Therese Coffey on removal of universal credit uplift

[Gecko1978]

bhstewie said:

Of course it's hard and unpleasant and there is no one size fits all solution but PistonHeads always brings it down to "just work more" and "learn a skill" as if that's possible for everyone.

Not everyone can and another hard and unpleasant truth is that if you take a trip around town or a supermarket or basically go on a tour of places with "minimum wage jobs you probably wouldn't want to do" the reality is someone has to do them.

People want their lunchtime coffee or our Amazon delivery or someone to serve us in the supermarket or at the click n collect.

Not everyone can simply up-skill and move on.

And temporary or not when you take money away from people and pile on a national insurance increase their reality is that they're going to be poorer and feel that.

For the work and pensions minister to not even know that it isn't as simple as "just doing a couple of extra hours" tells you all you need to know about how much of a fk Coffey gives about those people.

The current government do not give a fk about people that's for sure.

[Downward]

LargeRed said:

"Labour called the minister's remarks "an insult to hard working families"."

If they were hard working they wouldn't be on 'The Universally Accredited system.'

Hmm

[poo at Paul's]

This is just the removal of the extra grand per year such people were given for covid r, yes?
Why exactly did they need an extra grand a year….in their hands. And if they needed it, why didn’t everyone get it.
Many UC recipients don’t work, they don’t go to work, they stay at home. Why were such people paid more to stay at home,W hen that’s all they have to do anyway?
This talk of it being a ‘cut’ is horse st.

[davethebunny]

Age old problem though.

Lots of people on UC and other benefits are there as a lifestyle and not as a safety net.

Family member left school pretty much illiterate and has spent the last 3 years dossing at her boyfriends grans house.

No intention to get a job or do anything but occasionally ring up other family members complaining she’s cold or needs X.

Lots of people like her, generations of families that live this way.

My wife when she got furloughed last summer went straight round Dominos and got a delivery driver job.
She’s been back at work since the summer and is now working 26hrs at job no 1 and 20 hours at job no 2.

However Dominos cant fill their vacancies and she’s just been for another interview for job no 1 and was offered it on the spot. This is catering assistant so not overly skilled. She picked up the current job with no experience in the sector (was in a nursery before)

Most of the people she works with though, will not do anymore than 16 hours per week, but these are the same people who harp on about ‘the rich’ and their ‘tax avoidance’.

They can’t see that they are effectively avoiding tax by not wanting to take the extra hours on offer.

[bitchstewie]

anonymous said:

[redacted]

I agree completely on the "not a career" part and I'm not belittling it at all but if you're waiting on tables or stocking supermarket shelves you're probably not getting paid very well for doing it so you'll feel this more than many other people will and you have a steady stream of people like on this thread telling you to simply up-skill or make more of yourself which isn't always possible or as simple as it's made to sound.

[Biggy Stardust]

anonymous said:

[redacted]

If people want to do that then fair play to them. There's days I'd swap with the guys pushing brooms or warehouse picking

However, if folks on benefits want more money then acquiring a better paid skillset is more reasonable than sitting around bhing about how little they are given for nothing.

[valiant]

Have we had Sky tv and latest iPhones yet or am I a little early?

[anonymous-user]

Pixelpeep 135 said:

it was extra, paid during covid - now it's being removed. it was never a thing, why can't people just be thankful they got it for as long as they did?

Give an inch for a year and they expect a mile, forever.

While I agree with what you say, it would be nice if it worked the other way too. Remember when VAT went from 17.5% to 15, then they "temporarily" raised it to 20% to make up what was lost and it's stayed there ever since

[ZedLeg]

The funniest thing is that if everyone did train to be at the level of all the PH execs and contractors they would start moaning about all these jumped up proles driving salaries down by saturating the market

[Biggy Stardust]

ZedLeg said:

The funniest thing is that if everyone did train to be at the level of all the PH execs and contractors they would start moaning about all these jumped up proles driving salaries down by saturating the market

Give it a try & we'll see.

[Gecko1978]

ZedLeg said:

The funniest thing is that if everyone did train to be at the level of all the PH execs and contractors they would start moaning about all these jumped up proles driving salaries down by saturating the market

No if everyone trained hard then the entry criteria would rise. The reality is the majority who are paid more have better skills than those paid less. Sure some woke up found they has won lotto, or could sing like an angel or kick a ball (still hard work I suspect). But most people in work, focused on climbing the ladder moved jobs and location. You yourself moved cities. I worked overseas for a few years. There would be no driving of salaries down just higher criteria for entry to the next rung on the ladder. In time the same people would occupy the same roles.

[ZedLeg]

So everyone would train and nothing would change? Kind of defeats the point no?

I didn’t move cities for work. I packed in my old job to move and had to find a new one.

[Downward]

valiant said:

Have we had Sky tv and latest iPhones yet or am I a little early?

Reminds me of the song Common people by Pulp most the folk in here.

[Escy]

It's going back about 8 years but I spend a year on benefits, wife didn't have a job, we'd just had a baby (lost my job a month after she was born). I was earning 20k a year, we were renting which was about £650 a month. We were better off on benefits as they covered everything.

I found a job in my field a year later with a salary of £23,000. It's st money still (actually insulting considering you need a degree for it) but it's comfortably above the minimum wage stuff. I remember after the first month being less than £100 a month better off than I was on benefits for 37.5 hours of work. It's not hard to see why people feel trapped on them.

As for the temporary nature of the £20 uplift, fuel has gone up about 30p a litre since that was introduced, I had a email off my energy supplier last week saying my bill is going up £430 extra this year and i'm already paying £1200 a year. All these HGV bumper wages are being paid for with price increases at the shops. I bet lots of people affected by this are already feeling the pinch.

[valiant]

It’s the new triple lock.

Loss of UC.
Increased NI.
Gas&leccy seeing major increases.


It’s going to get very tough for many earning low wages unfortunately.

[Biggy Stardust]

ZedLeg said:

So everyone would train and nothing would change? Kind of defeats the point no?

I didn’t move cities for work. I packed in my old job to move and had to find a new one.

No- everyone could train but many will just sit on their arses & whinge. Things will change for the others so the point isn't defeated so much as proven.

[Castrol for a knave]

I am waiting for someone to say the hungry undeserving poor should fish in the Thames.

It is easy to belittle and be condescending to people who need to balance their wage with UC, making clever, pithy comments and posting wky memes.

A lot of people do work hard and still need to rely on UC. Often they are in that wage trap, or they work jobs that do require dedication and commitment - try working in a care home or care visitor. st money, st hours and literally dealing with st.

Not everyone who claims UC is laid on a couch, with their hand down their joggers watching Trisha, just as not everyone on NP&E is a self satisfied .

[ZedLeg]

Biggy Stardust said:

No- everyone could train but many will just sit on their arses & whinge. Things will change for the others so the point isn't defeated so much as proven.

My point was that following my logic you would end up with depressed salaries due to oversupply of Labour, the other guy’s logic was that you would end up with a lot of over skilled and underemployed people.

Your point just seems to be setting up a Strawman to prove yourself right.

None of these seem ideal tbh.

[swanseaboydan]

Why don’t poor people start their own track and trace system or maybe manufacture and import Covid testing equipment ? Better still, club together and buy a hotel that they can rent out at an extortionate rate to the government for people returning from holidays ? Works for some . . .

[sim72]

I'm just trying to imagine the response if Coffey's comments had been made by Diane Abbott.