Protests Against cuts to Child Benefit

[Mrs TP]

Do you have plans to fight it?

[DaveR]

The vast majority of households in the UK will continue to receive child benefit because no occupant is a higher rate taxpayer. In fact, most of these households have a total household income that is below the threshold. If you are currently receiving child benefit, and will lose it, then your household income is way above the UK average. Yes, there are anomalies, but they do not obscure the reality that nobody* who is genuinely in need of these benefits will not continue to get them. That's my test of fairness.

*or such a small number as to be statistically insignificant - and those people will undoubtedly qualify for other benefits.

[Jessie]

Are you actually DaveC, DaveR? Interesting to read your views though

[slipons]

Mrs T, Absolutely, i have written to my MP and told them in no uncertain terms about my future voting intentions due to this. In terms of Demo's, i am struggling to find traction mainly due to a) People don't understand the implications yet (e.g. Benefits in Kind, other income, bonuses will all be taken into account) & b) It now affects only families with a single high earner, so most two earner families just under the threshold are doing fine out of this!

There are a number of e-petitions on the internet, but take-up is low due to the above. If you follow me on twitter @slipons1 hopefully we can get a number of like-minded individuals together to take action.

DaveR

As always, everyone is entitled to their views, but my personal one is to value universal child benefit due to the below principles;

Promoting ?horizontal? equity between people of similar incomes, with and without children;

Providing a contribution from society as a whole to the next generation;

Giving a stable element at times of financial insecurity caused by, for example, insecure employment or family breakdown;

Offering an independent income for women

[LondonMix]

That's nice. What do you propose to cut instead to avoid means testing this currently universal benefit? Or perhaps you'd prefer to pay more tax?

Edited to add: don't underestimate people. Most fully understand the issue but the vast majority who are not affected by the means testing rightly won't be sympathetic and those of us who are impacted won't automatically oppose a policy out of self-interest but rather will take a broader view regarding what's going on in the economy and society right now.

slipons Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> Mrs T, Absolutely, i have written to my MP and

> told them in no uncertain terms about my future

> voting intentions due to this. In terms of Demo's,

> i am struggling to find traction mainly due to a)

> People don't understand the implications yet (e.g.

> Benefits in Kind, other income, bonuses will all

> be taken into account) & b) It now affects only

> families with a single high earner, so most two

> earner families just under the threshold are doing

> fine out of this!

>

> There are a number of e-petitions on the internet,

> but take-up is low due to the above. If you follow

> me on twitter @slipons1 hopefully we can get a

> number of like-minded individuals together to take

> action.

>

> DaveR

> As always, everyone is entitled to their views,

> but my personal one is to value universal child

> benefit due to the below principles;

>

> Promoting ?horizontal? equity between people of

> similar incomes, with and without children;

>

> Providing a contribution from society as a whole

> to the next generation;

>

> Giving a stable element at times of financial

> insecurity caused by, for example, insecure

> employment or family breakdown;

>

> Offering an independent income for women

[DaveR]

"Promoting ?horizontal? equity between people of similar incomes, with and without children;

Providing a contribution from society as a whole to the next generation;

Giving a stable element at times of financial insecurity caused by, for example, insecure employment or family breakdown;

Offering an independent income for women"

....and these principles happily coincide with your own self-interest!

Plus, when you look a bit more closely, what do those principles amount to?

"horizontal equity??" Does that mean subsidising people who have kids for the additional costs? Doesn't really addrerss the question of why it should be universal.

"Contribution from the whole of society"? Including from the minimum wage earning non-parent to the millionaire parent.

A stable element? Not really the purpose of this benefit, and in any event the lower paid are inherently more likely to suffer real crises.

Income for women? I thought it was for the kids.

[WishfulThinking]

I've been following this thread with interest, because I am amazed that anyone could object to a benefit being removed from a household with an income over ?50K. Yes, I agree that it is crazy that this change does not take into account joint income, so when both parents earn you can retain the benefit even with both parents earning almost ?50K. However, as many have pointed out, this is only going to change the situation for those earning in the top 10%. How can it ever be appropriate for tax money to be re-directed from someone on mimimum wage to someone earning so much?

For those that it does effect, think about this: we chose to have children. We also chose to live in an expensive area of London. Surely if this lifestyle can't be maintained without the assistance of the state, then it is our responsibiliy to change things so that we live within our means. Why should the child-free and lower earners subsidise our lifestyles? To some extent, I also think that if you have chosen not to work, then this is also a choice that you can alter if you need to (i.e. to make use of your tax-free allowance or to make ends meet after CB changes come into force).

I'm not saying that this policy is being implimented in a sensible way, but I do agree on principle with the view that a benefit should not be available to the highest 10% of earners in the country at the expense of the other 90%.

[Otta]

Well said.

[alieh]

I agree with Chippy Minton in that even if you agree with the idea of this being a means tested benefit (though there are lots of arguments in favour of there being some universal benefits, especially those related to children) that it is actually incredibly administratively costly to manage and monitor means tested benefits and sometimes the cost of doing this outweighs the savings for the government.

This point seems to get lost in most of the debates about this issue.

[LondonMix]

HMRC have already come up with a method. Its up to high-rate tax payers if we want to knowingly commit tax fraud. If HMRC don't make the savings they are anticipating and suspect widespread fraud, there are other alternatives that don't necessarily have to cost the earth to administer.

[Loz]

Scrap child benefit altogether. There are too many people in this world - why are we giving people a benefit to have more? Madness.

Everything else that increases the risk of climate change is being taxed. Scrapping CB makes the most sense.

[zeban]

http://www.eastdulwichforum.co.uk/forum/read.php?20,968674