Bedroom Tax At Last, Our Council Speaks Out.

[Guinness]

Originally Posted by tommiasfc

People should realize social housing is a privilege not a right.

Glad I'm too thick to realise this. I always thought the point of social housing was to give the less priviledged the right to shelter...

Surprised you ain't advocating bringing back workhouses, bedlam and stupid wars led by stupid people to cull the population..

[MargaretR]

The population cull is well under way.
If the junk food doesn't get you, the pharmacutical companies will.
..and if you survive to draw a pension, they will engineer your death by hypothermia.

[Gordon Booth]

Originally Posted by MargaretR

When you can accept this as fact you can then explore why.
.....and realise that 1984 is nearer than you think.

Yes, MargaretR but isn't it comforting to think it's getting further away as the years go by!

[MargaretR]

Originally Posted by Gordon Booth

Yes, MargaretR but isn't it comforting to think it's getting further away as the years go by!

You knew exactly to what I was referring.... so don't trivialise an important topic.

[Gordon Booth]

Originally Posted by MargaretR

You knew exactly to what I was referring.... so don't trivialise an important topic.

I'm terribly sorry, MargaretR, as a mere engineer I was simply responding to your incorrect statement with an accurate fact.

Originally Posted by MargaretR

The population cull is well under way.
If the junk food doesn't get you, the pharmacutical companies will.
..and if you survive to draw a pension, they will engineer your death by hypothermia.

The thought that death is inevitable must be a great comfort to you.

As for the bedroom tax, there is some sense in saying someone who doesn't need two or three bedrooms should make it available to someone who needs it and move into a one bedroom home.
HOWEVER-there needs to be a suitable home available for them, if there isn't one on offer it's not fair to punish them. If there is and they refuse it, well fair enough.
This has some of the petty meanness about it that the pasty tax had.

[Less]

Originally Posted by DaveinGermany

Well they get turned away until they can or they pay for an interpretor.

Back on subject though, here in Germany, if the social are picking up your tab for housing they have no qualms about reducing your allowance if they consider your accommodation beyond that required for your situation, you find the extra yourself or you move, no ifs, no buts, hard & uncompromising.

Well the Germans had a way of fitting whole families into a small space, being hygienic they always insisted folk went into a shower first!
Meanwhile if that is the way its always been then good luck to the na...sties.
Look at the bedroom tax this way, for some time in this country we haven't had the death penalty.
Now suppose it was re-introduced?
Do all those convicted of murder suddenly become people for the long drop? Or do we start with newly convicted folk?
I would think it most inhumane to suddenly give someone that has served a life sentence a sudden change to the death penalty.
So how come people already living in a house with two bedrooms suddenly gets penalized?
Surely if the decision about bedrooms was to be fair they should say, if before the date of taxing bedrooms becomes law you live in one ok no fine, if however from that date if you choose to have a single life with two bedrooms you will have to pay extra just for tommyfanatics privilige.

[DaveinGermany]

Originally Posted by Less

Meanwhile if that is the way its always been then good luck to the na...sties.

As far as I'm aware that's the case, since the rebuilding & restructuring of the Country after WWII. Towns had to be rebuilt & people housed so much of the monetary support the Germans received under the Marshall plan went into housing & industry.

There is also a large amount of social housing which is multi family accommodation "Mietshaus", anywhere between 4 - 20 families live alongside each other but there is also the consideration of the "family sizes". When these places are built a 20 family house over 4 floors will mirror each other with at least one, possibly 2 flats designated for single person/couple occupancy.

[accyman]

Originally Posted by MargaretR

When money is witheld from wages it is named 'tax'.

Benefits are substitutes for wages.

benefits are also what someone expects to get after paying in national insurance and tax.What people dont expect is that after years of paying tax and national insurance is to be labled a scrounger.Not everyone has sat on their arse since leaving school and believe it or not some folk worked before leaving school.Granted they didnt pay tax on morning and weekend jobs but they still got off their arses.

its becoeme trendy to class anyone on benefits a scrounger when in most cases on benefits is not the luxurious lifestyle that it is made out to be.

[jaysay]

Originally Posted by susie123

Why only European ones?

Exactly Susie, exactly

[jaysay]

Originally Posted by susie123

On the subject of migrants, this document makes interesting reading:

EU migrants: entitlement to housing assistance (England) - Commons Library Standard Note - UK Parliament

If you don't want to read it all I have copied some relevant paragraphs below, and page 11 onwards deals with the question of whether migrants jump the queue.

There is no general entitlement to social housing for anyone in England, including British citizens. [Emphasis mine] It should also be noted that even those people from abroad who may be eligible for housing assistance still have to qualify for assistance in line with an authority’s housing allocation scheme, or meet the criteria under which a statutory duty arises to households that are homeless (Part 7 of the 1996 Housing Act (as amended)).

Allocation of social housing
Foreign nationals are eligible for an allocation of social housing if:
in the case of European economic area nationals, they have a relevant right to reside, for example, if they are working, self-sufficient, or have a permanent right of residence in the UK (after five years lawful residence in the UK),
in the case of other foreign nationals, they have been granted leave to enter or remain in the UK with recourse to public funds (for example, people granted refugee status or humanitarian protection).
Where foreign nationals are eligible, they would have their housing needs considered on the same basis as other applicants in accordance with the local authority's allocation scheme.

Very interesting Susie, but to my way of thinking if people from the EU are eligible for social housing, the benefit they received should only be at the same monetary rate they would receive in their own country, and not make the streets of GB look like tey are paved with gold

[Margaret Pilkington]

If you come into this country without first making provision for accommodation, then doesn't that put you in the category of the 'homeless'?
Aren't these 'homeless' people given priority in respect of social housing?
Somehow, I'd got it in my head that they were...certainly in this country anyway....if you rock up on the Costa del Sol, and present yourself at the Spanish version of the social services offices, I think their response would have 'off' in the sentence.

[jaysay]

Originally Posted by Margaret Pilkington

If you come into this country without first making provision for accommodation, then doesn't that put you in the category of the 'homeless'?
Aren't these 'homeless' people given priority in respect of social housing?
Somehow, I'd got it in my head that they were...certainly in this country anyway....if you rock up on the Costa del Sol, and present yourself at the Spanish version of the social services offices, I think their response would have 'off' in the sentence.

Exactly right Margaret, you want and interpreter in Spain you pay for one, here the tax payer pays for it, in other countries documents are printed in the language of that country not in dozens of versions as in good old GB,. As I've said before the problem is we are the do-gooding capital of the world, there are to many Guardian reading hand wringing left wing liberals knocking about to let sanity prevail

[cmonstanley]

there is one reason to include a middleman here to pay rent is the banks,the more money that travel through their accounts the more money they make.plus when they start charging everybody for an account next year they will make a packet.that is what is coming the only way to stop it is to get the tories out and keep them out.

[Barrie Yates]

Originally Posted by cmonstanley

there is one reason to include a middleman here to pay rent is the banks,the more money that travel through their accounts the more money they make.plus when they start charging everybody for an account next year they will make a packet.that is what is coming the only way to stop it is to get the tories out and keep them out.

Have you ever known any political party reverse decisions made by the previous government no matter how hystericaly they ranted about the Government actions when in opposition?

[cmonstanley]

yep the tories do it all the time for their mates Houses in Multiple Occupation - Coalition Government Reverse Labour Policy by David Jones (Article) ? Evans Jones