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(A single mother contemplates the benefits system)


Welfare to work

The Freud Report and the country’s reaction to it is , in my opinion the most important political straw on the wind . It was always obvious that Brown, whose coronation is secure , would contest the middle ground, and this must mean revisiting welfare reform
The magnificently bitter Mr. Field popped up in the DT yesterday to say that labour were yet to grasp the issue , it was all carrot and no stick. . Lots of help is available to ,‘apply’, for jobs. New haircuts, new suits, and so on , but there was nothing to make sure that you actually worked . This will become another classic Labour non -solution .They have over legislated , and over taxed, but instead of removing the some of the burden , they introduce further checks and incentives ,to enforce good behaviour . Shall we all shout together .It does not work!
Sue Carrol ,( Mirror), unearthed this quote from a website this morning and it shows the scale of the problem .

A single mother writes….

“ Work used to the escalator out of poverty, but I `m a single mother with three children who was offered a brand new council house. I get choice of kitchen units , fitted bathroom , newly plastered walls, landscaped garden – on top of income support payments , free school dinners , no university fees. .and my house will be offered to me later under a right to buy scheme” …that would be at half price.

The last point is the crucial one. Politicians, including David Cameron, floating a, rent to Mortgage idea, treat welfare claimants as if they were needy and stupid . For the most part they are neither. Not only are the skilful and subverting the system, but they make long terms strategic choices ,based on the possibility of further welfare and tax payer largesse.One of the most important is to become a single mother in the first place.
Single mothers ,like widows, and simply good people, often do a good job , this is not the point ( Alan Johnson ). The point is to decide which policy structure gives children the best hope of the best start in life .
In the words of Al Gore , here are some “ Inconvenient truths “ ( except theses ones are true ).
Britain has 1.9 million lone parent households- an increase of more than 200,000 since Labour came to power- and the highest teenage birth-rate in Europe. An office of national statistics report in 2004 showed that children of lone parents are twice as likely to have mental health problems. Children aged 12 in one
Parent families are 2.4 times as likely to smoke and 1.6 times as likely to use alcohol. Drug taking is more common , children are more likely to be expelled, and, in the US , 63% of teenage suicides , 90 % of runaway children and 85 % of juvenile prisoners are from single parent homes.
I do not take these figures straight myself, there are other factor as work and some false correlations, but nonetheless the picture of a state induced moral breakdown is fair.
When Mr . Johnson , says our benefits system must be bias free what I thought was this . I’ll take that thanks ,because at the moment ,we have a brutal assault on marriage in low income households. If one spouse earns £5000 and the other £15,000 for example they would lose £5400 of benefits.The true marginal disincentive goes a long way higher up the scale that that because of the housing issue above.

We do not need a return to Peter Lilly’s little list “Young ladies who get pregnant jut to jump the housing list” ,which was needlessly impolitic. We need the stick of a fixed period benefits system, significant cuts in taxes on income especially at low levels ,and an all out assault on the concept of entitlement. This virulent lie is alive and well in this unreconstructed inner cities that Blair and co. make sure there children will never know. I meet them and I know

Do not imagine that there is no part for moral outrage in this fight,there is a place for anger visceral horror and this is my policy....

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