• The post you are reporting:
   
  Some good points there Marek.
  I agree on the ceiling to child benefit but what about families where there is one high earner who is so busy with 'outside interests' they only pass on an allowance to the partner that does not provide for the chil/children or where the couples are breaking up/abusive/otherwise disfunctional?
  On sickness/disability, there are already madical boards to assess claiments and they have as much of a vested interest in signing people off as you seem to think GP's may have in signing them on. I know of people that have been declared fit for work on the basis of having managed to get to the assessment, although their benefit would have stopped if they hadn't.
  Back to work payments are fine in theory but it would need a major overhaul of back to work training before it could work. Having worked as a support tutor in the jobclub system I have been admonished for helping people prepare business plans (despite two of them doing very well and coming off benefits altogether) because it did not meet the targets unless they were employed by somebody else. You also have the notable differences in what training you can study for that will be covered which at the moment means that sewing classes (leading to very few jobs) are paid for for claiments while driving lessons (which can lead to many more jobs) are not.
  Time limits in an uncertain economic climate would also be dangerous.
  I agree that the system needs an overhaul but it needs to lead somewhere and the support systems need a desperate overhaul first so that there are options outside of benefit.
  
  As a stastic to consider, while I was unemployed I went to the jobclub and sent out 4,000 speculative letters and CV's in one week, trying to at least get an interview. Of those I got less than twenty replies, none offering an interview and that was before the current recession. The one interview I did get that week, from a paper, I walked into and was told (even before the interview proper started) that their policy was to take only school leavers and I was in my forties (and the only one in the waiting room wearing a tie).

Report Post

Your Name

Reason