 | david hands wrote: Men - have been systematically sneered at in advertising, we are undermined in the home and the workplace, our meeting places were either corporatised (football) or closed down (pubs), our jobs were taken away and given to immigrants/women/people in other countries and not a single thought was given to the consequences, the education system favoured female thinking, as fathers we are denied any meaningful justice with regard to children, the onslaught against men via the telly and media in general has not been dealt with - despite being well known for years (and by turns shows men as foolish losers who need women/children to sort everything out for them or as hopelessly macho, guntoting killers), the environment we live in is awash with hormones and oestrogen as a result of intensive farming, and you have the nerve to complain about what has happened to men. Women's role has changed somewhat too. And your (women in general) lack of involvement in any of the above situations leaves you with some responsibility in this. You did not fight to keep men employed but rather, took the jobs and then sneered at the men without work. You did nothing to curb the flow of destructive, demoralising adverts or TV programs. You kept silent over the imbalance in the legal system. And now you don't like the end result - tough - you should have been more involved, and more vocally opposed, to the things that have been going on for the last 30 years. May 28, 2010 6:45 AM BST on community.timesonline.co.uk
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| | Dan M wrote: This was all part of the grand Labour plan to retain power. While they had enough people reliant on benefits, or directly employed by the state, their position was secure. Shame the money ran out.... May 28, 2010 1:08 AM BST on community.timesonline.co.uk
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| | colin beasley wrote: We had the same problem in Ontario in the early 1990's under the only socialist government ever elected here with 12% on benefits.The following Conservative government cut benefits 30% and they remained frozen for 13 years.It was amazingly effective with employment rising rapidly and claimants declining by nearly 50%,but you must grow the economy rapidly to provide the opportunities. I would also recommend benefits for the first child only.One child may be a mistake,but more a way of life.Finally no priority should be given on housing.You will be amazed how quickly people change their behavior. May 28, 2010 4:04 AM BST on community.timesonline.co.uk
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| | No to Discrimination wrote: Feminist bigots have brought us, crap TV, loneliness, an disgraceful public sector, which encourages discrimination against men starting with the family, then into the education system and then into the world of work. It even affects charity such as the feeding of girls, but not boys (by the World Food Programme) - even though, both boys and girls are starving. Feminists are no better than the sick racists, that blighted this country many years ago. They are dinosours from the past and that is where they belong. Time to rebalance, or the disaffected men, will be more of a problem to you than you desire. Feminists in my mind must take responsibilty for the numbers on the streets, on drugs, levels of rape etc etc. Time to acknowledge their evil and the world will move on. May 28, 2010 11:30 AM BST on community.timesonline.co.uk
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| | Edward Green wrote: New Labour never intended to make work pay their goal was to create a client state with a great many trapped in poverty and seeing themselves as dependent on the ever giving (but never helping) hand of THE PARTY. The damage that New Labour has deliberately done to this country far outweighs that done by Thatcher as a side effect of her curing of its 1970s disaster. May 28, 2010 8:13 AM BST on community.timesonline.co.uk
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| | Chris Stapleton wrote: "The striking correlation between male joblessness and single motherhood." You don't get it, do you? This is a double whammy result for the man-hating NuLab Sisterhood. It is the fully intended consequence of their agenda to replace fathers with the State, and to marginalise men in society. The first paret of the answer to this problem (removal of the man-hating feminists NuLab from Government)has been achieved. It now remains to be seen whether Ian Duncan Smith can overcome the feminist activists entrenched in his own department. May 28, 2010 6:47 AM BST on community.timesonline.co.uk
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| | Mr Gee wrote: There's a line in my employer's performance management documentation that states "When in a leading position encourages recruitment of women and retention." In other words, positive discrimination for females. So that means males are being discriminated against simply to fulful a hare-brained principle. I fear that it started even before Harriet Harwoman got involved. The fact that it's allowable is almost unbelievable. Equality is simply equality. I want to scream. May 28, 2010 8:47 AM BST on community.timesonline.co.uk
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| | K David wrote: As you hinted at in your article, the benefits paid to single mothers do as much to increase the number of unemployed men, as do the benefits paid to the men directly. Perhaps the jobless men can be divided into 3 groups. The men in group (a) are former partners of single mothers now on benefits. This group is depressed at the loss of their family and their unemployment is partly a consequence of this. Child support payments reduce their incentive to work. In many cases these families would have stayed together if the state wasn't there to step into the man's shoes as an alternative provider. Men in group (b) are reckless fathers. They are happy not to be encumbered with families but reproduce anyway. They may be serial fathers. They don't work, so don't need to worry about the child support payments. The single mothers may know these men are bad news, but they have the back up of benefits if things don't work out. So benefits to single mothers definitely increase the size of this group. Men in group (c) can't find a partner because the women have been taken out of the market by having children with the men in group (b). They become dejected and withdraw from society: benefits allow them not to have to work, and so even less likely to find a partner. May 28, 2010 5:12 AM BST on community.timesonline.co.uk
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| | Neville Smith wrote: You say NuLabor intended to make work pay. Hardly, I'm sorry. The plan was to control the people so they voted NuLabor. Circle must be broken. May 28, 2010 12:30 AM BST on community.timesonline.co.uk
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| | bn harper wrote: Permit males over the age of 40 or so, to sue employers for age discrimination - there are too many men over this age who are discarded from employment because of active age discrimination by employers. May 28, 2010 7:16 AM BST on community.timesonline.co.uk
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Des C wrote: This fantastic Article above by Camilla Cavendish has pinpointed a fundamental causation of our socio-economic ills in this age = the rise of Feminism and the feminisation of our society over the last 30 years. Oxymoronically, females today strive to be more like men, to adopt male attributes as their own to the detriment the very creature they have strove to replace over the last quarter of a century or so - men. The consequences of this disconnection of males from society can also be seen on our streets with the rise of the new family group = the 'gang'. Males today have nothing to look forward to because they have been informed by society that they are of no use - the family does not need them because women can get by on their own, the state does not need them because we now only employ those that can contribute to the service industry (there are no other types of industry left). Men aren't encouraged to get themselves into schools to work as this has become a female dominated bastion which has always been a firm objective of the feminist movement. Look at the % of Headteachers that are female, look at how many Teachers are female = children are being taught that Women are to respected & admired and men aren't important. This isn’t happening in only our schools. If what is said here is a misrepresentation of the feminist ideal then we only have to look at the advertising industry to see that men are nearly always portrayed as being 'stupid', 'slow on the uptake', 'inferior', 'less able to cope'. Male attributes are nearly always frowned upon and dumbed down in place of female ones. The onslaught on the male condition will, I fear lead to the eventual breakdown of social cohesion in our society unless we address these imbalances head on and quickly. There is no need to return to the old male chauvinistic approaches of the past - men should be allowed to be men and women be allowed to be women = we should admire and positively promote the positive attributes of both sexes and find a place in society for both, otherwise we will see disenfranchised, disconnected males revolt against a society that has thrown them on to the scrapheap and a rise of a new underclass that has nothing to lose. May 28, 2010 10:52 AM BST on community.timesonline.co.uk
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| | D Cairns wrote: "The taxpayer has become the father: one in four mothers is single and more than half live on welfare" Why has it taken so long for the media to catch onto this? probably because they don't move in the same circles the rest of us do. From my daughter's year at her comprehensive at least 33% of girls have gone on to have babies and get benefits and council flats. THIS IS DELIBERATE. The state is a better provider than either they or a bloke of their generation could ever be. They proudly post pictures on Facebook of their trips to Thorpe Park with babies in tow. As far as they're concerned they're "yummy mummies" and "ladies who lunch" because they don't have to work, they go out to lunch with each other and they can afford to have fortnightly trips to the nail bar. These are the same girls who attempted to ruin the education of other pupils by disrupting classes and bullying "swots". Do you have any idea how galling it is to their former classmates, some of whom may be working in shops or offices at near minimum wage, still having to live with mum & dad, barely able to afford a car? For God's sake - change the benefit system to STOP paying benefit to single mothers. They choose to have children - they and the fathers must support them. If this isn't done FAST the whole social fabric of this country will be altered irrevocably. Politicians and the media need to come out of their liberal intelligensia circles and look at what is actually going on in this country. May 28, 2010 10:56 AM BST on community.timesonline.co.uk
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| | JohnThe Banker wrote: Stuart McKay, we already do put our money back into the economy. 50% goes on income tax and national insurance, and then the rest is either spent, giving employment to others, or invested, again benefitting everyone. Rather than demanding that we be forced to pay you your eight pounds an hour how about getting off your backside and developing the skills that you need to earn it? If you are not worth that much, why on earth do you expect to be paid it? This entitlement culture that you espouse is dragging us down. All of us. May 28, 2010 12:31 AM BST on community.timesonline.co.uk
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| | Tim Wingrove wrote: Victoria M wrote: The level of anti-feminist energy on here is truly shocking, disgusting even. It's as if most of the men on here perceive women as weak little creatures, with nothing to contribute. Oh how very bitter! I don't agree with you - I think men are always looking for a princess to cherish, not the wicked queen, and we live in a society full of wicked queens who think they are princesses. It's not bitter opinion, just an opinion that feminism has not solved this countries problems, just created new ones. May 28, 2010 6:03 PM BST on community.timesonline.co.uk
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| | David C wrote: As someone who's lucky enough to have a job and a decent career i find it amazing that many of my friends in Liverpool can't get a job but the problem is with society as a whole. Most of these guys you speak about are bright and intelligent people who have fallen through the trap of worklessness at an early age and it's almost impossible for them to get a decent job once they get past 30 and have no working background. There is literally no help for them, they get by on the benefits and the "sidelines" they create for themselves which is mainly dealing weed and the odd cash in hand job. Unless there is are real opportunities created for them to gain qualifications and opportunities then this cycle will carry on and on. The only people who are looked and focused on are the mothers of their children as they show up on the child poverty statistics. Give these guys an opportunity for gods sake, most of them only need a break in life to create a decent life for themselves, it will also be much cheaper than paying benefits or locking them up for the small crimes they commit to get by in life. May 28, 2010 1:40 AM BST on community.timesonline.co.uk
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| | Ted Brandi wrote: My thinking with the billions that have been spent on welfare at home (as well as poverty-reduction schemes overseas through foreign aid) has been: why isn't it fixed yet? Surely by now everyone could have had a house and car bought for them outright for all the benefit payments made - and heart-stoppingly expensive administrative costs that go with. We've all heard stories about people who cheerfully make a comfortable enough living by rorting (lovely Australian word; says it all, really) the benefits system. Of course there will be those who are genuinely in need, but I'm sure not every single one of the 2.5m on incapacity benefit deserves it. What's really needed, it seems to me, is precisely what Ms Cavendish alludes to in her first paragraph, and that is to remove the sense of 'entitlement' which has been allowed to entrench itself. These payments are a privilege, and way more accountability on the part of those receiving the payments is long overdue. Here endeth the lesson. May 27, 2010 11:32 PM BST on community.timesonline.co.uk
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| | Michael Petek wrote: "Without steady work, he will struggle to acquire a family: unemployed men are less likely to marry or cohabit than employed ones. Without a stable relationship, he is less likely to grow into a good family man and raise good sons." A nation which refuses to ensure that its men - especially its young men - have jobs to go to doesn't deserve children from them. If a nation tells a man he isn't needed, then why would it need his kids? May 28, 2010 12:17 AM BST on community.timesonline.co.uk
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| | Andy B wrote: 2 words summarise the previous government's whole attitude to this problem, and why it was allowed to fester: Harriet Harman. May 28, 2010 8:22 AM BST on community.timesonline.co.uk
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| | Justin Bilton wrote: Is it just single men on benefits or are there also plenty of single mothers ? May 28, 2010 12:42 AM BST on community.timesonline.co.uk
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| | Steady Eddy wrote: Benefits and immigration have created a system here in central london (the largest city economy in Europe)where i have to fill my own car with petrol, scan my own shopping in the supermarket,my cleaner is Polish,my decorators Romanian,my carpet layer Brazilian. While i pay through my taxes to keep thousands of able bodied Englishmen on the dole. You can see them every day walking their bull terriers in the street. It is simply a disgrace that these people who speak English and have had a free education cannot or wil not take a job in London. May 28, 2010 8:13 AM BST on community.timesonline.co.uk |
Nick Morris wrote: Once we had industries such as coal and steel and ships where men could work hard and feel they had a place in their family and their community. Now what do we have? Call centres and coffee shops. Successive governments have set out to emasculate the white working class male and now we are seeing the consequences. May 28, 2010 6:41 AM BST on community.timesonline.co.uk
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| | Andrew Luscombe wrote: I don't understand, for the last 30 odd years but more specifically the last 13 years men have gradually been erased, a figure of fun, a useless broken down neanderthal. This has now been achieved and yet this is still wrong? Perhaps women are beginning to realise that a man about is really rather helpful, and that trying to write them out of history hasn't been. Still we have a nice mess to deal with now...after the experiment. May 28, 2010 7:27 AM BST on community.timesonline.co.uk
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| | Tom Elgin wrote: Remove child allowance for the 2nd and subsequent children and watch birth rates fall. May 28, 2010 8:23 AM BST on community.timesonline.co.uk
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| | stuart mckay wrote: So this journalist says it is bearable to be unemployed. What planet is she on? A typical conservative who has no idea of the real world. Go into any Department of Pension office and you will find there has been no training for decades. Cuts in adult education which the Conservatives will fast forward. Recruitment Agencies which take a third of your pay or even more. I can go on and on and it is ok if you have middle class parents who can give their child a good start in life but the world will always have children who cannot make it to the standards of others. If you want to remove the benefit system then you must pay employees at least £8.00 an hour. The problem with this is that companies and the rich don't want to pay these sort of wages, citing that they cannot afford it. You bet they can. The trickle down affect where the rich put their money back into the economy - that is a joke, right? May 28, 2010 12:19 AM BST on community.timesonline.co.uk
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| | david skitmore wrote: End globalization stop immigration. Why do we continue to export our jobs and import poverty. Industry and manufacturing is the key to unlocking the potential of all our people and before we start sticking the boot into the poor, lets look at the amount of money we pay our middle class unproductive government workers. Doctors been paid 100.000 a year!! Chief executives of councils 200.000+ not worth it.. and that's just the tip of the iceberg. May 28, 2010 6:14 AM BST on community.timesonline.co.uk
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| | Corin Keiler-Lloyd wrote: How about telling feckless girls that children need fathers and not State handouts? A man with a family might well strive to find work. Oops - sorry. A woman with a family wants state provision so that she can find work. How about all the women who want to be mothers and not cheap labour? May 28, 2010 12:32 AM BST on community.timesonline.co.uk
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| | Chris Stapleton wrote: David Griffin: "I think that lazy, feckless young males should get a job and stop living on benefits, if only to make themselves more attractive to females." Have you seen some of these single mothers? Have you considered that many single mothers are not exactly an attractive life-term proposition for young men? May 28, 2010 6:57 AM BST on community.timesonline.co.uk
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| | John Whitney wrote: Excellent article. It hits so many nails so squarely on the head. Problem is that the nightmare outcome you describe so well was actually Labour policy. The benefit trap and the emasculation of men were both key parts of Labour's blueprint to change our society forever. May 28, 2010 7:42 AM BST on community.timesonline.co.uk
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| | Dean M wrote: In today's society, with divorce rife, what sane man would want to enter into marriage? Marriage is a really raw deal for men. May 29, 2010 2:31 AM BST on community.timesonline.co.uk
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| | Brian Williamson wrote: I've just been out into my local town. The sun is out and also the hordes of fat, unatractive teenage girls, all pushing prams, chatting to mates, also pushing prams. The leggings are bulging to bursting point with soggy human flesh squeezed and overhanging the impossibly stretched waist band in a flabby roll. The tops are low, dug into shoulder bra's exposed and a plethora of rippled, mottled red flesh is the over riding image. The obligatory bottled soft drink is held in hand, the pram is stuffed with cheap toys, and it's pink all the way. They look cheerful enough but they are around sixteen, whats not to like at that age when a willing state is providing for their careless promiscuity? Only later will the resentment and anger kick in as they are shunned by the young males except for quick unresponsible sex. No questions asked and no proclamations of fidelity offered. Even that will dry up as the army of fresher meat replaces these girls in the pecking order. What then? They are doomed and destined to useless lives, always expecting and never for one moment giving. They'll blame anything and anyone for their predicament but ask them to raise one finger of self help and the gawping mouth will droop in astonishment and anger. It's never their fault you see. Thats the real and awful outcome of the Toynbee's and Harman's of this world's ranting about equality. And lets not forget Labour itself. What a legacy? May 28, 2010 6:43 PM BST on community.timesonline.co.uk |
Graham Ridler wrote: Useless, sponging women - the blight of every age. May 28, 2010 3:42 AM BST on community.timesonline.co.uk
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| | Seamus Smith wrote: There are currently 470,000 job vacancies (ONS). We have 6 million adults who are unemployed and depend entirely on benefits. So we don't have enough jobs for even 10% of our unemployed. Remember, our economic model demands a labour surplus. The commitment to full employment died about 30 years ago. So when Camilla talks about a romantic past where people had work and families were strong, that didn't end because the dole became enticing and young men became feckless. It happened because our economic model changed, for better or worse. You can't simply tweak that model with a few punitive measures and expect the good old days to return. May 28, 2010 2:57 AM BST on community.timesonline.co.uk
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| | Sneaky Beaky wrote: Excellent article as ever Camilla, I particularly like: "The welfare system has helped to deprive these children of the most effective check on abuse — the family." Which is too often overlooked. A baby dies, or is abused- and we look for someone to blame. The social worker. The Doctor. The Nurse. Very, very rarely does anyone say hang on a minute, this kid did not die/ was not abused BY the carer or myriad professionals called in to tick boxes by Labour, they were hurt by the FAMILY, typically the father- ignored by the Mother, who somehow have all escaped scrutiny or blame and are somehow depicted as victims. Benefits perpetuates this... May 28, 2010 8:25 AM BST on community.timesonline.co.uk
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| | Andrew Luscombe wrote: As opposed to the monet grabbing, house grabbing constantly breeding single mothers would it? This situation has arisen because for the last 30 odd years the powers that be, along with a powerful group of hysterical feminists have tried to remove men from any involvement in anything, good job girls, of course now its all gone belly up I don't suppose any of those right on thinking loons will be anywhere near. What a mess. May 28, 2010 7:30 AM BST on community.timesonline.co.uk
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| | james franklin wrote: A very very good article and absolutely correct. And the key to getting this underclass back in to society is education. Too many ignorant schoolboys thinking it is cool to be ignorant, not assisted by ignorant parents who rely on benefits, is a self perpetuating disaster. Intelligence is cool, intelligence is valued by employers and women and intelligence gets you money. I rest my case. May 28, 2010 9:36 AM BST on community.timesonline.co.uk
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| | Tom Fenn wrote: Camilla Have you ever considered that it is the women who have chosen the state as their childrens farther not the men recjecting responsibility for a life of preying on single mothers. Get a boy friend, get pregnanant,get rid of the boy friend,sit back and get the lot off the state, When you are all nice and settled in get a part time job on the side. This has become a real career. Who needs a man? Who ultimately pays the price? the children and tommorows society. May 28, 2010 7:08 AM BST on community.timesonline.co.uk
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| | Failed Planner wrote: "In the worst cases, the State has helped to create a class of jobless serial boyfriends who prey on single mothers on benefits. When two of these men moved into the flat that Haringey Council had generously provided for Tracey Connelly, Baby P’s mother, the little boy’s fate was sealed. They killed him." I really don't think it's reasonable to infer that the unemployed are all baby killers in waiting. Unemployment is usually a consequence of structural economic problems of the kind brought on by the Global Financial Crisis. Most people would not choose to be unemployed, although it becomes 'normality' in the sense that you have to deal with it when you experience it. Decent unemployed people find the murder of children abhorrent too! Don't confuse decent people with murderers. May 28, 2010 2:44 AM BST on community.timesonline.co.uk
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| | Seamus Smith wrote: I'd like to point out that the "£200 billion welfare budget" Camilla mentions is the total social security budget. Unemployment benefits account for only 12% of that budget. The vast majority of social security spending goes on pensions, tax credits, child benefit, etc. Some people are under the mistaken impression that "welfare spending" = "unemployment spending," which is clearly far from the case. May 28, 2010 3:03 AM BST on community.timesonline.co.uk
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| | David Griffin wrote: Like many correspondents to this page I think that lazy, feckless young males should get a job and stop living on benefits, if only to make themselves more attractive to females. Nevertheless, your scribbling journalist forgets that whilst it is true that eastern Europeans have come here for job, there were many thousands of Britons working in Germany and Holland during the 1970's (Auf Wiedersehn Pet) and there are many thousands of young men in the armed forces fighting in Afghanistan. There are many lazy middle aged men who will not work, and there are even more from privileged backgrounds who have never done a day's work in their lives. Britain lost its work ethic because exploitation has been the driver of employment. Them and us. Little has changed. What should not be forgotten is that virtually every penny paid out in benefit still ends up in the tills of Tesco and Asda. The money is not stashed under a mattress. It all goes back into circulation and everyone benefits from benefits. It's only money. May 28, 2010 12:50 AM BST on community.timesonline.co.uk
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| | Free Electron wrote: I'm on a low salary and initially wanted to save for a deposit to get on the housing ladder. Therefore, I lived in houseshares for nearly 2 years (5 of them, periods ranging from 6 weeks to 9 months). I've met quite a lot of these unemployed British males: they were in their 20's, 30's and 40's, did not want to work, and were making fun of me because, despite my f/t job, I could only afford the cheapest room in the house, and could not afford a car, or holidays, at all. They also sneered at me for leaving for work at 6:40 am, and doing overtime (sometimes unpaid): the usual 'only foreigners would accept to do a job like this'. May 28, 2010 2:29 PM BST on community.timesonline.co.uk |
Martin Edwards wrote: We have invested heavily over the years in replacing the blue collar worker with machines, computers and cheap immigrant labour. Labouring class wages will no longer support a family. Technology is both a blessing and a curse. Gone is the need for a team of men to do what a single JCB can achieve, gone is the typing pool having been replaced by a few computers. We cannot step back in time but the reality is that progress has enriched the few at the expense of the many. I am not a socialist but I can see that it is up to those of us who prosper to now support those we no longer need, either through job creation or taxes. We cannot just abandon people who are not needed as so much obsolete machinery sent to the scrap heap. Even getting rid of an old 'fridge or car requires us to pay to have it recycled. we must accept this if we abandon the class that once provided the labour to build this country. May 28, 2010 8:20 AM BST on community.timesonline.co.uk
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| | Ken Leyland wrote: I don't disagree with any of this but these are symptoms and consequences not causes. The give-away is the phrase "construction sites in London". Britain is saddled with a Capital that has long had its head shoved firmly up its own backside, and the rest of the country has become a wasteland. By the way, Liverpool was never an industrial city. It was first, second and always, a port. The industrial cities that were its hinterland are now nothing more than part of that wasteland. May 28, 2010 12:39 AM BST on community.timesonline.co.uk
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| | Robert Dewar wrote: "If the Government is going to make real inroads into the deficit it will have to tackle the nearly £200 billion welfare budget, which is a third of government spending." Why? Why should the welfare budget NOT represent nearly a third of govt. spending? An over-reliance on the finance sector, the destruction of British industry, offshoring (I should repeat that word 3 times!), 3 million immigrants in 13 years, the almost total extinction of factory work, lousy state schooling, the extreme scarcity of work for those who cannot use their brains but only their hands:- these are the choices that global capitalism and rampant corporatism have made, and they should damn well pay the cost. And the cost is unemployed native Britishers, unemployable Britishers, permanent recession and joblessness. Neo-liberalism wants to have it's cake and eat it:- well, it cannot, because if it tries, there will eventually be an explosion of rage and deprivation, and society will rip apart. "So in declaring war yesterday on both poverty and the benefits system, Iain Duncan Smith had it right" I can see where he is waging war on welfare:- where is he "declaring war on poverty"? There are too few jobs, and even fewer non-skilled jobs; joblessness is something we're going to see more and more of, over the coming years of artificially-induced austerity:- waging war on the very necessary welfare benefits required as a result of global corporatism's logical outcome for Britain's economy and job-market, is hardly "waging war on poverty", but EXACERBATING poverty. There aint no work; take away welfare payments:- you've got big fat POVERTY. And dont the neo-liberal globalists whose fathers made their piles in the finance sector, just love it! Because by G-d, they hate and they fear the poor and the unemployed, who they have created. May 28, 2010 5:33 AM BST on community.timesonline.co.uk
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| | Michael Barnes wrote: NANNY STATE! The greatest achievement of a socialist government is to generate a voting majority with the many who are grateful dependents. A solution is to take the voting rights away from non-taxpayers. 'No taxation without representation:' 'No representation without taxation.' May 28, 2010 9:10 PM BST on community.timesonline.co.uk
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| | David Livermore wrote: There are a lot of useless feckless men - true....... but surely also a similar number of useless feckless women who have found that dropping their knickers and an occasional sprog allows a viable subsistence alternative to the world of work. The answer? No benefits unless you've paid national insurance for at least 5 years and no more than one year's worth of benefits unless you've paid for 10 years. May 28, 2010 12:24 PM BST on community.timesonline.co.uk
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| | Jeremy Taylor wrote: Quite a depressing article - something must be done to remove the disincentive to work. I pay someone £20,000 for a full-time post & she wants to work, but that person is no better off than when she worked part-time & claimed benefits. The benefit trap is real & stifling. May 28, 2010 8:13 AM BST on community.timesonline.co.uk
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| | h marph wrote: Benefit Britain is unique that other European countries have set limits and other means to encourage jobless men and women to become less dependent. The irony is that previous governments attempted to reform it but all were failed to proceed. This time though coalition may be able to simplify the benefit system. May 27, 2010 11:40 PM BST on community.timesonline.co.uk
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| | iain carstairs wrote: Excellent article, I think. The human tendency is to accept whatever benefits fortune bestows and conserve their energy as much as these gifts allow. This holds true not only for the work-shy but for employees who earn a fortune for doing very little, or women who marry wealthy men: after reckless behaviour have shot their circumstances to hell, they cling like RSB bankers, or Fergie or Heather Mills to a lifestyle which only good luck bestowed in the first place, far beyond their real worth as people. This also applies to countries: America and the West have crumbling economies which have followed generations of wealth, built, unfortunately, on the wrecking of entire nations and civilisations. Even now the i-pads, and places like Dubai, are made by slaves and greedily enjoyed by wealthy westerners. We simply cannot get around human nature and any "welfare" state which panders to human weakness, whether in the banks, wealthy marriages, or the benefits system ends up crippling the human spirit, which thrives on a healthy challenge. May 28, 2010 9:23 AM BST on community.timesonline.co.uk
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| | Daisy Smith wrote: Adultery is a graver sin than Godless Britain wants to admit. It will increasingly lead to ever more fatherless children, unhappiness, loneliness and a sorrow, society has collectively created. Don't believe the contemporary 'intelligentsa', an overtly sexualised society as we have is leading to all sorts of problems. May 28, 2010 7:35 AM BST on community.timesonline.co.uk
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| | Michael scales wrote: I have a some sympathy for the unemployed.Most of them could be described as "factory fodder" when they left school.However we no longer have dozens and dozens of factories in every town with each one employing hundreds of people.In the factories that are left,only a handful of people are employed thanks to robots and computers.Even when we were the "workshop to the world" we had periods of high unemployment.Don't ask me what the solution is-the impact of robots and computers has resulted in the loss of millions of jobs,and blaming everyone who is unemployed will gets us nowhere as I'm certain most of them would prefer to go back to the situation we had in the 1960's where jobs were plentiful. May 28, 2010 6:55 AM BST on community.timesonline.co.uk
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http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/camilla_cavendish/article7138520.ece#comment-have-your-say
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