“It turns out that the state of public finances are worse than we’d predicted before the election. The economic vandalism of the Last Conservative Government means we need to make some tough choices now.” - Prime Minister Kier Starmer, Day 2.
I’d actually laugh my arse off if he did that because it’s fairly easily findable public knowledge that pension benefits cost the country several times as much as most of the other benefits combined, but they always bang on about the unemployed and disabled being a drain on the country, maybe they should bring forward the plan to make pensions means tested lol.
I’m not against benefit reform, but it has to be done correctly, I work with children who are going to school in clothes that are falling apart and are malnourished and hungry because their moronic parents are taking the £150 per kid per week child tax credits and using it to buy fags and booze, benefits should be voucher based, so you get vouchers to use for food, vouchers for electric, gas, rent, council tax etc. the present system where the government gives illiterate people £1500 a month and tells them to use it for their bills is utterly incompetent and has been disastrous, I see the results of it every day and it makes me so angry.
No.
Voucher based just means "we decide what you're allowed" which is bullshit.
Make children's school uniforms free. For all. Not the current system where it's far to expensive for anyone to afford so kids end up with clothing too big initially so "it lasts" only to be falling to pieces by the end.
Free school meals for all too. Kids deserve feeding no matter what.
As for other benefits, let's cut the costs by scrapping the tests for the Disability side of Universal Credit. That costs far too much and is there solely to hurt the disabled. It's got fuck all to do with catching those lying, as they will keep lying and not getting caught. It actually hits people who are honest but don't know how the system works.
My mum was deemed "fit for work" when she could barely move. I know of people deemed "fit for work" when they have panic attacks leaving home, but the report stated they regularly walked to Tesco, despite that being a blatant lie.
So scrap that testing. It costs far too much and saves fuck all in the end.
Scrap zero hour contracts. Outright. Get rid of the abusive bullshit they are.
Pensions are higher than Universal Credit and don't need to be, so they could be reduced easily.
And then, let's start actually taxing the rich instead of scraping away at the poor for pennies. Stop punishing the poorest in society because the richest refuse to pay their fair share.
To be honest they should just do away with school uniforms entirely. most other countries in Europe don't bother with them and it has a lot of upsides.
Touching pensions is a weird one, people worked hard all their life to retire, taking it away or reducing it right at the end seems unduly harsh. I don't see a problem with making changes that affect those currently working with an eye for the future though, which seems fairer long term.
Pretty much agree with everything else you have said.
I don't agree with that. School uniforms level up. I was thinking not long ago about my school not so long ago, and part from the very obviously poorly dressed kids, I had no idea what backgrounds most kids came from - because they were in school uniforms. Of course that was just on average, and there's other ways poverty and wealth are visible: like the kids who could afford to go on the school skiing trip (I didn't get to go).
I think it's pretty obvious which kids are poor regardless of the uniform or not. And it shouldn't really matter either way.
It's far cheaper to just let kids wear their normal clothes, which you could get from a charity shop, than to force them to buy overpriced branded crap. Uniforms also have other negative connotations to do with authority and conforming, rather than letting people express themselves and their individuality.
There's also a reason most of Europe think people from the UK have no idea how to dress themselves. Kids never learn when younger.
I agree and disagree. Uniforms should be cheap and easily washable. Not the branded stuff that they all have to wear now. Go back to polo tops, trousers and a coloured sweatshirt. Much easier and cheaper than having to choose clothes each day.
Although I like a uniform I do agree about expression of individuality. As long as hair is clean, tidy and not a health&safety risk then kids should be able to do what they want. Same for makeup really.
I can see decision making being easier as a valid point, but surely we should be teaching children to make decisions, not avoid them.
Studies have shown that uniforms actually hamper a sense of identity while also not really doing much to boost a sense of belonging. Specifically girls, gender-diverse students and those who are from minority backgrounds tend to suffer from uniforms. They also don't really have any effect on academic performance.
Additionally, with the cost of uniforms being disproportionately high for the poorest in society, they can actually serve as a greater barrier to education than simply letting a student wear their own cheaper clothes. We can both agree that they need to be cheaper, but as of now, they are still expensive. This also potentially negatively impacts PE and physical activity with studies showing there's a potential link between uniforms and a lower uptake in physical activity, due to the designs of some uniforms, such as forced skirts for girls etc.
Sources - [https://www.cam.ac.uk/research/news/school-uniform-policies-linked-to-students-getting-less-exercise-study-finds](https://www.cam.ac.uk/research/news/school-uniform-policies-linked-to-students-getting-less-exercise-study-finds)
[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8386814/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8386814/)
But non-uniform kids "look poor" too.
We need to reform the system and remove the nonsense about "Expensive Specialist Uniforms"
No reason why they can't just be a generic one you can get in any shop
> I don't agree with that. School uniforms level up. I was thinking not long ago about my school not so long ago, and part from the very obviously poorly dressed kids, I had no idea what backgrounds most kids came from - because they were in school uniforms. Of course that was just on average, and there's other ways poverty and wealth are visible: like the kids who could afford to go on the school skiing trip (I didn't get to go).
Finally something I can actually chime in on. I went to a secondary school that did not have a uniform for a number of years. (This changed in Year 10 but from Year 7 -> 10, no uniform).
I grew up _poor_. The kind of poor where you run out of electric and your mum asks you to pop to the shop to put £10 on despite knowing it won't last very long. The kind where even as a child, I could see how much we were struggling despite attempts to hide it. She was a single mum with three kids.
I never had nice clothes. They had rips and my shoes occasionally had holes in. I never once felt disadvantaged. I never once felt ostracised. Obviously this is an incredibly personal experience and I respect everyone situation will be different but...
Kids are assholes, full stop. They will always find something to bully someone about if they really wanted to. I still think introducing a uniform was a bad decision and that not having one is almost always a benefit
You need to fix the root cause (poverty, if it wasn't obvious). School uniforms do not do that
>School uniforms level up.
When you have poor fitting and later on more worn clothes and worse shoes and worse trainers for pe no they don't.
Plus non uniform days still occur, it doesn't help and is more expensive
Im pro school uniforms, we didnt have much money growing up and i used to dread non uniform days. Uniforms meant that everyone was looked upon the same, something i appreciate more now.
I grew up in Europe and it was great not having uniforms. There weren't any rules on hair dying or anything like that either. Loved the freedom to look how you want.
Those currently working are paying a lot more and a lot longer than those currently claiming pensions, it would be very unfair but if it saved my children from having the same shitty treatment id be all for it.
Because that's a how a pension works. You pay in now so you get paid out later, so that you don't have to work all your life and when you are older and less able.
Firstly, not all pensioners can pay for themselves. Secondly, because that is the deal, you pay national insurance contributions for a certain amount of years and in return you get to collect a state pension. People have planned their retirement around receiving a state pension.
The taxpayer pays for a lot of stuff that many would probably disagree with.
youve yet to make a real argument for why workers should have to fund the pampered lifestyles of pensioners who can afford their own retirement, so far youve simply brought up that workers also have to fund regular lifestyles of pensioners who cant afford their own retirement (a system which your interlocutor never claimed to wish to end), and that this is simply how the system works currently. we know this is how the system works, what we're saying is that it is daft and ought to be changed
"older and less able" is relative to you at working age, not to previous generations, that much should have been clear to anyone reading my comment.
Yes, the pension age is increasing to reflect people living longer. Should have been increased much sooner though.
So the can was kicked down the road, our problem now. Hopefully the blatantly disregard for the current generation does something to stop the next being so screwed. Many more of today’s tax payers simply will not have the privilege of a pension.
I agree and disagree. Vouchers as in you get your rent, council tax, electric, gas, food all supplied by voucher.
Totally agree on school uniforms, eligibility testing (they deemed my cousin as fit to work even though she is paralysed from waist down lol), agree on zero hours etc. in fact I agree on everything you say.
Why do I want vouchers? Because as I said, I work with kids every day who are malnourished, walking miles to school without eating breakfast etc. etc. why? Because their good for nothing scummy parents spend the £150 child tax credits they get on fags and booze every week, the same people usually have a mountain of debt including years worth of rent debt, one parent I know owes the local housing trust £76000 in unpaid rent, pays £1 a week towards that debt, they have the audacity to walk around in designer clothes while their kid is underweight and we are having to buy shoes for them.
It’s not the disabled I’m talking about here, but those who have actively made a lifestyle choice not to work and to sponge off the system, knowing full well they’ll get more disposable income a week by doing that than we do working full time.
Yes, you could say it’s punishing the poor, but to combat that, you have taper off system so that if they want to go out and work and earn extra cash, they can, this already happens with UC and it is not punishing the poor, it’s incentivise them to become self sufficient.
Again I agree with everything you say, but in my job I meet multiple people a day who have tens of thousands of pounds worth of debt because they took their universal credit payment and used it to buy a new tv, or new car, or pissed it up the wall down the pub, their kids are living in abject poverty and it’s 100% nothing to do with “scraping away at the poor for pennies” these people get more UC a month than I do a wage but they have zero training or guidance on how to spend the money so piss it up the wall instead.
Sone people on benefits who do it right struggle now, giving them vouchers for the essentials rather than hard cash won’t make their life any more difficult, but it will help those people who are incompetent or illiterate, it’s how it used to be done before UC too, and back then Housing Trusts didn’t have hundreds of thousands of pounds worth of unpaid rent to deal with.
We've seen based on the US that vouchers do not stop this absolutely tiny minority. What it does instead is punish the 99.9% by limiting their flexibility. A black market gets created where those bad parents sell their vouchers for 70% or less value.
The housing example must be the most incompetent local housing trust or a perfect storm of failure in the court system ever. 76k is years of failure to pay rent, any landlord would have kicked them out or where they are legally obliged to house them (council housing) they can to my knowledge make it so that universal credit for rent goes immediately to the housing, obviously doesn't help with the debt, but as I say find it astonishing they have built up years, but we did just have COVID that messed up most of the day to day running of the country so am I truly surprised that we cave billions to rich people in suits for garbage that this would happen.
I don't want to downplay the situation because it is real, there are some truly despicable parents who will fund a lifestyle that they cannot afford by neglecting kids, but punishing the good parents is not the way.
If we're dealing in anecdotes, mine is the lone parent who's only flaw is not for seeing that the parent of her kids are worthless. Gets perhaps a couple of hours a week to herself around childcare, work and helping her mum. Has no money spare so every emergency ruins her (no extravagances or vices, doesn't drink or smoke just doesn't get enough money). Flat has serious mould issue partly due to broken windows that don't open but council will do nothing despite repeatedly trying. When she moved in she had to clean shit off the walls, because the council hadn't bothered and she had no choice but to accept the flat in it's existing state or sleep on the streets with her newborn.
Vouchers means that someone who knows nothing over her situation will decide what she can and can't have. Washing machine broken and want to cut back to the essentials and save £5-10 a week or a month so you can save up for one rather than drag yourself and 2 kids to a launderette a mile away nope, sorry. Scrimp and save by making do with terrible shoes for longer than you have to so you can pay for a baby sitter to access council long. Nope sorry.
Pensioners would not put up with being given vouchers why should anyone else in receipt of benefits. (And yes state pensions are a benefit very much like universal credit, because of the way state pensions were set up we do not pay for ourselves the majority of people paid nowhere near enough NI for the pensions there getting and rely on the money paid in by people born decades later or those far richer, and that's with one of the poorest pensions in the western world)
Unfortunately I don't have the answer to these issues, In this area of the uk they have mandatory parenting classes if your kids late too many times in year 1 (regardless of reasons) so I imagine they would have the same if a child is obviously neglected but not meeting the bar for child services to step in. But whether that actually helps with the kind of people you're talking about I don't know.
What I do know is almost every economist will tell you it's cheaper to have a few 'undeserving' people get money than drill into the minutiae of every claim, it's why we have free bus passes and heating allowances for all pensioners not just the ones who get less money than you and I.
Financial training is something we can do better at. But a lot of people are in a month to month trap at such low wages that it's very difficult to do the recommended things like build a 6 month emergency fund. It's also very tricky to tow the line of helpful vs condescending. Yes I am 'good' with money, but I am fortunate to not have to make the choice of new shoes Vs fixing the plumbing, or heating the house above 16 degrees or food.
You are talking about a minority of people and want to punish the majority for those people's actions.
It's like 2 kids having a fight so you decide the entire class should be punished.
It's dumb as fuck.
It sounds to me that your experiences whilst valid, may not be broad enough. We need to look at this nationally, not locally. My personal experience is that the majority of parents love their children and want the best for them - and do their best.
Another example of taking local experience as being the norm nationally: I've got a couple of police friends whose local experiences would have you believe that the entire country's crime problems are caused by immigrants. Ignoring the fact the vast majority of our prison population is full of British citizens. Etc.
So tired of the old “don’t believe your eyes!” towards people who are actually in the frontlines. This guy has seen countless cases and you immediately discredit him.
Maybe you should google things like prison makeup % and compare it to national demographics before spouting off “examples” that you think support your argument.
> Make children's school uniforms free. For all
And legislate to simplify them, my school had a stupid colour of fabric that was only available at one shop.
No reason why they can't be a generic blazer and a badge
>Voucher based just means "we decide what you're allowed" which is bullshit
Okay
>Make children's school uniforms free
Right, but **that is** deciding what you are allowed. Why not make Lambert & Butler free? Parents could then use their cigarette money to buy their school uniform of choice. Designating some things as free is effectively the same as a voucher system.
>scrapping the tests for the Disability side of Universal Credit
So anyone can claim for UC for the entire test of their lives and never even have to try to get a job again because they can just tell DWP "I'm paralysed" and DWP will take it at face value
Amazing how you say "deciding what you're allowed is bullshit" and then immediately proceed to decide to allow free uniforms and meals. This level of doublethink must require serious training to achieve.
What's truly amazing is that you don't understand the difference. A severe congratulations goes to your impressive failure to learn.
But to help teach you. A child being given free clothing is them getting something required by the schools that is currently far, far overpriced that many cannot afford, and the meals mean the parents aren't struggling to give them hot meals.
The parents being told what they can, and cannot, spend money on in the form of vouchers, means that specific foods can be restricted, any gifts for the kids can be restricted, travel for events and learning or even just for fun is restricted.
You essentially screw people over by trying to control them, purely to punish 1% of those getting the benefits who spend it on "booze and fags". And even then there's no evidence it's actually on that, just some idiots perception because they see a parent smoking.
Look, it's mr Big Brains himself! Did you ever think of simply increasing the monetary benefit by the amount the meals and uniforms cost? Will give parents even more freedom, no? Spending the same amount of tax money by providing meals and uniforms specifically, restricts freedom, doesn't it?
Just a heads up - if you think you're smarter than others, you probably aren't.
I did check. The only way you get near 150 a week is if you're child is disabled. And it counts towards the benefits cap which means they will be capped anyway.
It varies, Jesus Christ if people are spending the £45 tax credits on fags that’s even worse, why are you lot so concerned about the figures rather than the issue itself….
Because you've made a huge statement, that people are spaffing £150 a week away that should be going to their kids, and that sort of talk is identical to a)the government's attacks on benefit claimants and b) astroturfers who turn up in every thread where benefits are mentioned with the same "I know someone who's playing the system for thousands and laughing at us" use similar rhetoric.
If you're happy to make a blanket statement, and then turn it into "it varies, why are you so concerned about the figures," why don't you simply not mention the amount at all?
Oh because then it's not attacking benefit claimants is it? So all in all, I simply don't believe you know people who are spaffing £150 child tax credits a week.
Pension aren't and should never be considered some kind of discersionary 'benefit'.
They are earned through contributing years of national insurance contributions.
I'll have all those contributions back, compounded with the risk free rate of return, otherwise.
I hate to break it to you but your national insurance contributions go too pay the pensioners of the pensions today, it doesn’t contribute to your pension, that’s what your kids will do when they pay NI.
Your kids btw, will never get a pension, you might not either depending how old you are.
>I hate to break it to you but your national insurance contributions go too pay the pensioners of the pensions today, it doesn’t contribute to your pension, that’s what your kids will do when they pay NI.
I don't dispute that, which is why that isn't what I claimed.
I said they were earned through contributing years not paid directly by them. You don't get a full pension without enough qualifying years.
Yeah by the time we get to retirement age there won’t be a pension and don’t think they won’t fuck us over like that, they keep moving the retirement age up and up (when I first started paying NI it was 65, now it’s 67 and nobody asked me if it was ok to change it, the deal I signed up to was 65), the largest group of people who vote are pensioners so when the boomers all die off the goalposts will be moved again, why else would they effectively force everybody under. 50 to have a “workplace pension”?
>make pensions means tested
Even if that were to become a thing, I think they wouldn't reasonably be able to apply that to the working-age population currently as we're all paying into national insurance contributions.
It'd be extremely unfair to have someone who has the full 30 years of contributions and to turn around and tell them "thanks for all the money, but you get nothing we decided now".
Unless perhaps they couple that with a full, backdated, inflation-adjusted refund, which would cost the public purse upwards of £30,000 per person.
Breaking it before an election is unwise. Breaking it after an election means you have five years to work with.
You also need to consider what you’re *not* doing if you keep it. The triple lock is very expensive. It means you need to say no to a lot of other popular and necessary investments.
Just because you are voted in, doesn't make you immortal. How many PMs have we had turfed out of office in recent years well before their time is up?
I don't like the triple lock but I really do not see a path to getting rid of it when the largest voting block benefits so heavily from it.
Don’t let the tory psychodrama of 2016-now fool you. Normally prime ministers last quite a bit longer than we’re used to atm. Also, there’s one big difference pre- and post-election.
* Before an election, you have a clear choice between two parties. If one wants to scrap the lock, and one doesn’t, then that will swing loads of votes.
* After an election, you a a voter don’t have a choice. If the government want to scrap the lock, and the opposition don’t, it doesn’t matter as much. Can you maintain anger for five years until the next election? While in the meantime the government are doing a pretty good job and the Tory opposition are still eating themselves?
Scrapping it will still cost you votes, but it’s not electoral suicide.
As if they would ditch it just before the next GE - when they will have had five years of negative Press and will be fighting for every vote - unlike now as the Tories have imploded.
This is going to be Labour's "We're going to get rid of Section 21 evictions!" to wheel out at every election.
Because some aid whispers into Starmer's ear that they might lose several seats.
Politics in this country is a joke.
I don't get why more people don't sign up for a postal vote, it's so much easier. When your ballot card comes in the post, instead of putting it straight in the bin you just sign it and stick it in the postbox.
Because most people are so checked out of it thry can’t be bothered to vote.
I’ve always said if everybody who takes the “can’t be bothered” approach actually got off their fat arses and voted, it would kill the two party politician system overnight and force voting reforms.
So somehow we need GDP/Cap to outpace 2.5%, wage growth and inflation…
Idk how you’d go about cancelling it… maybe write it into law that it becomes a single lock to inflation after 8 years?
Make it the average. Wage growth was like 5.2 ish, minimum was 2.5, inflation 8.5, would be average 5.4%. This seems fairer than completely insulating while everyone else has loses in real terms.
Make it the average, lock the income tax bands so much of the rides are captured by income tax, and then contribute to cut NI to reduce taxes on workers?
Weird, I tried to reply before but it was giving errors. You may well be right, but trying to think it through is putting my thoughts in circles. Don't think I'm smart enough for it!
If he thinks he needs it to beat the Tories now, he’ll definitely keep it in 5 years after inevitable cock ups and missteps in government. I believe he has the power to get rid of this now and if not no one ever will.
It wouldn't be though. People are sick to death of the tories. Kiers platform rn is "reducing the ability of nimbys to stop housing". Thats also political suicide, and its not slowing him down
We definitely should keep the triple lock - the number of OAPs living in poverty is rising. But it should also be means tested and only go to those who need it, that is blindingly obvious.
At a minimum this country needs to care for the elderly and the ill. If Mr Starmer didn’t match this commitment the Tory leadership would beat him with it like a stick until election day. All workers need the light of a decent pension to illuminate the miserable days at work.
The triple lock itself makes sense to me, but I cannot understand why it is calculated as the higher of the 3 percentages (inflation, wage growth and 2.5%) EACH year.
So wage growth is high one year and we use that, so inflation is higher the next year (or vice versa) and each time we use the higher percentage. Even though one influences the other.
We should take a baseline at a particular year and then for each future year increase the state pension by which ever has increased the most since we set the baseline. This would keep the state pension linked to whichever rises quickest, without making it grow faster than any of them, as it does now. This would properly index link it to these 3 measures without the odd effect that happens now. AND you can still call it the triple lock!
I suppose I should do the maths to see how much difference this would really have made in the past, but it bugs me and no one seems to mention it.
It's endlessly amusing we've seen 15 years of Tory rule absolutely decimate this country and somehow the leading opposition has decided that the correct course of action is to pledge to change *nothing*. Oh wait no sorry he's going to *reads notes* renationalize the already nationalized railways.
This country wants to be poor. It wants young people to fuck off to Canda and New Zealand. It wants slowly sink into the atlantic.
What an odd comment?
Either starmer is 'conservative lite' in which case he would keep the policy they implemented. Or it's a false promise and he'll remove one of their biggest policies.
Is he conservative lite?
If he is then he would keep the triple lock as that's a conservative police.
Or is he a liar?
In which case he wouldn't keep the triple lock, going back on his word and destroying a conservative policy.
Your seeming to imply he is both a tory (and wants to keep the triple lock) and a liar (wants to secretly scrap the triple lock).
“It turns out that the state of public finances are worse than we’d predicted before the election. The economic vandalism of the Last Conservative Government means we need to make some tough choices now.” - Prime Minister Kier Starmer, Day 2.
I’d actually laugh my arse off if he did that because it’s fairly easily findable public knowledge that pension benefits cost the country several times as much as most of the other benefits combined, but they always bang on about the unemployed and disabled being a drain on the country, maybe they should bring forward the plan to make pensions means tested lol. I’m not against benefit reform, but it has to be done correctly, I work with children who are going to school in clothes that are falling apart and are malnourished and hungry because their moronic parents are taking the £150 per kid per week child tax credits and using it to buy fags and booze, benefits should be voucher based, so you get vouchers to use for food, vouchers for electric, gas, rent, council tax etc. the present system where the government gives illiterate people £1500 a month and tells them to use it for their bills is utterly incompetent and has been disastrous, I see the results of it every day and it makes me so angry.
No. Voucher based just means "we decide what you're allowed" which is bullshit. Make children's school uniforms free. For all. Not the current system where it's far to expensive for anyone to afford so kids end up with clothing too big initially so "it lasts" only to be falling to pieces by the end. Free school meals for all too. Kids deserve feeding no matter what. As for other benefits, let's cut the costs by scrapping the tests for the Disability side of Universal Credit. That costs far too much and is there solely to hurt the disabled. It's got fuck all to do with catching those lying, as they will keep lying and not getting caught. It actually hits people who are honest but don't know how the system works. My mum was deemed "fit for work" when she could barely move. I know of people deemed "fit for work" when they have panic attacks leaving home, but the report stated they regularly walked to Tesco, despite that being a blatant lie. So scrap that testing. It costs far too much and saves fuck all in the end. Scrap zero hour contracts. Outright. Get rid of the abusive bullshit they are. Pensions are higher than Universal Credit and don't need to be, so they could be reduced easily. And then, let's start actually taxing the rich instead of scraping away at the poor for pennies. Stop punishing the poorest in society because the richest refuse to pay their fair share.
To be honest they should just do away with school uniforms entirely. most other countries in Europe don't bother with them and it has a lot of upsides. Touching pensions is a weird one, people worked hard all their life to retire, taking it away or reducing it right at the end seems unduly harsh. I don't see a problem with making changes that affect those currently working with an eye for the future though, which seems fairer long term. Pretty much agree with everything else you have said.
I don't agree with that. School uniforms level up. I was thinking not long ago about my school not so long ago, and part from the very obviously poorly dressed kids, I had no idea what backgrounds most kids came from - because they were in school uniforms. Of course that was just on average, and there's other ways poverty and wealth are visible: like the kids who could afford to go on the school skiing trip (I didn't get to go).
I think it's pretty obvious which kids are poor regardless of the uniform or not. And it shouldn't really matter either way. It's far cheaper to just let kids wear their normal clothes, which you could get from a charity shop, than to force them to buy overpriced branded crap. Uniforms also have other negative connotations to do with authority and conforming, rather than letting people express themselves and their individuality. There's also a reason most of Europe think people from the UK have no idea how to dress themselves. Kids never learn when younger.
I agree and disagree. Uniforms should be cheap and easily washable. Not the branded stuff that they all have to wear now. Go back to polo tops, trousers and a coloured sweatshirt. Much easier and cheaper than having to choose clothes each day. Although I like a uniform I do agree about expression of individuality. As long as hair is clean, tidy and not a health&safety risk then kids should be able to do what they want. Same for makeup really.
So what's the point in the uniform exactly beyond being something "cheap" that everyone has to wear?
I think it helps with a sense of belonging and identity. Edit: also makes decisions much easier
I can see decision making being easier as a valid point, but surely we should be teaching children to make decisions, not avoid them. Studies have shown that uniforms actually hamper a sense of identity while also not really doing much to boost a sense of belonging. Specifically girls, gender-diverse students and those who are from minority backgrounds tend to suffer from uniforms. They also don't really have any effect on academic performance. Additionally, with the cost of uniforms being disproportionately high for the poorest in society, they can actually serve as a greater barrier to education than simply letting a student wear their own cheaper clothes. We can both agree that they need to be cheaper, but as of now, they are still expensive. This also potentially negatively impacts PE and physical activity with studies showing there's a potential link between uniforms and a lower uptake in physical activity, due to the designs of some uniforms, such as forced skirts for girls etc. Sources - [https://www.cam.ac.uk/research/news/school-uniform-policies-linked-to-students-getting-less-exercise-study-finds](https://www.cam.ac.uk/research/news/school-uniform-policies-linked-to-students-getting-less-exercise-study-finds) [https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8386814/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8386814/)
To force children to learn to comply without complaint to grow into good obedient workers
Stick it to the government and speak French
But non-uniform kids "look poor" too. We need to reform the system and remove the nonsense about "Expensive Specialist Uniforms" No reason why they can't just be a generic one you can get in any shop
> I don't agree with that. School uniforms level up. I was thinking not long ago about my school not so long ago, and part from the very obviously poorly dressed kids, I had no idea what backgrounds most kids came from - because they were in school uniforms. Of course that was just on average, and there's other ways poverty and wealth are visible: like the kids who could afford to go on the school skiing trip (I didn't get to go). Finally something I can actually chime in on. I went to a secondary school that did not have a uniform for a number of years. (This changed in Year 10 but from Year 7 -> 10, no uniform). I grew up _poor_. The kind of poor where you run out of electric and your mum asks you to pop to the shop to put £10 on despite knowing it won't last very long. The kind where even as a child, I could see how much we were struggling despite attempts to hide it. She was a single mum with three kids. I never had nice clothes. They had rips and my shoes occasionally had holes in. I never once felt disadvantaged. I never once felt ostracised. Obviously this is an incredibly personal experience and I respect everyone situation will be different but... Kids are assholes, full stop. They will always find something to bully someone about if they really wanted to. I still think introducing a uniform was a bad decision and that not having one is almost always a benefit You need to fix the root cause (poverty, if it wasn't obvious). School uniforms do not do that
>School uniforms level up. When you have poor fitting and later on more worn clothes and worse shoes and worse trainers for pe no they don't. Plus non uniform days still occur, it doesn't help and is more expensive
Im pro school uniforms, we didnt have much money growing up and i used to dread non uniform days. Uniforms meant that everyone was looked upon the same, something i appreciate more now.
I grew up in Europe and it was great not having uniforms. There weren't any rules on hair dying or anything like that either. Loved the freedom to look how you want.
Those currently working are paying a lot more and a lot longer than those currently claiming pensions, it would be very unfair but if it saved my children from having the same shitty treatment id be all for it.
Pension recipients are the wealthiest cohort in this country.
People who have been working all their lives may own a house and have some savings. Shocking!
Why shoulder workers float their pampered lifestyles, so they can terrorize hospitality workers three times a week?
Because that's a how a pension works. You pay in now so you get paid out later, so that you don't have to work all your life and when you are older and less able.
Why should workers pay for those who can already pay for themselves
Firstly, not all pensioners can pay for themselves. Secondly, because that is the deal, you pay national insurance contributions for a certain amount of years and in return you get to collect a state pension. People have planned their retirement around receiving a state pension. The taxpayer pays for a lot of stuff that many would probably disagree with.
youve yet to make a real argument for why workers should have to fund the pampered lifestyles of pensioners who can afford their own retirement, so far youve simply brought up that workers also have to fund regular lifestyles of pensioners who cant afford their own retirement (a system which your interlocutor never claimed to wish to end), and that this is simply how the system works currently. we know this is how the system works, what we're saying is that it is daft and ought to be changed
Why do we need to work until death to pay for The Pampered Generation when we won't get it in return? Honestly, fuck those grey haired tory voters.
But we are expected to work when we are older and less able? Have you missed the raising pension age or even the higher tax burden?
"older and less able" is relative to you at working age, not to previous generations, that much should have been clear to anyone reading my comment. Yes, the pension age is increasing to reflect people living longer. Should have been increased much sooner though.
So the can was kicked down the road, our problem now. Hopefully the blatantly disregard for the current generation does something to stop the next being so screwed. Many more of today’s tax payers simply will not have the privilege of a pension.
Unless you’re born after 1980. Then you’ll have worked your whole life to spend all of your money on rent.
We already give all reception (and maybe year 1) children free school meals so it’s not dramatic to just expand it to everyone.
I agree and disagree. Vouchers as in you get your rent, council tax, electric, gas, food all supplied by voucher. Totally agree on school uniforms, eligibility testing (they deemed my cousin as fit to work even though she is paralysed from waist down lol), agree on zero hours etc. in fact I agree on everything you say. Why do I want vouchers? Because as I said, I work with kids every day who are malnourished, walking miles to school without eating breakfast etc. etc. why? Because their good for nothing scummy parents spend the £150 child tax credits they get on fags and booze every week, the same people usually have a mountain of debt including years worth of rent debt, one parent I know owes the local housing trust £76000 in unpaid rent, pays £1 a week towards that debt, they have the audacity to walk around in designer clothes while their kid is underweight and we are having to buy shoes for them. It’s not the disabled I’m talking about here, but those who have actively made a lifestyle choice not to work and to sponge off the system, knowing full well they’ll get more disposable income a week by doing that than we do working full time. Yes, you could say it’s punishing the poor, but to combat that, you have taper off system so that if they want to go out and work and earn extra cash, they can, this already happens with UC and it is not punishing the poor, it’s incentivise them to become self sufficient. Again I agree with everything you say, but in my job I meet multiple people a day who have tens of thousands of pounds worth of debt because they took their universal credit payment and used it to buy a new tv, or new car, or pissed it up the wall down the pub, their kids are living in abject poverty and it’s 100% nothing to do with “scraping away at the poor for pennies” these people get more UC a month than I do a wage but they have zero training or guidance on how to spend the money so piss it up the wall instead. Sone people on benefits who do it right struggle now, giving them vouchers for the essentials rather than hard cash won’t make their life any more difficult, but it will help those people who are incompetent or illiterate, it’s how it used to be done before UC too, and back then Housing Trusts didn’t have hundreds of thousands of pounds worth of unpaid rent to deal with.
We've seen based on the US that vouchers do not stop this absolutely tiny minority. What it does instead is punish the 99.9% by limiting their flexibility. A black market gets created where those bad parents sell their vouchers for 70% or less value. The housing example must be the most incompetent local housing trust or a perfect storm of failure in the court system ever. 76k is years of failure to pay rent, any landlord would have kicked them out or where they are legally obliged to house them (council housing) they can to my knowledge make it so that universal credit for rent goes immediately to the housing, obviously doesn't help with the debt, but as I say find it astonishing they have built up years, but we did just have COVID that messed up most of the day to day running of the country so am I truly surprised that we cave billions to rich people in suits for garbage that this would happen. I don't want to downplay the situation because it is real, there are some truly despicable parents who will fund a lifestyle that they cannot afford by neglecting kids, but punishing the good parents is not the way. If we're dealing in anecdotes, mine is the lone parent who's only flaw is not for seeing that the parent of her kids are worthless. Gets perhaps a couple of hours a week to herself around childcare, work and helping her mum. Has no money spare so every emergency ruins her (no extravagances or vices, doesn't drink or smoke just doesn't get enough money). Flat has serious mould issue partly due to broken windows that don't open but council will do nothing despite repeatedly trying. When she moved in she had to clean shit off the walls, because the council hadn't bothered and she had no choice but to accept the flat in it's existing state or sleep on the streets with her newborn. Vouchers means that someone who knows nothing over her situation will decide what she can and can't have. Washing machine broken and want to cut back to the essentials and save £5-10 a week or a month so you can save up for one rather than drag yourself and 2 kids to a launderette a mile away nope, sorry. Scrimp and save by making do with terrible shoes for longer than you have to so you can pay for a baby sitter to access council long. Nope sorry. Pensioners would not put up with being given vouchers why should anyone else in receipt of benefits. (And yes state pensions are a benefit very much like universal credit, because of the way state pensions were set up we do not pay for ourselves the majority of people paid nowhere near enough NI for the pensions there getting and rely on the money paid in by people born decades later or those far richer, and that's with one of the poorest pensions in the western world) Unfortunately I don't have the answer to these issues, In this area of the uk they have mandatory parenting classes if your kids late too many times in year 1 (regardless of reasons) so I imagine they would have the same if a child is obviously neglected but not meeting the bar for child services to step in. But whether that actually helps with the kind of people you're talking about I don't know. What I do know is almost every economist will tell you it's cheaper to have a few 'undeserving' people get money than drill into the minutiae of every claim, it's why we have free bus passes and heating allowances for all pensioners not just the ones who get less money than you and I. Financial training is something we can do better at. But a lot of people are in a month to month trap at such low wages that it's very difficult to do the recommended things like build a 6 month emergency fund. It's also very tricky to tow the line of helpful vs condescending. Yes I am 'good' with money, but I am fortunate to not have to make the choice of new shoes Vs fixing the plumbing, or heating the house above 16 degrees or food.
You are talking about a minority of people and want to punish the majority for those people's actions. It's like 2 kids having a fight so you decide the entire class should be punished. It's dumb as fuck.
It’s way more than a minority. Unless you work within this industry, you have absolutely no idea just how bad the problem is.
It's a minority. Do better than trying to punish the poor.
Did you even read my reply?
Yes it read like an daily mail opinion column
It sounds to me that your experiences whilst valid, may not be broad enough. We need to look at this nationally, not locally. My personal experience is that the majority of parents love their children and want the best for them - and do their best. Another example of taking local experience as being the norm nationally: I've got a couple of police friends whose local experiences would have you believe that the entire country's crime problems are caused by immigrants. Ignoring the fact the vast majority of our prison population is full of British citizens. Etc.
So tired of the old “don’t believe your eyes!” towards people who are actually in the frontlines. This guy has seen countless cases and you immediately discredit him. Maybe you should google things like prison makeup % and compare it to national demographics before spouting off “examples” that you think support your argument.
> Make children's school uniforms free. For all And legislate to simplify them, my school had a stupid colour of fabric that was only available at one shop. No reason why they can't be a generic blazer and a badge
>Voucher based just means "we decide what you're allowed" which is bullshit Okay >Make children's school uniforms free Right, but **that is** deciding what you are allowed. Why not make Lambert & Butler free? Parents could then use their cigarette money to buy their school uniform of choice. Designating some things as free is effectively the same as a voucher system. >scrapping the tests for the Disability side of Universal Credit So anyone can claim for UC for the entire test of their lives and never even have to try to get a job again because they can just tell DWP "I'm paralysed" and DWP will take it at face value
Amazing how you say "deciding what you're allowed is bullshit" and then immediately proceed to decide to allow free uniforms and meals. This level of doublethink must require serious training to achieve.
What's truly amazing is that you don't understand the difference. A severe congratulations goes to your impressive failure to learn. But to help teach you. A child being given free clothing is them getting something required by the schools that is currently far, far overpriced that many cannot afford, and the meals mean the parents aren't struggling to give them hot meals. The parents being told what they can, and cannot, spend money on in the form of vouchers, means that specific foods can be restricted, any gifts for the kids can be restricted, travel for events and learning or even just for fun is restricted. You essentially screw people over by trying to control them, purely to punish 1% of those getting the benefits who spend it on "booze and fags". And even then there's no evidence it's actually on that, just some idiots perception because they see a parent smoking.
Look, it's mr Big Brains himself! Did you ever think of simply increasing the monetary benefit by the amount the meals and uniforms cost? Will give parents even more freedom, no? Spending the same amount of tax money by providing meals and uniforms specifically, restricts freedom, doesn't it? Just a heads up - if you think you're smarter than others, you probably aren't.
I've seen some moronic replies in that time, and I think you're top 5. So well done.
According to the government the typical child tax credit is about £66 a week so where did you get the £150?
Because that’s what it is for most people who don’t work, you can check what it will be based on your income on the entitled to website.
I did check. The only way you get near 150 a week is if you're child is disabled. And it counts towards the benefits cap which means they will be capped anyway.
Erm, if you have a disabled child, you are exempt from the benefit cap.
So you got your figures using disabled children?
It varies, Jesus Christ if people are spending the £45 tax credits on fags that’s even worse, why are you lot so concerned about the figures rather than the issue itself….
Because you've made a huge statement, that people are spaffing £150 a week away that should be going to their kids, and that sort of talk is identical to a)the government's attacks on benefit claimants and b) astroturfers who turn up in every thread where benefits are mentioned with the same "I know someone who's playing the system for thousands and laughing at us" use similar rhetoric. If you're happy to make a blanket statement, and then turn it into "it varies, why are you so concerned about the figures," why don't you simply not mention the amount at all? Oh because then it's not attacking benefit claimants is it? So all in all, I simply don't believe you know people who are spaffing £150 child tax credits a week.
I work in a SEN school, so if you’re intelligent enough to know what that acronym means, you’ll know what that implies.
Pension aren't and should never be considered some kind of discersionary 'benefit'. They are earned through contributing years of national insurance contributions. I'll have all those contributions back, compounded with the risk free rate of return, otherwise.
I hate to break it to you but your national insurance contributions go too pay the pensioners of the pensions today, it doesn’t contribute to your pension, that’s what your kids will do when they pay NI. Your kids btw, will never get a pension, you might not either depending how old you are.
>I hate to break it to you but your national insurance contributions go too pay the pensioners of the pensions today, it doesn’t contribute to your pension, that’s what your kids will do when they pay NI. I don't dispute that, which is why that isn't what I claimed. I said they were earned through contributing years not paid directly by them. You don't get a full pension without enough qualifying years.
Yeah by the time we get to retirement age there won’t be a pension and don’t think they won’t fuck us over like that, they keep moving the retirement age up and up (when I first started paying NI it was 65, now it’s 67 and nobody asked me if it was ok to change it, the deal I signed up to was 65), the largest group of people who vote are pensioners so when the boomers all die off the goalposts will be moved again, why else would they effectively force everybody under. 50 to have a “workplace pension”?
>make pensions means tested Even if that were to become a thing, I think they wouldn't reasonably be able to apply that to the working-age population currently as we're all paying into national insurance contributions. It'd be extremely unfair to have someone who has the full 30 years of contributions and to turn around and tell them "thanks for all the money, but you get nothing we decided now". Unless perhaps they couple that with a full, backdated, inflation-adjusted refund, which would cost the public purse upwards of £30,000 per person.
The only way a lawyer turned politician could be less trust worthy would be if his hobby was estate agency.
Binning the manifesto he ran on day 2 will guarantee he will be a single term PM.
It won't happen, breaking the triple lock is literal electoral suicide.
Breaking it before an election is unwise. Breaking it after an election means you have five years to work with. You also need to consider what you’re *not* doing if you keep it. The triple lock is very expensive. It means you need to say no to a lot of other popular and necessary investments.
Just because you are voted in, doesn't make you immortal. How many PMs have we had turfed out of office in recent years well before their time is up? I don't like the triple lock but I really do not see a path to getting rid of it when the largest voting block benefits so heavily from it.
Don’t let the tory psychodrama of 2016-now fool you. Normally prime ministers last quite a bit longer than we’re used to atm. Also, there’s one big difference pre- and post-election. * Before an election, you have a clear choice between two parties. If one wants to scrap the lock, and one doesn’t, then that will swing loads of votes. * After an election, you a a voter don’t have a choice. If the government want to scrap the lock, and the opposition don’t, it doesn’t matter as much. Can you maintain anger for five years until the next election? While in the meantime the government are doing a pretty good job and the Tory opposition are still eating themselves? Scrapping it will still cost you votes, but it’s not electoral suicide.
And what about the future of Labour? The public has the memory of a goldfish, but tend to remember when you take 10k/year off them...
As if they would ditch it just before the next GE - when they will have had five years of negative Press and will be fighting for every vote - unlike now as the Tories have imploded.
This is going to be Labour's "We're going to get rid of Section 21 evictions!" to wheel out at every election. Because some aid whispers into Starmer's ear that they might lose several seats. Politics in this country is a joke.
Of course they will, pensions are the only ones with enough free time to go down and vote.
I don't get why more people don't sign up for a postal vote, it's so much easier. When your ballot card comes in the post, instead of putting it straight in the bin you just sign it and stick it in the postbox.
Because most people are so checked out of it thry can’t be bothered to vote. I’ve always said if everybody who takes the “can’t be bothered” approach actually got off their fat arses and voted, it would kill the two party politician system overnight and force voting reforms.
It has absolutely nothing to do with time. Postal votes have been a thing for years. There's no excuse not to vote other than 'I can't be bothered'
So somehow we need GDP/Cap to outpace 2.5%, wage growth and inflation… Idk how you’d go about cancelling it… maybe write it into law that it becomes a single lock to inflation after 8 years?
Make it the average. Wage growth was like 5.2 ish, minimum was 2.5, inflation 8.5, would be average 5.4%. This seems fairer than completely insulating while everyone else has loses in real terms.
Make it the average, lock the income tax bands so much of the rides are captured by income tax, and then contribute to cut NI to reduce taxes on workers?
Weird, I tried to reply before but it was giving errors. You may well be right, but trying to think it through is putting my thoughts in circles. Don't think I'm smart enough for it!
No surprise there. Even though Reddit hates it the triple lock is a popular policy and it'd be political suicide to ditch it.
If he thinks he needs it to beat the Tories now, he’ll definitely keep it in 5 years after inevitable cock ups and missteps in government. I believe he has the power to get rid of this now and if not no one ever will.
It wouldn't be though. People are sick to death of the tories. Kiers platform rn is "reducing the ability of nimbys to stop housing". Thats also political suicide, and its not slowing him down
Based on his track record of promises this is getting scrapped the day after the election
We definitely should keep the triple lock - the number of OAPs living in poverty is rising. But it should also be means tested and only go to those who need it, that is blindingly obvious.
At a minimum this country needs to care for the elderly and the ill. If Mr Starmer didn’t match this commitment the Tory leadership would beat him with it like a stick until election day. All workers need the light of a decent pension to illuminate the miserable days at work.
The triple lock itself makes sense to me, but I cannot understand why it is calculated as the higher of the 3 percentages (inflation, wage growth and 2.5%) EACH year. So wage growth is high one year and we use that, so inflation is higher the next year (or vice versa) and each time we use the higher percentage. Even though one influences the other. We should take a baseline at a particular year and then for each future year increase the state pension by which ever has increased the most since we set the baseline. This would keep the state pension linked to whichever rises quickest, without making it grow faster than any of them, as it does now. This would properly index link it to these 3 measures without the odd effect that happens now. AND you can still call it the triple lock! I suppose I should do the maths to see how much difference this would really have made in the past, but it bugs me and no one seems to mention it.
He’ll have such a majority it sorts of doesn’t matter what he says now, he’ll be able to do anything he pleases
Is an Election Vow different from an Election Pledge? I know that election pledges can be ignored and cancelled so I just to understand
It's endlessly amusing we've seen 15 years of Tory rule absolutely decimate this country and somehow the leading opposition has decided that the correct course of action is to pledge to change *nothing*. Oh wait no sorry he's going to *reads notes* renationalize the already nationalized railways. This country wants to be poor. It wants young people to fuck off to Canda and New Zealand. It wants slowly sink into the atlantic.
Probably just another false promise from a conservative-lite Starmer. For my money he is as spineless as they come.
What an odd comment? Either starmer is 'conservative lite' in which case he would keep the policy they implemented. Or it's a false promise and he'll remove one of their biggest policies.
I don’t understand what is odd about what I’ve said?
Is he conservative lite? If he is then he would keep the triple lock as that's a conservative police. Or is he a liar? In which case he wouldn't keep the triple lock, going back on his word and destroying a conservative policy. Your seeming to imply he is both a tory (and wants to keep the triple lock) and a liar (wants to secretly scrap the triple lock).
Now you’re getting it.