddy]

I actually agree with your sentiments there Jim. However, as GAV mentions, food banks existed under Labour therefore society has been on an increasing decline even before this particular government.

How much has the "Right wing hysteria" from the tabloids fuelled the expansion of bank banks by people realising they are "missing out"?

Unfortunately there are no concrete facts on who is actually using the food banks. There has been the magical "1 million people" banded about and even the Trussel Trust has clarified that they gave out 1 million food parcels in the last year, of which there would have been multiple returnees. So based on 3 allowed parcels per claimant, the figure could actually be as few as 333,333 individuals. Still far far too high, but no where near where the left wing hysteria tries to tell us.

As with all things, the figures can be manipulated to suit the agenda.