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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: English social cleansing
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Karl: Liberal Backslider
Shipmate
# 76
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Twilight:
It's not, "I had it bad, so you should, too." It's, "Leaving home is part of life for most grown-ups in today's world." Not since most of the world was agricultural did you stay home with, or next door to, Mom and Dad after you were grown.
Besides, if you think because there were jobs where I went that I needed a support group less, then you have it backwards. I did not need a babysitter when I was home all the time.
Leaving home is one thing. Being uprooted and moved half way across the country against your will for absolutely no benefit for you, but considerable disbenefit, is quite another. Your choice to move, despite the downside, because you could see an upside (otherwise why would you have done it) is not remotely comparable with a forced move that benefits the mover not one iota.
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Might as well ask the bloody cat.
Posts: 17938 | From: Chesterfield | Registered: May 2001
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Karl: Liberal Backslider
Shipmate
# 76
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Twilight:
quote:
Originally posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider:
Twilight - you made a choice. We're talking about people being given no choice but being made to move to a worse life.
No choice? Really? The police come to the door and force them to move to Birmingham? I doubt that.
No. The council tax stops covering their rent. Therefore they will be evicted. They either move to Birmingham or are made homeless. Since they've been offered a move, if they reject it they'll be classed as intentionally homeless and get nowt. The choice at that point would be to live on the streets (children presumably taken into care) or move. Near enough forced for my money. It's a policy devoid of compassion or empathy, rather like, I have to say, the tone of your posts.
[ 27. March 2015, 16:25: Message edited by: Karl: Liberal Backslider ]
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Might as well ask the bloody cat.
Posts: 17938 | From: Chesterfield | Registered: May 2001
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Sioni Sais
Shipmate
# 5713
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Twilight:
quote:
Originally posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider:
Twilight - you made a choice. We're talking about people being given no choice but being made to move to a worse life.
No choice? Really? The police come to the door and force them to move to Birmingham? I doubt that.
Please, just try reading what has been stated already. It is UK government policy to move families from London (where rents are sky high) to cheaper areas simply to save the government money. Not to a place where there is or even may be a job. Nothing constructive, just deliberately moving people around.
If you think any of that is fair, reasonable or anything other than ghettoization I want a better case than "Something similar happened to me 'cos my husband was in the US Armed Forces". Shit, my dad was in the RAF, but we got moved (all expenses paid too) when he was assigned another post.
(x-p with Karl)
[ 27. March 2015, 16:29: Message edited by: Sioni Sais ]
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"He isn't Doctor Who, he's The Doctor"
(Paul Sinha, BBC)
Posts: 24276 | From: Newport, Wales | Registered: Apr 2004
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quetzalcoatl
Shipmate
# 16740
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Posted
The police won't come at first, but the bailiffs will, if you don't leave, and if you still won't, the police might come.
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I can't talk to you today; I talked to two people yesterday.
Posts: 9878 | From: UK | Registered: Oct 2011
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JoannaP
Shipmate
# 4493
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Sioni Sais:
Please, just try reading what has been stated already. It is UK government policy to move families from London (where rents are sky high) to cheaper areas simply to save the government money. Not to a place where there is or even may be a job. Nothing constructive, just deliberately moving people around.
Surely, as housing is a local issue, it is not a central UK govt policy but the policy of some local councils, most notably Westminster.
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"Freedom for the pike is death for the minnow." R. H. Tawney (quoted by Isaiah Berlin)
"Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety." Benjamin Franklin
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Tulfes
Shipmate
# 18000
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Posted
Joanne
No, it is down to central government policy. Central government has placed a cap on the total benefits which a family can receive (£26K per annum or £500 per week). The cap doesn't apply if at least one of the adults (or the only adult if a single parent family) is working at least 15 hours a week. So it only affects workless families. If the cap applies, housing benefit is reduced (not cash benefits received eg child benefit) to meet the cap. This means that in high rent areas the family are unlikely to be able to afford their current rent, unless they psy the difference from their cash benefits and starve.
Housing benefit is administered and paid by local councils on behalf of central government (DWP).
Posts: 175 | Registered: Feb 2014
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tomsk
Shipmate
# 15370
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Posted
Joanna P said'Surely, as housing is a local issue, it is not a central UK govt policy but the policy of some local councils, most notably Westminster.'
Yes and no. While there is an element of local choice, The fundamentals are driven centrally, in particular the shortage of housing stock is the result of central laws making them available for sale to tenants.
Posts: 372 | From: UK | Registered: Dec 2009
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Twilight
Puddleglum's sister
# 2832
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Sioni Sais:
"Something similar happened to me 'cos my husband was in the US Armed Forces". Shit, my dad was in the RAF, but we got moved (all expenses paid too) when he was assigned another post.
(x-p with Karl)
No. I didn't marry an Air Force man until I was 33. At 18, I left West Virginia, by myself, and went to Ohio to look for a job. I found a minimum wage job and a room in rooming house and occasionally went hungry.
This is all such a first world problem. "We can't have free housing, medical care and food unless we move to a different city," vs people in Africa who have none of those things under any condition. Even the idea of the extended family as a "support system," rather than, quite possibly, a financial and emotional drain sounds like the talk of privileged people to me.
Posts: 6817 | Registered: May 2002
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orfeo
Ship's Musical Counterpoint
# 13878
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Posted
I always find it bizarre when someone uses the internet to criticise people about 'first world problems'.
We live in the first world. Of course we have first world problems. Why on earth would you expect people to get all the way back to third world issues before they're allowed to start being upset about going backwards?
[ 27. March 2015, 21:51: Message edited by: orfeo ]
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Technology has brought us all closer together. Turns out a lot of the people you meet as a result are complete idiots.
Posts: 18173 | From: Under | Registered: Jul 2008
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quetzalcoatl
Shipmate
# 16740
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Posted
It's a bit like a Monty Python sketch; you think you had it hard, we had to wear cardboard on our feet.
Cardboard! Jings, we had our feet amputated to save on shoe-leather.
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I can't talk to you today; I talked to two people yesterday.
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Twilight
Puddleglum's sister
# 2832
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Posted
I think we live on a planet with all these worlds and a finite amount of resources, so that it seems odd to me to be worried, to this extent, about some people's preferences as to exactly where they receive free food and housing, while others are homeless and starving.
quote:
Originally posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider:
Twilight -- It's a policy devoid of compassion or empathy, rather like, I have to say, the tone of your posts.
Well, I think your tone is patronizing. I think your view sees only two types of people. Highly educated people like yourself who move to other cities to take professional jobs at high pay and those others who aren't capable of ever supporting themselves or functioning without your help. I think there are lots of people in between who might actually do well from this change and find jobs where there were, obviously, none in London.
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Twilight
Puddleglum's sister
# 2832
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
It's a bit like a Monty Python sketch; you think you had it hard, we had to wear cardboard on our feet.
Cardboard! Jings, we had our feet amputated to save on shoe-leather.
You find stories of my life so comical because what I remember as ordinary and typical of the people I grew up with, sounds like an hilarious Monty Python sketch to you. It is just life to most of us. It's how the large majority of people live. Only a small percentage have the education that you have and the luxury of either laughing at or patronizing the rest of us.
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Albertus
Shipmate
# 13356
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Posted
There are lots of jobs in London. The original subject of this discussion was people being forced to move - often to places with fewer work opportunities- to save money on housing costs. I have no problem with people moving around ffor work or wwith people being encourageed and helped to ovee around for work. Thing is, when you've got fuck all else, your social networks are not things you sacrifice lightly, especially if they'll help you manage childcare and so on. I was walking through Bermondsey in SE London yesterday, a traditionally working class area. Still quite a lot of council housing and, wonder of wonders, some actually being built, but more and more pricey flats going up, 'gentrification' creeping in. The people living there maay well in fact have jobs locally, but where are they going tto go when rents are going up- including in social housing- to levels they can't afford? AIUI most people in Britain who claim Housing Benefit (welfare assistance with rents) are actually in work. It's not the simple case of people needing to bee prepared to light out for the territories that you seem to imagine it is, Twilight.
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My beard is a testament to my masculinity and virility, and demonstrates that I am a real man. Trouble is, bits of quiche sometimes get caught in it.
Posts: 6498 | From: Y Sowth | Registered: Jan 2008
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quetzalcoatl
Shipmate
# 16740
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Twilight:
quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
It's a bit like a Monty Python sketch; you think you had it hard, we had to wear cardboard on our feet.
Cardboard! Jings, we had our feet amputated to save on shoe-leather.
You find stories of my life so comical because what I remember as ordinary and typical of the people I grew up with, sounds like an hilarious Monty Python sketch to you. It is just life to most of us. It's how the large majority of people live. Only a small percentage have the education that you have and the luxury of either laughing at or patronizing the rest of us.
Well, I'm sticking up for the poor and the disabled in the UK, who are getting shafted by the present government. It's possible we are going to get 5 more years of it as well. I think we should say no to a world where the poor are punished, so that the rich can keep their bonuses.
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I can't talk to you today; I talked to two people yesterday.
Posts: 9878 | From: UK | Registered: Oct 2011
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Albertus
Shipmate
# 13356
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Posted
And that's what's been happening to housing in London and similar areas: the poor and the not so poor but just ordinary get shafted, directly or indirectly, so that the rich can make yet more money in proprty sspeculation.
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My beard is a testament to my masculinity and virility, and demonstrates that I am a real man. Trouble is, bits of quiche sometimes get caught in it.
Posts: 6498 | From: Y Sowth | Registered: Jan 2008
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quetzalcoatl
Shipmate
# 16740
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Posted
And then Twilight says it's a first world problem. Fuck, there are people in London who in winter have to choose between eating and heating. But never mind, there's somebody worse off than you.
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I can't talk to you today; I talked to two people yesterday.
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Twilight
Puddleglum's sister
# 2832
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Albertus:
AIUI most people in Britain who claim Housing Benefit (welfare assistance with rents) are actually in work. It's not the simple case of people needing to bee prepared to light out for the territories that you seem to imagine it is, Twilight.
Tulfes said in the OP quote:
The problem portrayed in the film is that rents and housing benefit in London are so high that non working familiss are caught by the cap and face heart breaking situations of being shipped out of London to eg Birmingham (where rents are cheaper) with consequent problems of getting separated from extended family and friends and children losing their schools and friends etc.
Posts: 6817 | Registered: May 2002
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Twilight
Puddleglum's sister
# 2832
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
And then Twilight says it's a first world problem. Fuck, there are people in London who in winter have to choose between eating and heating. But never mind, there's somebody worse off than you.
The only thing I've been talking about her is the problem Tulfes stated in the OP. People who do not have jobs, being asked to move to Birmingham so that they can be given free housing.
I don't find that particularly punishing.
How that opinion translated to me not having sympathy for people who don't have food or heat, I don't know.
Do you actually know any poor people? If they told you they had to chose between food and heat would you pull out your tiny violin and tell them they remind you of a Monty Python sketch? Is it just the poor in abstract who spark your compassion?
Posts: 6817 | Registered: May 2002
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Sioni Sais
Shipmate
# 5713
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Twilight:
quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
And then Twilight says it's a first world problem. Fuck, there are people in London who in winter have to choose between eating and heating. But never mind, there's somebody worse off than you.
The only thing I've been talking about her is the problem Tulfes stated in the OP. People who do not have jobs, being asked to move to Birmingham so that they can be given free housing.
I don't find that particularly punishing.
How that opinion translated to me not having sympathy for people who don't have food or heat, I don't know.
Do you actually know any poor people? If they told you they had to chose between food and heat would you pull out your tiny violin and tell them they remind you of a Monty Python sketch? Is it just the poor in abstract who spark your compassion?
I give up, I really, really do.
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"He isn't Doctor Who, he's The Doctor"
(Paul Sinha, BBC)
Posts: 24276 | From: Newport, Wales | Registered: Apr 2004
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quetzalcoatl
Shipmate
# 16740
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Posted
Gordon Bennett.
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I can't talk to you today; I talked to two people yesterday.
Posts: 9878 | From: UK | Registered: Oct 2011
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Twilight
Puddleglum's sister
# 2832
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Posted
You know, Sioni Sais, you're the one that implied all my 15 moves must have been easy ones because I was married to someone in the Air Force, leading me to explain that I was actually not well off at all during my earliest moves, leading Q to imply I was doing a version of "I had it worse than they do," which I certainly was not.
So now you just give up, you really do.
I happen to be a liberal Democrat entirely in favor of free medical care for all, food and housing for the poor, social security, aid to dependent mothers, food stamps, WIC coupons, head start, you name it. I vote and give accordingly.
I simply found the OP a bit over the top in its lament of "social cleansing," and the "heart break" of kids having to change schools, like that never happens.
Posts: 6817 | Registered: May 2002
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lilBuddha
Shipmate
# 14333
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Posted
It isn't that it ever happens, but that it shouldn't.
This is true in the U.S. as well, ISTM.
The government, to benefit the rich, makes life more difficult for the poor and those in the middle.
It widens the gap between the rich and the poor and pushes the middle towards the bottom.
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I put on my rockin' shoes in the morning
Hallellou, hallellou
Posts: 17627 | From: the round earth's imagined corners | Registered: Dec 2008
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Albertus
Shipmate
# 13356
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Twilight:
quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
And then Twilight says it's a first world problem. Fuck, there are people in London who in winter have to choose between eating and heating. But never mind, there's somebody worse off than you.
The only thing I've been talking about her is the problem Tulfes stated in the OP. People who do not have jobs, being asked to move to Birmingham so that they can be given free housing.
I don't find that particularly punishing.
How that opinion translated to me not having sympathy for people who don't have food or heat, I don't know.
Do you actually know any poor people? If they told you they had to chose between food and heat would you pull out your tiny violin and tell them they remind you of a Monty Python sketch? Is it just the poor in abstract who spark your compassion?
It's not free housing. They have to pay for it but they can claim social assistance to meet the cost. But rents in all sectors have been rising (and the government now thinks that 80% of market rent is an 'affordable' social rent, which in most of the SE it plainly isn't) and assistance is being cut. It's a complex problem but it is having a huge human cost.
[ 28. March 2015, 09:00: Message edited by: Albertus ]
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My beard is a testament to my masculinity and virility, and demonstrates that I am a real man. Trouble is, bits of quiche sometimes get caught in it.
Posts: 6498 | From: Y Sowth | Registered: Jan 2008
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Twilight
Puddleglum's sister
# 2832
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Posted
(I meant that children often have to change schools, children of well to do families, probably most often.)
So, it's not free housing as I thought. If they are not working at all, how are they paying that?If they are paying 80% of their rent in London, does that mean they can stay where they are if they come up with the other 20%?
Posts: 6817 | Registered: May 2002
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Soror Magna
Shipmate
# 9881
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Twilight:
... (I meant that children often have to change schools, children of well to do families, probably most often.)...
Evidence?
quote:
Originally posted by Twilight:
So, it's not free housing as I thought. If they are not working at all, how are they paying that?
quote:
Originally posted by Albertus:
It's not free housing. They have to pay for it but they can claim social assistance to meet the cost.
quote:
Originally posted by Twilight:
If they are paying 80% of their rent in London, does that mean they can stay where they are if they come up with the other 20%?
( ![[brick wall]](graemlins/brick_wall.gif) No wonder people are giving up. ![[Waterworks]](graemlins/bawling.gif) )
No, they're paying 100% of their rent, just like anyone else. The 80% figure means that the if the government decides that average market rent is 1,000 clams/month, the housing benefit will pay up to 800 clams/month, but no more. However, this is a benchmark that does not necessarily take into account local variations:
quote:
Originally posted by Albertus:
... the government now thinks that 80% of market rent is an 'affordable' social rent, which in most of the SE it plainly isn't) ...
In an area where market rents are actually 2,000 clams/month, 800 clams doesn't go very far. If they're not working or working for so little that they qualify for assistance, how exactly are they supposed to come up with an additional 1,200 clams/month to top that up?
Obviously, they can't. So the options are: 1) move to a place where the rents really are 800 clams/month, or 2) stay and eventually be evicted for non-payment of rent and end up doing 1) anyway. And remember, this does not take into account whether employment prospects are better or worse in either location, never mind abandoning the social capital accumulated in that community.
The same thing is happening in Caprica City:
quote:
...just four percent of privately run SRO* hotels surveyed are renting all their rooms for the welfare shelter rate of $375, compared to nine percent last year. The authors found no vacant rooms renting for $375 or less. ...
... Other statistics highlighted by CCAP include an average lowest rent of $469 a month ...
... The report also identifies a “troubling trend” of rents rising to $500 a month or higher, with 614 of SRO rooms surveyed renting at this rate. ...
... CCAP also noted that provincial income-assistance rates have not been increased from $610 since 2007. Yet between 2009 and 2013, the average lowest rent in SRO buildings surveyed increased from $398 to $469. ...
Downtown Eastside housing survey shows rising SRO rents
*SRO = single-room occupancy hotels like these:
Three Vancouver SROs win prize for worst living conditions
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"You come with me to room 1013 over at the hospital, I'll show you America. Terminal, crazy and mean." -- Tony Kushner, "Angels in America"
Posts: 5430 | From: Caprica City | Registered: Jul 2005
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Albertus
Shipmate
# 13356
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Posted
Yes. The detail of your explanation is not quite correct but the general tenor of it is- thank you.
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My beard is a testament to my masculinity and virility, and demonstrates that I am a real man. Trouble is, bits of quiche sometimes get caught in it.
Posts: 6498 | From: Y Sowth | Registered: Jan 2008
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Leaf
Shipmate
# 14169
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Posted
I suspect there may be a pond difference regarding one's relationship to the land, and having to move.
quote:
69 per cent of the acreage of Britain is owned by 0.6 per cent of the population. Or, more pertinently, 158,000 families own 41 million acres of land, while 24 million families live on the four million acres of the urban plot. No other country in Europe, apart from Spain, has such an unequal concentration of land ownership.
Article here. I suppose that's progress: quote:
less than a century and a half ago, all land was owned by 4.5 per cent of the population and the rest owned nothing at all.
Article here. So unless you were part of the aristocracy, you sat on some rich bugger's land and could be bumped off it at his pleasure. This caused Some Resentment and motivated emigration.
North America, by contrast, was treated as terra nullius, "land belonging to no one" (with which several aboriginal groups begged to differ, but I digress). Moving from place to place is likely to have been by choice for better opportunity, rather than being caused by some distant rich bugger throwing you off his land.
Strangely, I think the difference in attitude to gun ownership may be a historic carryover from one place to the other. People who had emigrated and finally got land ownership were unhappy with the prospect of being forced off it for any reason. Hence the mythology around using firearms to defend one's homestead.
Posts: 2786 | From: the electrical field | Registered: Oct 2008
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Golden Key
Shipmate
# 1468
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Posted
Leaf--
Yes re guns and land, at least here in the US. And it's been reinforced, for decades, on TV and in the movies--primarily in, but not limited to, Westerns.
And, for pioneers, it was a long time before they had to deal with much (if any) law enforcement. So people settled things on their own, often with violence.
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Blessed Gator, pray for us!
--"Oh bat bladders, do you have to bring common sense into this?" (Dragon, "Jane & the Dragon")
--"Oh, Peace Train, save this country!" (Yusuf/Cat Stevens, "Peace Train")
Posts: 18601 | From: Chilling out in an undisclosed, sincere pumpkin patch. | Registered: Oct 2001
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anoesis
Shipmate
# 14189
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Sioni Sais:
It has been going on for years. Even back in the seventies the DHSS was moving families out of London to seaside towns that had seen better days and didn't have great communications with London. I can remember this in Bexhill and St Leonards but I'm sure it happened elsewhere too.
It was all entirely voluntary you understand.
I'm finding this whole thread fascinating because, as far as I understand it, my own government has the opposite policy: If you wind up jobless and on a benefit in our own miniature version of London, you can't opt to move away to our own miniature version of [insert name of faded provincial town here], in order to both save money on housing and live better on the remainder, because by doing so, you would remove yourself from the category of "actively seeking work", and thus not qualify for a benefit any longer - the assumption being that there IS no work in faded provincial towns. What really galls me about this is that for some people, realistically, there are no jobs ANYWHERE. Not just because some people are unemployable, mind - though that's likely true, but because there are just more people than jobs. It's how things are. Someone has to miss out - always. Why should these people then have to pay a staggeringly high proportion of their (incentivisingly meagre)* benefit, in order to live in a festering shithole of a dwelling, whose many deficiencies are likely to be entirely ignored by any landlord, given that what is really worth money in this city is land, not buildings - and the value of the land will skyrocket anyway, while Johnny unlucky pays the mortgage and eats white bread and weetbix? Why, especially when said provincial towns are faded, as much as anything, from a 50-year hemorrhaging of population to the main centres?
*Can anyone explain to me why you incentivise poor people by taking money away from them, but incentivise CEOs by giving them more?
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The history of humanity give one little hope that strength left to its own devices won't be abused. Indeed, it gives one little ground to think that strength would continue to exist if it were not abused. -- Dafyd --
Posts: 993 | From: New Zealand | Registered: Oct 2008
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Soror Magna
Shipmate
# 9881
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by anoesis:
... *Can anyone explain to me why you incentivise poor people by taking money away from them, but incentivise CEOs by giving them more?
Poor people are motivated to do whatever it takes to survive and care for their families. Rich people are apparently only motivated by greed. One can argue whether this is true or not, fair or not, but it is how public policy is justified. We can't allow the safety net to become a hammock, but the rich will pack up and leave if they aren't making "enough" money.
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"You come with me to room 1013 over at the hospital, I'll show you America. Terminal, crazy and mean." -- Tony Kushner, "Angels in America"
Posts: 5430 | From: Caprica City | Registered: Jul 2005
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quetzalcoatl
Shipmate
# 16740
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Posted
Aren't we also going back to a notion of the undeserving poor, who actually should be punished? Of course, no politician is going to say that explicitly, but current withdrawals of benefits for relatively minor infringements, suggest it. In fact, a while ago, I think Osborne made a crack about people still in bed, with the curtains shut - inference, they are lazy and undeserving of help.
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I can't talk to you today; I talked to two people yesterday.
Posts: 9878 | From: UK | Registered: Oct 2011
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L'organist
Shipmate
# 17338
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Posted
The trouble is, some of us have relatives who are exactly the type of person people have in mind when they utter the word 'scrounger'.
I'm not ashamed of it because they're sentient adults who make their own choices, but I have 3 adult (50+) relatives who have never had a proper job, who have spent their entire adult lives claiming one benefit or another, who have always been housed at public expense, who have fathered (they're all male) children and given nothing towards their upkeep and made precious little effort with their upbringing.
Various well-meaning family members have over the years contributed significant sums to provide furniture, transport, holidays, etc, etc, etc; other family members have taken over the housing and educating of children.
These three men feel no shame, all three will happily (and at length) tell you how "the tory system and tory class" is ruining the country and none sees anything wrong with having spent 30+ years taking out of a system to which they have contributed nothing.
Do I consider these three (and their various non-working partners) "undeserving" - yes, because they are.
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Rara temporum felicitate ubi sentire quae velis et quae sentias dicere licet
Posts: 4950 | From: somewhere in England... | Registered: Sep 2012
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quetzalcoatl
Shipmate
# 16740
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by L'organist:
The trouble is, some of us have relatives who are exactly the type of person people have in mind when they utter the word 'scrounger'.
I'm not ashamed of it because they're sentient adults who make their own choices, but I have 3 adult (50+) relatives who have never had a proper job, who have spent their entire adult lives claiming one benefit or another, who have always been housed at public expense, who have fathered (they're all male) children and given nothing towards their upkeep and made precious little effort with their upbringing.
Various well-meaning family members have over the years contributed significant sums to provide furniture, transport, holidays, etc, etc, etc; other family members have taken over the housing and educating of children.
These three men feel no shame, all three will happily (and at length) tell you how "the tory system and tory class" is ruining the country and none sees anything wrong with having spent 30+ years taking out of a system to which they have contributed nothing.
Do I consider these three (and their various non-working partners) "undeserving" - yes, because they are.
So what would you do with them? Make them homeless?
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I can't talk to you today; I talked to two people yesterday.
Posts: 9878 | From: UK | Registered: Oct 2011
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Albertus
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# 13356
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Posted
I'd have no problem with that in principle, if they are indeed as l'o describes and there are no mitigating factors such as mental ill health.
[ 30. March 2015, 13:14: Message edited by: Albertus ]
Posts: 6498 | From: Y Sowth | Registered: Jan 2008
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Doc Tor
Deepest Red
# 9748
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by L'organist:
The trouble is, some of us have relatives who are exactly the type of person people have in mind when they utter the word 'scrounger'.
Well quite. One of my mother's friends was proud that he was able to hide so much of his income from the HMRC, yet was more than happy to claim all the benefits - reduced council tax, blue badge, winter fuel, state pension, NHS treatment - that he could.
I'm sorry you have relatives like that. Fortunately for me, I'm not directly related to anyone with an offshore account or works in the City.
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Forward the New Republic
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L'organist
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# 17338
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Posted
posted by Doc Tor quote:
Fortunately for me, I'm not directly related to anyone with an offshore account or works in the City.
Eh?
What is wrong with working in the City of London?
As for an 'offshore' account, plenty of us have them, and declare them, and pay tax on any interest earned. I first got an 'offshore' account so I could be paid for some work I did in a foreign country where I knew I was likely to be going from time-to-time for a considerable time. So I have that account and pay interest on any money in it to the tax authorities of the country, and if that turns out to be less than my tax liability here then I pay the difference to HMRC.
Don't assume everyone is on the fiddle - most of us are honest.
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Rara temporum felicitate ubi sentire quae velis et quae sentias dicere licet
Posts: 4950 | From: somewhere in England... | Registered: Sep 2012
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Karl: Liberal Backslider
Shipmate
# 76
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by L'organist:
posted by Doc Tor quote:
Fortunately for me, I'm not directly related to anyone with an offshore account or works in the City.
Eh?
What is wrong with working in the City of London?
As for an 'offshore' account, plenty of us have them, and declare them, and pay tax on any interest earned. I first got an 'offshore' account so I could be paid for some work I did in a foreign country where I knew I was likely to be going from time-to-time for a considerable time. So I have that account and pay interest on any money in it to the tax authorities of the country, and if that turns out to be less than my tax liability here then I pay the difference to HMRC.
Don't assume everyone is on the fiddle - most of us are honest.
Indeed.
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Might as well ask the bloody cat.
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Doc Tor
Deepest Red
# 9748
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by L'organist:
Don't assume everyone is on the fiddle - most of us are honest.
Scrounger means different things to different people.
I genuinely believe that if you can work, you should. Nothing comes for free. I also genuinely believe that if you earn, you pay all your taxes and don't chisel. And that those on benefits who do game the system cost the country far, far less than those who have great wealth and game the system.
If the only thing that comes out of a little bit of satire on my part is that you remember that the vast majority of benefit claimants are honest, decent people, and that the problem with 'scroungers' is disproportionately at the top of society, and not at the bottom, then my work is done.
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Forward the New Republic
Posts: 9131 | From: Ultima Thule | Registered: Jul 2005
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Marvin the Martian
Interplanetary
# 4360
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Doc Tor:
...the problem with 'scroungers' is disproportionately at the top of society, and not at the bottom
It's my impression that most of it isn't even done by people, but by companies.
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Hail Gallaxhar
Posts: 30100 | From: Adrift on a sea of surreality | Registered: Apr 2003
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Doc Tor
Deepest Red
# 9748
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Marvin the Martian:
quote:
Originally posted by Doc Tor:
...the problem with 'scroungers' is disproportionately at the top of society, and not at the bottom
It's my impression that most of it isn't even done by people, but by companies.
Oh, there's a lot of that too. But companies are comprised of people.
Basically, people. And yes, I do think most folk are mostly decent, and it isn't just fear of getting caught that curbs their baser instincts. But there's an awful lot of money at the top, and very few sanctions in place if they are caught - whereas at the bottom, there's very little to play for and the penalties Draconian.
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Forward the New Republic
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Sioni Sais
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# 5713
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Posted
I have to agree with Marvin. The economy and legal system too are designed with companies, ie legal entities that are not people, in mind. While limited companies and the like can sue and be sued they cannot be sent down for five years and it is very rare for the owners of same to suffer any criminal proceedings.
I doubt any party would advocate levelling this particular playing field as it would put investors off if instead of losing their money they might, God forbid, be held responsible for what has been done in their name.
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"He isn't Doctor Who, he's The Doctor"
(Paul Sinha, BBC)
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chris stiles
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# 12641
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Sioni Sais:
I have to agree with Marvin. The economy and legal system too are designed with companies, ie legal entities that are not people, in mind.
Sure, but equally there are plenty of high net worth individuals who arrange their affairs so that their assets are effectively owned via interconnected sets of companies - so I don't think you can absolve *individuals* of responsibility so easily.
The figures for money lost via tax evasion (rather than tax avoidance of the sort above) dwarfs the money lost in benefit fraud. Evasion will largely be down to individuals.
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Sioni Sais
Shipmate
# 5713
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by chris stiles:
quote:
Originally posted by Sioni Sais:
I have to agree with Marvin. The economy and legal system too are designed with companies, ie legal entities that are not people, in mind.
Sure, but equally there are plenty of high net worth individuals who arrange their affairs so that their assets are effectively owned via interconnected sets of companies - so I don't think you can absolve *individuals* of responsibility so easily.
The figures for money lost via tax evasion (rather than tax avoidance of the sort above) dwarfs the money lost in benefit fraud. Evasion will largely be down to individuals.
I wouldn't absolve individuals of responsibility - far from it - but it is my view that the very structure of companies facilitates tax evasion. If I could arrange my household finances as a limited company can, I'm sure I would pay far less tax. PAYE may be convenient for the Treasury, but anyone with the option seems to use alternative means, whatever they may be.
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Ricardus
Shipmate
# 8757
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by L'organist:
Do I consider these three (and their various non-working partners) "undeserving" - yes, because they are.
And have Mr Cameron's reforms caused these people to get jobs and contribute to society?
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Then the dog ran before, and coming as if he had brought the news, shewed his joy by his fawning and wagging his tail. -- Tobit 11:9 (Douai-Rheims)
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quetzalcoatl
Shipmate
# 16740
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Ricardus:
quote:
Originally posted by L'organist:
Do I consider these three (and their various non-working partners) "undeserving" - yes, because they are.
And have Mr Cameron's reforms caused these people to get jobs and contribute to society?
Never mind that; are they being punished with sufficient severity, so that the rest of us can enjoy feelings of smug Schadenfreude?
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I can't talk to you today; I talked to two people yesterday.
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Ethne Alba
Shipmate
# 5804
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Posted
The Supreme Court on Thursday appears to have thrown a life line to some in this situation. Although whether this is a partial life line remains to be seen.
( hopeless at linking, need to visit that place where one learns...sorry....)
[ 03. April 2015, 12:55: Message edited by: Ethne Alba ]
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Cod
Shipmate
# 2643
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Sioni Sais:
I wouldn't absolve individuals of responsibility - far from it - but it is my view that the very structure of companies facilitates tax evasion. If I could arrange my household finances as a limited company can, I'm sure I would pay far less tax. PAYE may be convenient for the Treasury, but anyone with the option seems to use alternative means, whatever they may be.
PAYE is collected from employers. They don't have to be companies.
That aside, you're picking the wrong target. You should take aim at trusts. There are plenty of good commercial reasons to incorporate a limited company. For example, it makes administration of a decent-sized business concern much more easy than any of the legal alternatives. That's a great help to commerce, which in turn generates more income to tax. By contrast, people use trusts so they can tell the taxman, a creditor, or the state administrators of various benefits that they haven't any money.
There are three ways in which the taxman loses out. The first is tax avoidance. I note at this point that the Coalition has brought in the UK's first anti-avoidance provision. The second is evasion (ie, lying on your tax return). The third is insolvency.
Now, there are plenty of ways to avoid tax without using limited companies. Imagine the following. Sterboks Rooibos Cafe trades in countries A and B. It does so under an agreement with Sterboks Bermuda Ltd that the cost of using Sterboks' logo is equal to the annual profit (other than that particular cost). Once it is deducted, Sterboks' profit in countries A and B is zero. However, it's profit in Bermuda is equal to the amount paid to Sterboks Bermuda Ltd. However, there's no particular reason why the owner of the logo can't be Mr Sterbok rather than a limited company. The law deems limited companies and humans as people.
Both humans and companies can evade tax. In the case of the latter, it is due to the company officers telling fibs, and I would be astonished if HMRC didn't prosecute the officers (and/or the company) and have them sent to prison in plenty of situations like that.
The final one is insolvency. I note that companies are designed to allow people to trade in the knowledge that they have some protection for their personal assets if things go wrong. If the company ends up insolvent, it will be liquidated, and the creditors' rights are wiped out. However, the alternative is probably much less commerce, and therefore less tax collection. Also, individuals can go bankrupt leaving creditors out of pocket in just the same way.
But if a person is careful enough to put all his assets in a discretionary trust, the creditors generally can't touch it because he can say it isn't "his". Because it's discretionary, it isn't anyone else's either... So, for the period of his bankruptcy he can laze by the swimming pool that isn't his, because he is the trustee and he says what happens to the property.
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"I fart in your general direction."
M Barnier
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