Work hard lads

[Glenn Baker]

I think a lot of people have completely forgotten what it is truly like to be forever going nowhere fast with low wages and the 10pound average wage that got you nowhere.
the same thing is happening again now except there are no jobs as well.

Yes this generation has made a lot of mistakes including the masses of Single mothers , but it doesnt alter the fact that Britain is in Recession many people have lost their jobs and even more have had the Banks pleasure on foreclosing on their main assett their house.

Many people try hard , many people apply for dozens of Jobs that are not there. just cast your minds back to when and where you sprung from and your circumstances.
Ask your selves why so many people migrated to Australia and New Zealand.

Secondly try going down to the dole office to get a Job. there is no Merchant Navy no selection of ships and worse still no memory of hard times, hard times and pain seem to vanish when those that speak are all right.

try telling a family paying off a house and lost their jobs that they are spoilt.

[Tony Morcom]

It is very interesting to hear some members saying how others should live. Other threads on the site have very similar debates from the other side of the coin i.e. criticising the so called upper classes, M.Ps etc., etc, for saying how the rest of us should live. Without wishing to get into an argument and without trying to gain any sympathy at all, I would just like people to imagine for a few minutes just what it would mean to them to suddenly be faced with life on benefits. Well I'll tell you from my perspective. Up until 5 years ago I was earning anything up to £45k a year sometimes more as a sales manager, working 14 hours a day and enjoying life to the full. Then BANG: through no fault of my own my company went bankrupt leaving me without a job at 50. A month later my wife was struck down with her illness. All of a sudden my working life was over, still with no hope of return anytime soon. My existing financial commitments such as pensions, life insurance, h.p. on the car, savings for holidays, pet insurance, medical insurance etc all came to an end and in the majority of cases I lost all the benefits of them because I was having to default on the payments. My overdraft was taken away, along with my credit cards. A good income became a nightmare of debt. The only saving grace was the fact that luckily we were renting rather than paying a mortgage. However we were still forced to move at our own expense to a smaller house. Our life style changed beyond all recognition. Forget the actual fact of my wife's illness that we had to cope with as well ~ it is the principal that I am talking about.

Oh how easy it is for you non smokers to criticise that I still smoke, albeit rollups these days instead of the tailor mades I'd much prefer. £40 a month is all I spend on baccie, probably less than you spend on booze during the average week. Yes we have the occasional take away, not because we can afford it but because we deserve a treat now and again!! What right has anybody to tell me that I should feed my daughter porridge every day or weetabix?? And what about the cost of everything else, fruit, veg, gravy, beans, spagetti, oh the list is endless! What about school uniforms, school shoes at a tenner a pop for cheapies that will last a term, coats, normal clothes, school trips, sweets, T.V. costs etc.. All child benefit does is help to contribute to the normal household bills. 1 child you get £20.30, 2 kids =£16.85 each, 3 kids, £15.70, 4 kids £15.12 and so on. I will tell you now that if after paying all the necessary bills each month, food, gas, electric, water, rent short fall, petrol, insurance, clothes, cleaning materials, washing powder, bog rolls ~ the list goes on and on, we are lucky if we have much left over to actually try and LIVE LIFE! To sit hear listening to all the generalisations is frankly insulting and I am sure there are other members on here who are in a similar position and feel the same. We all know there is a percentage that flout the rules: THEY ARE NOT THE ONES who live next door and have a few pizzas!!!! They are the ones who do hard drugs, are alcoholics or are abusing the system in one of many other ways and using their illgotten gains for several holidays a year, have 2 or 3 cars and living the high life. Usually they have a job or jobs in addition top claiming benefits. Drive around any council estates and you will see the ones I mean.

Yes we are all painfully aware that there are benefit scroungers from abroad. We can't do anything about those: Just accept it. They are here to stay until we get a decent government in. There is a problem in this country and probably many others with benefit scroungers. Why? That's simple: its because we keep voting in the same clowns to run the country. Until everyone and I mean everyone convinces each person they know to vote NOTHING will ever change. So please stop banging on about porridge, weetabix and cheap chickens ~ you know absolutely nothing about what its like to survive on benefits with no hope of getting off them. Don't come here moaning about how you can't afford to put petrol in the car and in the same sentence talk about going to the pub: I dream of a night out in the pub!!! With the greatest of respect Brian you don't do so badly with your world cruises, weekends away and the like. No I am not deliberately having a go at you personally, I am having ago at the principle of attacking those on benefits, and your post was just the catalyst to make my blood boil. I am bloody furious. I wasn't even going to get involved in this one as a moderator but I have bitten my tongue for long enough. You are all intelligent adults; instead of moaning about it DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT! Stop making out the millions of us sadly reliant on benefits are like something nasty stuck to the bottom of your shoes and stop presuming that you have any right whatsoever to tell us how we should try and survive in this sad society.

I freely apologise to anyone I have upset with this post but it needed to be said. Rant over and not to be continued

[Les Woodard]

Same happening here in Oz. My take on it all goes back to when women demanded equal rights. Because of that we now have double the workforce with less than half the positions that used to be there. When we purchased our house the mortgage was only assessed on my flat wage and nothing else so that it could be proved that I could pay it. Now it is taken on both partneres wages including any overtime and other jobs which puts them into a position where if one losses a job they are in trouble. Women used to rule the street because they usually grouped together and watched out for each other so crime was not so rife as it is today where the streets are barren of people and especially kids. If a women got a job it was not uncommon for one of the local women to look after the kids for a few bob. Today they have to be put in kindergartens that cost about as much as they earn. Now they have maternity leave to go and have a kid as well as being given an allowance for having it. Will not be long before we will be expected to have the kids for them. I know this sounds like I am against feminism but I do believe that women have been conned by greed and manipullation and we are all suffering because of it. Reading Kong's account of poverty well most of us can relate similar stories so it is quite evident that we might not have had oppulence in them days but we had a solid civic stucture that worked.

Food handouts are a bloody waste of time it is education in being able to cook a meal that they need not a chit to MacDonalds. Does not take much to throw a few veggies in a pot for a feed does it. Hand outs no matter if in goods or food will not get them of their back sides and motivated. We see it here all the time where like the UK we have suburbs where no one works or wants to work and expect the rest to look after them. Going back to Unions. Yes they did become strong and might not have seemed like they where doing anything for you but now that they have lost a lot of that power look where the worker is today. We can not go back to the old days but can not see how we can keep up with todays greed by a select few manipulating the masses.

[happy daze john in oz]

A few years ago a report was done into feeding habits of the population. It was discovered that the lower down the soci-economic scale the higher the reliance on ready made food. Those of a higher education standard were far more able to produce a meal from scratch. But much of the sad situations we see today are brought about by governments. Ours here in Oz recently made the decission that each school student should recieve $800 to assit with school costs. Of course had the gov half an ounce of sence they would have gieven the money directly to the schools, the result, a massive spike in sales of Tv etc. Come the new term those same parenst will be looking for money to pay school fees. There is a combination of stupidity on both parts.
As I see it we are all part socialist, part capitalist. It depends on which side of the fence you sit as to how much of either side shows.

[Keith Tindell]

There is also a lack of education in preparation of food, a few years ago schools did away with wood work and metal work and also domestic science classes, these subjects are no longer in most schools. the classrooms were turned over to IT, so a lot of the youngsters today are brilliant with computers , but cannot cook. Food today is very cheap, and if you can cook there should be no reason to go short. Chicken is one of the cheapest meats you can buy, and all sorts of meals created from it. When i was a child we only saw chicken at xmas, now a lot of the younger generation will only eat the breast of the chicken, its a sad world KT

[Jim Brady]

Brian,your post 60#.A woman has moved into your street with 5 kids,right away you have stereotyped her as being a benefit scrounger.How do you know her circumstances,have you seen her weekly income and where it is coming from? To presume anything in life is a very dangerous road to go down,always get the facts is what I was always taught be fore passing comment.I certainly dont know anybodys income or circumstance's in my road and in fact it's not my business.
Regards.
Jim.B.

[Captain Kong]

Hi Tony,
I am sorry if I upset you, But I was going on about people on Benefits who abuse the system , and there are many many deserving people on benefits through no fault of their own.
What I started to say was, ...The subject was Child Poverty, ....someone said there was child poverty in this country, and I said with proper management there was no Child poverty. Many children go to school without a breakfast, this is a fact,
I mentioned the Weetabix and porridge to show that it is cheap to send a child to school with a decent breakfast, there is no excuse for that. Also there is nothing wrong with a good bowl of porridge for kids to go to school on, better than an empty bellly. It is nourishing and does not cost much, I still have porridge for breakfast, never had a cooked one for many years. It has done me no harm. SHE has Weetabix.
.
I was certainly Not getting at people who through no fault of their own have to be there. but the fact is there are a lot of lazy `mothers` out there who cannot be bothered to look after their kids properly, who cannot be bothered or have no idea how to cook a meal. It is so easy to phone for a take away meal. These are expensive, they are the ones with a ciggy who complain they cannot afford to feed their kids.
.
Also I do not really drink, I was at the Merchant Navy Day in the Eldonian Club, Liverpool on Sunday with my old seafaring mates, I only had one glass of beer all afternoon.
I go to see an old mate once a week, last night , two halfs of bitter, that is the most I ever drink. On the QE across the Pacific earlier this year my bar bill for three of us was NIL.
I do not waste my money, I save it and spend it wisely. As I have said before a cruise does not cost a lot if you know what you are doing and with good planning. and after 50 years of hard graft I think I deserve a little pleasure in my retirement.
.
I hope this explains what it is all about, Just lazy `mothers` who get the benefits and cannot feed their kids properly and expect the Tax payer to do it for them.
Cheers
Brian.

[Roger Dyer]

Hi Les.....your #63 refers.

Your interesting theory regarding the relativity between equal rights for women and the reduction of employment opportunities in the workplace may have some merit, although I don't believe it was the sole cause. Certainly, the recognition of equality did bring women into the workplace in ever increasing numbers which may well have deprived a job opportunity for a man who had a family to feed.

Taking it a step further, there may have been other implications arising from the recognition of equal rights for women, particularly on the home front, an increase in neglected children, 'latch-key kids', separation and divorce, all arising from the extended absence of the mother from the family home or from the heightened sense of independence a private income gave her, who can say? But, who would deny women the right to equality?..not I.


As simplistic as this may sound, I believe the major root cause for the malaise now effecting the western world is the rapid advancement of
modern technology in the past decade or two, particularly in the world of
industry where there is now a greatly reduced need for labour. Machinery operated by one man can accomplish what, twenty years ago, it took five men to do. The IT world reigns supreme and unless one becomes skilled and educated, the opportunities for employment in tomorrow's world will become fewer. Those with employment will be highly paid, then there will be the masses living on the welfare hand-outs from incompetent and ineffectual governments in the thrall of multi-national conglomerates.........I tell you now, mate, we're all doomed.

'...........Roger


p.s. Now, if you're not suitably depressed after reading this, then you are obviously doing what I'm doing.....time for another Appleton's 8 year old
Reserve, hooroo

[j.sabourn]

No he wasnt a dustman, but a good tradesman. His 3 bits of advce to me was 1. never look down on the working man 2. The working man could never afford a Conservative government. and 3. Money was meant to go around. ( I suppose he meant to keep the economy going). I did not agree with his second piece of advice as believe the name of the people in power means nothing. Cheers John Sabourn.

[Captain Kong]

Brian,your post 60#.A woman has moved into your street with 5 kids,right away you have stereotyped her as being a benefit scrounger.How do you know her circumstances,have you seen her weekly income and where it is coming from? To presume anything in life is a very dangerous road to go down,always get the facts is what I was always taught be fore passing comment.I certainly dont know anybodys income or circumstance's in my road and in fact it's not my business.
Regards.
Jim.B.
.
.
Hi Jim.
. This woman is on benefits, she has five children from two different fathers, they dont pay for the kids, she told me so. One ran back to Nigeria and the other father has gone to the States, last heard of in New York but his where abouts are now unknown, none pay a penny towards their keep, no maintenance. it is done by the tax payer.
I help her sometimes with her garden, when the trees were overgrown over her drive way and they were scraping over her car , I cut them down for her and shifted them, She is good natured and interesting to talk to, but has no idea how to cook a meal for her kids, hence the Pizza man calling daily.
I helped her daughter with her homework, they were doing a lesson on WW2, I gave her my story , "A Boys View of The Second World War" which I have put on this site. Her daughter took it to school and it was well appreciated by the school and teachers.
I am not a Ballbag, I do help people who want to be helped but I do draw the line sometimes with the ones who are just too lazy and expect every thing for nothing.
Hope this explains this. I am not against people on Benefits, because a lot of people are there due to circumstances beyong their control, it is only the ones who abuse the system.
Cheers
Brian.