Friday 16 September 2011

Interesting Thoughts

I just got this comment at he end of my Guardian thread and I thought it was so startlingly good, I asked if I could post it here.

So thanks to "ephemerid" ......

We have 2.5 million people out of work. 


Allegedly.

The way the figures are calculated means that : 

-People of working age who have no job and are claiming JSA are counted.

These people aren't - 

Those who have no job but don't claim including self-employed people without entitlement and people who have a working person in their household; 

Those who have run run out of the 6 months JSA entitlement; 

Those who are "hidden" on work programmes; 

Those who have been made redundant but aren't claiming yet due to severance packages, 

Those who have taken early retirement, or are economically inactive due to some other reason (parents, carers, students, interns);

Prisoners; 

and of course, those who are disabled, sick, or dying.

Some of those people claim benefits, many don't
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The vast majority of people who get benefits in the UK are, old age pensioners. There are more people in work claiming Working Tax Credits, Child Tax Credits, Disabled Tax Credits, Disability Living Allowance, Housing Benefit, and Council Tax Benefit, than there are people on ESA. 

People with incomes of more than £40k pa can claim some of those benefits. (You can look all this up at HMRC and other sites - it's all true)

Big corporations who pay minimum wage, offer zero-hours contracts, and employ people for less than 16 hours to avoid NIC, are effectively getting benefits in that their profits are made by using armies of people whose labour is subsidised by the state. 

They must be rubbing their hands with glee at the thought that people claiming JSA will now have to "earn" their £65 by working a full week for free. 

Those JSA claimants will include people who have been thrown off their ESA by a French IT company, which, with all the money its' got for doing this, has the brass neck to sponsor the Paralympics.

There are people who have cancer having these benefits stopped; if they have to claim JSA they get sanctioned if they don't turn up for an interview for a MacJob because they had to go for chemo.
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The Tories are engaging in classic divide and rule tactics - it started under Labour, to its' eternal shame - and the hype and hysteria regarding benefit cheats and scroungers is causing absolute misery.

I genuinely fear another cold winter; I know that I can't work, I know that I'm facing yet another battle to claim what I'm entitled to and have paid for; I know that I will never meet draconian jobsearch conditions; I know that if I didn't have the support of a loving friend I'd be homeless; and I know that this government is deliberately, callously, and coldly demonising people like me and it's disgusting.
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My heart goes out to the people on here who have described the appalling treatment they face every day.
Divide and rule, bread and circuses - no bread for us, we've become the bloody circus. It's reprehensible.

Hear! Hear! ephemerid. Hear! Hear!


7 comments:

  1. Well this article is all so bloody true and its a bit like the yorkshire men sketch by monty python ...you try tellin em and the wont believe yer! It is so bloody sick that the very company that persecutes the sick and disabled sponsors the olympics for gods sake you couldnt make this shit up if you tried.
    It is the divide and rule policy in action .WAKE UP WAKE UP...There are more people in work claiming than those on esa etc and when THOSE benefits go ,as they will, then lets see the screaching start then .....We should ALL have been screaching as loud as possible but remember the divide and rule policy ...drip drip drip in the papers and tv ...repeat till message is imbedded and repeat at regular intervals.
    What every MP should have is a contract of employment that states who they work for and what they are employed for.They shouldnt be allowed to undermine the voters wishes or sell of anything we paid for ..nhs for example,or introduce or try to promote any legislation deemed harmfull to the public infrastructure paid for by us and previous generations held in trust by them and us for future generations.Social Legacy Policy..eh not elist hegenomy...Just cos your dad has a castle or sells posh wallpaper does not give you any rights over the majority .I dont want bread circuses but i do want a big society just one a million times better than the blairbrowncamcleggosborne beast keep trying to fool us with.

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  2. what we need is someone from the government looking in on this blog and putting the correct lawful measures in place that offer protection to the sick and disabled

    What we have at this time is far to many blogs and i mean no disrespect to anyone here or elsewhere but there are far to many blogs with the same agenda and that causes confusion all round and lets everyone in the government and DWP off the hook as they would be able to say "i don't read that blog i read this one" in other words i know nothing and just play the devils advocate why ? because that gets them off the hook under living in a so called democracy as the government would be able to say in law i wasn't aware of so and so's death but will look in to it which is to late as the death has taken place

    Personally i would rather have all sick and disabled follow one blog only as i do believe it would give focus and clarity as it is at present I'm finding it a bit of a mish mash hopping all over the web and not being able to keep up with everyone ans with the odd death or to creeping in I'm finding that is not good and am sure there are many others that i know nothing about and in my mind that's just plain criminal

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  3. Ephemerid from Latin Ephēmerida (short-lived)
    A wonderful article by this intelligent and articulate poster whom I sincerely hope lives long and prospers.

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  4. Thanks Sue - I'm very flattered you should want to use my words, but may I just say that in the original post on CIF the sentence said "old age pensioners excluded". Petty, I know - but I like to be clear!
    Anonymous - how kind you are. Long before I got sick, I had a tattoo done on my ankle to celebrate a special birthday (I was 2 years sober after a battle with alcoholism) and I chose a mayfly - from the genus ephemeridae, they are said to live for just one day.
    And I take my life a day at a time.
    At one memorable WCA, I was asked about my drinking history in the most patronising fashion (none of my current medical problems were caused by it) and the woman/robot/whatever was astonished when I told her I was a recovering alcoholic who hadn't had a drink for over 10 years. She seemed to think this was an oxymoron but she clearly knew nothing about addiction or recovery - this is very worrying when you consider how many people there are in recovery (100,000 in AA in the UK alone, which doesn't include many others in other treatments or programmes) and how common substance use issues are. Many people misuse drugs or alcohol if they self-medicate, and this can cause additional problems for people who are already ill.
    So - by telling you why I use my pen-name, I've gone off on one of my many bugbears. Luckily I belong to a group of people who are working together to tackle some of those issues and make recovery more visible - if you're interested, check out www.ukrf.org.uk
    We had a summit recently, and we had some discussion on WCA's and how many people still in treatment or rehab are getting benefits stopped; many of those people have physical and mental health issues which take time to address, and the last thing they need is to end up back on the streets.
    I'm glad I came across this blog via CIF and I'll be back! Thanks for the compliments.
    Soldier on......

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  5. Sorry ephemerid, you're right. I didn't quite understand what you meant by those words in the original post - probably my fault. If you want to re-write the sentence/explain - I'll happily amend.

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  6. No need really, Sue.
    The original remarks were aimed at all the people on benefits - excluding pensioners - who are far greater in number than those of us on ESA (when we can actually get it, that is) so the message came across anyway.
    Thanks for the politeness, though - it's getting less common in the real world out there, as your article demonstrated. So well done!

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  7. Well… I discharge up zones on an anxiously seeming like issue, sitting above I never visited your blog. I added it to populars other than i'll be your solid starter. Benefit Beverages

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