Will the bedroom tax be the new poll tax?

Original at: http://skwalker1964.wordpress.com/2013/01/24/unbelievable-not-1-tory-turns-up-for-bedroom-tax-debate/

The Tories’ complete contempt for ordinary people couldn’t have been more clearly demonstrated than it was in yesterday’s Westminster Hall debate on the onerous, ludicrously-unfair ‘bedroom tax’, which will impoverish millions of struggling people for daring to have a spare bedroom, by deducting benefits.

This includes many people whose children are at university and millions of estranged parents who will be punished for having a room for their visiting children to stay in.

Not one Tory turned up for the debate. Not a single one, apart from the minister who was obliged to attend. Even the pathetic LibDems couldn’t be bothered to make an appearance.




For more details, read Eoin Clark’s excellent blog here.

A bloody disgrace.

sickchip wrote:A bloody disgrace.

Its a lot worse than that sickchip, but the same backstuds will turn up looking for people votes come 2015 I hope that people find out about this and when they do eventually turn up looking for votes tell them to F**K OFF, and not forgetting the bloody yellow tories this is the straw that will break the camel's back what say you sickchip.

Hi there folks.....

I know it's been a while, but I have been too busy with my own forum-set to spare the time to come back here too.

Now that things have stabilised on my own forums I am glad to be able to find the time to pop into Cutting Edge and to join in the discussions here once again.

NOW.... to get to the point: ( Yes, I do waffle a bit ).

As I go around my journeys on "The net" I am finding more and more people who are getting angry about the new and cruel Bedroom-Tax.

Just like the old Window-Tax, and Lady Thatcher's Poll-Tax this tax makes no special dispensations for the poor, the sick or the disabled and in fact it disproportionally attacks this demographic over the more able-to-pay citizens out there.

A news item I found in my online Scottish Sunday Mail even states that EIGHT OUT OF TEN disabled people are going to be hit hard by this iniquitous tax as it is the renting disabled that are going to specifically be caught in this Tory trap.

Don't get me wrong here folks, as I can see what is behind this tax: It does seem unfair that some people should have many spare rooms that are never used while there are a lot of families that are chronically short of room, but, I feel that the way that the Tory-led government have went about this is nothing short of cruelty when it is made to apply to the poor, the sick and the disabled as well as it does to all of the rest.

Read more about this article HERE and give an opinion please.

Regards.....

Papaumau

How can government claim to be on the side of families, when they introduce such policies as the 'bedroom tax', suggest people take in lodgers, and make property unaffordable for young people?

It seems to me that far from being pro-family, government policy on housing positively encourages dysfunctional living arrangements.

Excellent post, bobby. Spot on.

The NEXT intake of fresh-faced Tories to Parliament will be largely composed of sadists seeing a fresh field to be ploughed.

Good post bobby, if you include the labour party in that you've hit the nail on the head when talking about the political class.

Papa, what bedroom tax, what a farcical post.

tlttf,

JSA/Income Support is 'the amount the governemnt says you need to live on'. That's what it says on the DWP award letter that claimants receive. If the government say you must pay rent from that they are effectively 'taxing' your benefit.......removing approx 15% of your income.

Therefore it is perfectly reasonable to call this 'bedroom tax'.

However, I would expect this to be challenged in court (both here and in the EU court of human rights) since they will expect you to pay it from 'the amount you need to live on'.

Nice try sickchip and though I appreciate where your coming from there is still no bedroom tax. Income support and housing costs are totally different things and putting a maximum amount of benefits payable for housing still doesn't make it a tax.

Having said that I hope it does go to the courts (not being able to claim for rooms not used) and I hope it gets overturned. Like everybody else it worries me when the most vulnerable appear to be singled out, though there are some cases where a couple live in a 3/4/5 bedroom house that the taxpayer has to pay for.

tlttf,

Yes income support and housing benefits are separate things. Income support is the 'amount you need to live on' - as defined by the DWP. Income support is meant to cover your food, travel, clothing, and gas/electric.........it is not intended to cover housing costs.

So can you tell me from what money a person on income support / JSA should use to pay any shortfall in 'housing benefit' as a result of having an extra bedroom? They can't pay it from income support / JSA because then they would not have the basic amount they need to live on - as stated by the DWP.

If you say it must be paid from income support / JSA than you are, in effect, taxing their basic living expenses.

.....and - Have the government invested in the building of an ample amount of one or two bedroomed properties for people to move into - and in their local areas? I think not. If they can provide, or had provided, such homes for people than the government might be able to claim the policy is fair - but they haven't, and therefore it is not.

In my local area a three - bedroomed council house costs around £70 - 80pw. The council don't have many, if any, available one-bedroomed properties. However one could privately rent a one-bedroomed place for in excess of £100pw.........in which case one assumes full housing benefit entitlement would be paid. Thus increasing the welfare bill.

Have the stupid tory party even bothered to think this policy through?

Papa, what bedroom tax, what a farcical post.

tlttf. That’s out of order. Papaumau (good to see you here again!) has started a perfectly valid and topical thread, using his own words and then providing a link to a source. He hasn’t copied a large part, or all, of a newspaper article, or infringed any copyright laws, as some people are prone to do.

Let’s not mess with semantics; that reminds me of when Thatcher kept trying to call her poll tax a 'community charge'. This callous government is in effect ‘taxing’ people from April if they have a spare bedroom, while at the same time giving a massive income tax cut to millionaires.

Meanwhile, the owner of your favourite 'newspaper' (for want of a better word) is a billionaire and friend of Cameron who contributes nothing in this country because, for the sake of taxation purposes, he is considered French. It’s no wonder that Cameron looks after the rich when his buddy ensures that his crap paper endlessly spews out Tory lies and propaganda – and mugs like you are taken in by it.

Sorry to disappoint Ivan, no matter how you try to swing this it isn't a tax so ye not lets mess with semantics. Whether wha'ts happening is right or wrong to call it a tax is utter tripe.

What favourite paper, what has a newspaper owner got to do with a fantasy tax?

tlttf said: Good post bobby, "if you include the labour party in that you've hit the nail on the head when talking about the political class."
Good morning Landy Hows fings
As things stand at present I can not include Labour in my post, as what is happening at present is clearly the doings of the Tory Led Coalition. If though labour when they return to Government in 2015, continue in the same vein I will attack them with the same amount of venom as I now attack the present evil Government. Until they show themselves to be as nasty and evil as the Tory’s and their Lib Dem bed friends, I can only blame those that do, and not those that may or not may do.
By the way Landy, Thanks for the support re Roc.

tlttf wrote:Sorry to disappoint Ivan, no matter how you try to swing this it isn't a tax so ye not lets mess with semantics. Whether wha'ts happening is right or wrong to call it a tax is utter tripe.

What favourite paper, what has a newspaper owner got to do with a fantasy tax?

Ok! Answer the question - from what money should someone on income support/JSA pay the shortfall in housing benefit, due to having a spare room. Remembering income support/JSA as defined by the DWP is the basic amount you need to live on......excluding housing costs.

If people don't pay the shortfall will councils evict people from their homes without providing them with elsewhere to live?

sickchip said: "If people don't pay the shortfall will councils evict people from their homes without providing them with elsewhere to live?"

If the Tory Councils could get away with it, yes they would.

tlttf.....

If you think that there is no such thing as a "Tory bedroom tax" then just visit THESE Google pages and read all about the phrase and where it originated.

Just like the "poll-tax" was not the specific name for this tax the "bedroom tax" is a much simpler and more easily-recognised connection to this cruel act drawn from the dark annals of Tory-land.

We ALL know what is being talked about when we use that term and I think it is disingenuous to split hairs about the wording of this "TAX" when it will do so much harm to so many vulnerable people.

Oh, and BTW.....HERE are a lot more people in our parliament that know EXACTLY what we are talking about when we mention the "bedroom tax".

Regards....

Papaumau.

sickchip wrote:If people don't pay the shortfall will councils evict people from their homes without providing them with elsewhere to live?

Councils locally to me have been told by the local judiciary not to bother them with eviction notices for people losing housing benefit. Seems the judges/magistrates have recognised the insanity of the policy - but a major problem for councils, who'll lose money through arrears. The government knows there are few smaller properties available and must be relying on this effect as a means of sucking yet more money out of local government.

Therein lies the problem Steve, theoretically a good idea will be screwed over simply because there is nowhere (within certain areas) for people to downsize to even if they wanted to. From what I hear if they make people homeless a council holds a duty of care and would have to put them in a B&B at grossly inflated costs.
Papa, the fact that everybody knows it as a tax doesn't actually make it so. If it was a tax it would affect every householder, as a restriction on benefits it only affect those on benefits, hence not a tax dress it as you will.

Things are great bobby, we'll have to agree to disagree on the labour party though How could I not support a legitimate question that is constantly ignored whilst the writer is similarly making the same claims against other countries and cultures. Take care mate.

If it was a tax it would affect every householder

tlttf. Strange remark. When Labour brings in its mansion tax in 2015, it won’t affect every householder.

This is a perfectly valid thread, and everyone knows what’s being referred to by the phrase ‘bedroom tax’, an expression which is in common use nationally. In any case, one definition of a tax is “a strain or a heavy demand”; losing £14 a week for each spare bedroom is likely to be just that for someone on benefits.

I hope someone is calculating how much Mrs Windsor, who has spent her entire life on benefits, is going to have to forego for her 52 bedrooms at Buckingham Palace (plus 188 more bedrooms for her staff). Oh, I nearly forgot, pensioners are exempt from the bedroom tax.

Pensioners seem to get a better deal out of the Tories than most (for example, the Tories won’t let Clegg means-test bus passes and winter fuel payments), no doubt because they’ve identified them as the people most like to vote and most likely to vote Tory. Yet it’s probably pensioners, living in houses long after their children have fled the nest, who should be encouraged to move – not by financial penalties, but by the construction of small bungalows for them to go and live in if they so choose.

(P.S. For your assistance - if you want to edit a message before anyone has added another post to the thread, you can do so and it will not show that it’s been edited. In those circumstances, there is no need to write anything in that ‘reasons for editing’ box. https://cuttingedge2.forumotion.co.uk/t645-notices-for-members)

tlttf wrote:Sorry to disappoint Ivan, no matter how you try to swing this it isn't a tax so ye not lets mess with semantics. Whether wha'ts happening is right or wrong to call it a tax is utter tripe.

What favourite paper, what has a newspaper owner got to do with a fantasy tax?

tlttf, it doesn't take long to make a list of Government imposts which do not carry the word "Tax" in their name, but cannot accurately be described any other way.

Try these for starters, and feel free to add any of your own favourites:

1. National Insurance Contributions
2. The Road Fund Licence
3. Air Passenger Duty
4. Hydrocarbon Oil Duty. Although fuel for aircraft attracts neither Duty, nor VAT.
5. Excise Duty
6. Stamp Duty
7. Uniform Business Rate
8. Investment Income surcharge
9. Aggregates levy
10. Climate Change levy
11. Betting and Gaming Duties
........................................................... I'll let you decide for yourself what you want to call the Treasury's 50% "TAKE" from the Lottery.

Once again showing taxes as an example doesn't take away from the fact that the so called "bedroom tax" isn't a tax, what's wrong with you lot, don't you think were hammered (as OW proudly points out) by enough of the f*cking things as it is.

I wonder why you're trying so hard to sabotage this discussion tlttf?
As you must know, being of at least average intelligence, 'bedroom tax' is a convenient expression for discussing the plan to further reduce the income of some of the poorest people in the country.
Can it be that you actually agree that this is an iniquitous move on the part of a government which appears to have declared all-out class war?
Or perhaps, dare one hope? you have something constructive to say on this topic
I think the expression is 'put up or shut up'

tlttf

What would you call it?

tlttf. Confession time - show us that you have some integrity.....

For years, Tories used to accuse Gordon Brown of "a pension raid". There was no "raid", nothing was stolen, nothing was ever taken out of existing pension pots. What Brown did was to abolish the dividend tax credit, something which the Tory Norman Lamont had already reduced in 1993.

Please tell us, old chap, have you ever referred to the abolition of the dividend tax credit as "a pension raid"? I know that your favourite tabloid 'newspaper' has, on many many occasions.

Whatever you choose to call it, tlttf.......'bedroom tax' or another name, it is clear this policy is an unworkable mess of a policy that has been ill planned.

- or perhaps not. One can imagine the bullingdon boys sniggering up their sleeves when forming these ideas - laughing at the idea of how much they can get away with hurting the poor.

People just need to decide whether there is a legitimate cost to living within a Society based upon Law.

If we want quiet enjoyment of our Home, protected by Police, Fire and Ambulance services widening to National Defence where appropriate, education for our children and care for the sick, we have to accept that there is a cost. The individuals providing those services on our behalf are entitled to a reward, and the essentials involved in providing the services must also be funded. So we pay our taxes.

The alternative is law at the end of a gun. Consult any Hollywood Western to see how that turned out.

Oh! and disregarding Human Dignity is going to land the current Administration in the deepest of deep doo-doo, never to be seen again. Take my word for that.

If the idea is to save money (taxpayers) rather than punish some unfortunates that are temporarily on their back foot, perhaps a rent cap could be put in place, though the most logical thing is to have a land tax that affects the person owning the land whether he/she's there or not. Apparently there are at present over 1,000,000 properties standing empty in the UK + numerous acres of land standing idle waiting for some rich person/company to develop at a time that suits themselves so as to maximise profit. If they had to pay themselves it would make them more inclined to build and rent those properties out which theoretically would help force rent prices down. The government would be in a win win situation.

Ivan, it's pointless your attempting personal attacks, save your breath for some sycophant that takes any notice.

Boatlady, I hope I've enlightened you, though why you think I'm trying to sabotage a thread is beyond my simple mind. Has anybody else got an idea, or should we do the standard whinge and whine with no alternatives?

it's pointless your attempting personal attacks

tlttf. It wasn’t a personal attack, I asked you a question. Since you’re so hot on correct terminology these days, I wondered if you ever referred to the abolition of the dividend tax credit as a “pension raid”?

why you think I'm trying to sabotage a thread is beyond my simple mind.

Probably because of your track record. You tried it with one of Steve Walker’s threads, posting some rubbish (which I deleted) about the number of links in his opening post, and you tried it here:-
https://cuttingedge2.forumotion.co.uk/t709-does-inequality-matter

Ivan,

I think you're being a little unfair on tlttf here.

I think tlttf can see the 'bedroom tax' - or whatever we call it, is a bad idea and agrees it is an ill-considered policy.

Let's look at this calmly and carefully shall we, instead of falling out over split hairs !

We ALL know that many governments of the past have introduced new and sneakier ways to lever more and more money out of our pockets and that they invariable call these methods by fancy names - like The Community Charge, for instance - but those of us that are sentient prefer to call these "taxes" ( for that is what they truly are ), by more-easily-recognisable names that we can all cotton on to.

Another name that is not an official one but that is now widely acceptable in the world is what is called "stealth taxes", as all of the ways that governments use that are not what we know as "direct" taxes, ( like National Insurance and Income Tax ,( the only one they seem happy to call a tax even if they are terrified to raise this one BTW )), are indeed taxes in all but name.

Rather than making excuses for governments trying to hide these taxes from us by calling them other names we should be agreeing to use the words that colloquially describe these charges for exactly what they are;TAXES !

Regards......

Papaumau.

Thanks sickchip, yes I do think it's unfair, don't worry about Ivan, anybody that doesn't tow his party line is somebody to be abused. Such is modern day socialism. Anybody else got anidea or should we carry on wihinging about the unfairness of it all?

tlttf wrote:Thanks sickchip, yes I do think it's unfair, don't worry about Ivan, anybody that doesn't tow his party line is somebody to be abused. Such is modern day socialism. Anybody else got anidea or should we carry on wihinging about the unfairness of it all?

"Modern day Socialism" is what we make it and is no longer the version that Tony Blair and his cohorts would have us believing in.

Blair - in his genius - ( for that cannot be denied ), dragged the Labour party so far over to the right that it totally lost it's identity and became an ersatz Tory party. Now that this party and government, ( which would not even use the word "Socialism" when it was in power ), has been destroyed, all that is left is for us to either go for true Toryism or to go for REAL LABOUR where the word "Socialism", ( not Communism BTW ), is no longer a shameful word or ethic to use.

Be certain-sure that no Tory party or government of the future will EVER care about the ordinary people of Britain and if this is the case then there is only one choice left: A new ( small "n" ) Labour government that does and will care about the working people that are at the heart of this country.

All that will be left after that has been considered will be a few single-issue parties that will not get enough votes to do anything with or a Liberal Democrat Party that will no longer exist because it has been decimated due to it's traitorous connections with Toryism.

It's make your mind up time folks !

Regards.....

Papaumau

Anybody else got anidea or should we carry on wihinging about the unfairness of it all?

Yesterday's General Election in Italy may have suggested such an idea.
The balance will be held by Beppe Grillo's Five Star Movement (M5S). Grillo has ruled out supporting either side in his drive to sweep away Italy's existing political parties and the cronyistic culture they support – a sentiment he appeared to reiterate after the count by insisting the M5S was not planning on "any stitch-ups, big or small" and lambasting Berlusconi's voters for committing "a crime against the galaxy".

In an audio message broadcast live online, Grillo said that, after his movement's "exceptional" results, the mainstream parties were "finished, and they know it". "We've started a war of generations … They've been there for 25 to 30 years and they've led this country to catastrophe," he said. "We will be an extraordinary force … We will be 110 inside [the parliament] and several million outside."



http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/feb/25/italy-election-result-euro-fears

Simple proof that individuals can gain control if enough people that are pissed with the present shoed in professional politicians can be bothered to get off of their collective arses and vote, there's over 60% of the voting age people out there that are totally unrepresented at the mo.

tlttf,

Alas! We're talking about UK citizens......the walking braindead.

:affraid: