Benefit cap goes before the Lords.

[Wynonie Harris]

Originally Posted by Gordon Booth

you're running out of allies(and logical arguments).

He's got the unelected Godbotherers and Paddy Pantsdown and various other spacewasters in the second chamber.

[Gordon Booth]

Originally Posted by Wynonie Harris

He's got the unelected Godbotherers and Paddy Pantsdown and various other spacewasters in the second chamber.

With allies like those who needs enemies?

[Gordon Booth]

I wondered as I listened to the Bishops pontificating about the homeless and the little children if they have considered leading by example?
How many homeless and little children have they welcomed into their multi roomed, multi million pound Bishops Palaces? I'll open the bidding at none.
And if £26,000(£35000 before tax) is not enough for a needy family, why is £22,000(before tax) considered by them to be enough for a vicar and his family?
Charity begins at home-but not if you're a Bishop!

[Margaret Pilkington]

The other thing that no-one mentions is that these sky high rents paid for by benefits will be forced to come down if the tenants can no longer afford them.......who on earth pays £2000 a month for a simple mews house?
I am pretty sure that the private landlords will accept less to ensure their properties are occupied by renters rather than Moldovan squatters.

It is all down to market forces.

On another subject altogether, wasn't there something in the newspapers about bullying the elderly(sorry, I should have said taxing) out of their homes and into smaller properties.
The homes that these people have lived in all of their lives....scrimped and saved up to buy........and the government produced a report that says they should move out and allow families to move into them....families who perhaps haven't bothered to save up for a home. Families who perhaps have had a 'want it now - I'm having it now' kind of lifestyle.
Wrong...plain wrong!

[ToffeeGuy]

Originally Posted by MargaretR

..... the Benefit Cap needs to be accompanied by a large scale building of affordable rented housing and an increase in employment opportunities.......

100% agree. It annoys me when old Etonians like Cameron and Boris born with silver spoons in their mouths bang on about people having to get jobs on the minimum wage in Poundland. Like they'd know.

Let the masses be distracted by their bread and circuses whilst the upper classes rule.

[Gordon Booth]

Originally Posted by ToffeeGuy

Let the masses be distracted by their bread and circuses whilst the upper classes rule.

I'm eating cake and looking forward to the circus-is it free entry, subsidised by HBC as an Art event?

[garinda]

Originally Posted by ToffeeGuy

100% agree. It annoys me when old Etonians like Cameron and Boris born with silver spoons in their mouths bang on about people having to get jobs on the minimum wage in Poundland. Like they'd know.

Let the masses be distracted by their bread and circuses whilst the upper classes rule.

So, in soft sap land, you'd rather politicans tell people that they shouldn't bother with a paid job, and instead they should stay at home sat on their arse, because those in work will provide them with more income on benefits, than if they actually worked for a living?

Give me strength.

Earlier Eric put this all down to the British class system, and the divide between rich and poor.

Rubbish.

As a society, materially, we never have had it as good.

Of course there's disparity between rich and poor.

There always has been, and always will be.

Unless we abandon capitalism, and go down the soviet, or communist China route.

Which still had/have a hierarchy, haves versus the have nots, but on power, rather than class divisons.

You only have to go back a few years to see how the lives of the poorest members of society have improved.

Fifty years ago your destiny was mapped out aged eleven. With 90% of children given an inferior education, knowing they were factory fodder. Now, rightly or wrongly, we've never had as many graduates.

Working class women especially had a life of hard toil and drudgery. No automatic washing machines, no vacuum cleaners, no hot and cold runing water, with indoor bathrooms to keep your kids clean in. All this after working full time, as many were forced to do.

We've never had a higher percentage of people with their own transport, access to communication, mobiles, computers, etc, and the majority of people have never travelled so much. Plus all the leisure activities the vast majority of people have, such as films, television, games, reading material etc.

So no, I disagree. We've never had as many opportunities for social mobility in this country.

People certainly don't doth their caps, and tug their forelocks to their 'betters', as would have happened once over.

Our parents/grandparents generations had relatively little, compared to us.

In desperation, when out of work, some might have stolen food in the past, to make sure their children didn't actually die of starvation.

However, those generations of folk didn't take to the streets, rioting and looting, so they could have the very latest dolly tub, or wind-up gramaphone player.

That's the difference.

Pride, and self-respect.

Not what nowadays passes as poverty, and some see as an excuse to do whatever they want, and take what they see as their's by right.

[mobertol]

Great post Garinda - time to cut the nonsense and get back to common sense.

[garinda]

Originally Posted by mobertol

Great post Garinda - time to cut the nonsense and get back to common sense.

Thanks comrade.

(That's just to confuse those who like to throw 'right-wing' labels about, willy-nilly, and who know nothing of our past ties to the left. Though I was never as close to the heart of it all as you.)

[mobertol]

Originally Posted by garinda

Thanks comrade.

(That's just to confuse those who like to throw 'right-wing' labels about, willy-nilly, and who know nothing of our past ties to the left. Though I was never as close to the heart of it all as you.)

Compagno Garinda - less of the heart and more of the "Russian Salute" these days thinking about old affiliations methinks.

[garinda]

Originally Posted by mobertol

Compagno Garinda - less of the heart and more of the "Russian Salute" these days thinking about old affiliations methinks.

What is it they say?

You can take the student out of Liverpool, but you can't take the Militant out of the student.

Something like that.

[mobertol]

Originally Posted by garinda

What is it they say?

You can take the student out of Liverpool, but you can't take the Militant out of the student.

Something like that.

Apart from my liking for lace-up, kick-ass boots, little remains of the rather active, ideological student I knew back then.

Got lost on the road to Damascus a long time ago and now, so it seems, has the other student, who I think never met back then. That student has kept a soapbox to stand on from time to time though

The circle has finally closed and like everything it's history of a sort, or nearly was!

[Mancie]

Of course there should be a benefit cap, but why are the Government making this so called "defeat" such a big issue?... last week the Lords rejected the cuts for the disabled and cancer victims and not a mention of public opinion.. all of a sudden they turn out opinion polls showing a large percentage of those in favour of a benefit cap, no surprise there.
There is very little opposition to a cap .. the stalling point is wether child benefit should be included in the cap.. nothing to do with the 4 or 5 families living in "mansions" some newspapers churned out..anyone with a bit of common sense knows that most families working or not recieving any benefits are far from living a life in luxury.

[garinda]

Originally Posted by Mancie

.
There is very little opposition to a cap

True.

Just a few of your M.P.'s bleeding heart mates, the Lib Dem peers, and a load of purple clad old women who live in palaces, called the bishops.

Talking of your mate, Simon Hughes.

He bends for Jesus.

Get him lobbied, and tell him how poverty could be solved overnight.

By making the church sell off all their assests, and give the proceeds to the poor and starving.

[ToffeeGuy]

Originally Posted by garinda

True.

Just a few of your M.P.'s bleeding heart mates, the Lib Dem peers, and a load of purple clad old women who live in palaces, called the bishops.

Talking of your mate, Simon Hughes.

He bends for Jesus.

Get him lobbied, and tell him how poverty could be solved overnight.

By making the church sell off all their assests, and give the proceeds to the poor and starving.

I'd rather on the side of the righteous whoever they maybe, Simon Hughes, Bishops, Leigh Bowery, Lib Dem peers etc...