Posted on 06/29/2010 3:15:22 AM PDT by Cardhu
Britain must end its obsession with getting young single mothers into work, and focus on young, unemployed fathers whose historic role as the family breadwinner has had to be taken over by the taxpayer, Frank Field, David Cameron's poverty adviser, has said.
Field claimed many of these young, unemployed fathers will not accept offers of work for less than £300 a week since they feel it is not worth their while.
He suggests that men who refuse to take up a government offer of work should have their benefit removed altogether, a far tougher sanction than they face under the current benefits regime.
Field, the Labour MP who was commissioned by the government to carry out a review of poverty, said: "The reason why we have so many single mums is because we have so many single dads who cannot fulfil what most single mothers want from their partners, and the children from their fathers."
Ministers this week signalled a crackdown on incapacity benefit, with plans to reduce the benefit levels of claimants who are found capable of doing some work.
There are also plans to cut the housing benefit budget. The work and pensions secretary, Iain Duncan Smith, has spoken of encouraging people to leave "under-occupied" council homes and move into smaller properties.
Field's remarks underline the extent to which he believes the causes of social immobility lie not just not in material poverty, but also in character, child rearing and the loss of work for unskilled, working-class men.
He said successive governments had focused too much on monetary means to cure poverty. "Labour's very existence had become bound up with high public expenditure," he said. In remarks made in a lecture to the Attlee Foundation, a charity which works in disadvantaged areas,
(Excerpt) Read more at guardian.co.uk ...
You really can’t force anyone to do productive work against their will unless you are allowed to cause them severe pain.
Bailing out the boat with a Dixie Cup.
The British Empire slain by the welfare state. RIP.
A good analogy.
If you cut ALL benefits by 75%, then young men will be more willing to find a job, and young women will prefer ritual disembowelment to risking getting pregnant by some unemployed yob.
The elites are backdooring debtors prison using a politically popular cause . . . child support. Can’t pay, go to jail.
Anybody ever had a credit card charge off or an unpaid medical bill?
If you cut ALL benefits by 75%, then young men will be more willing to find a job, and young women will prefer ritual disembowelment to risking getting pregnant by some unemployed yob.
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True that.
When you subsidize something you get more of it.
I agree with everyone’s comments. However, another point I’d like to raise is the part that mentions encouraging people to move from under-occupied homes to smaller properties. How long until that trend catches on here at the behest of tge environmental whacko?? I’m a single mother with a six-figure income. I have a 3000 sq ft house. Who’s to stop Obama from saying that’s more than my toddler & I need? Granted, I pay for my house but still.......
Sorry. Little off the subject but that jumped out at me
Too late - the generational habit has taken hold.
The personal responsibility for one’s own life was hi-jacked by government welfare programs and will never be lifted.
“Britain must end its obsession with getting young single mothers into work, and focus on young, unemployed fathers whose historic role as the family breadwinner has had to be taken over by the taxpayer, Frank Field, David Cameron’s poverty adviser, has said.”
Are the authors of these kind of words required to undergo a lobotomy before writing?
As you note, the is a big difference owning your home or living in a subsidized, many even rent free, council owned properties.
Why they can’t just move them on a take it or leave it basis or simple raise the rent to make it economically good sense.
Stop feeding them, sooner or later they will get the idea.
Don’t even get me started on the welfare system!!! I could yap on all day about the absurdity. I realize this article is referencing the UK but the problem is no different here in the States - people milking the system & the beaurocrats lacking in common sense scratching their heads while the taxpayer gets raped. My mom is a disability caseworker who’s intimately familiar with our welfare system. The benefits these people get are unbelievable. She loves Newt Gingrich but she’ll admit that welfare reform did little to overhaul the system. I’m enouraging her to write a book when she retires. If the public was informed about how ridiculous the benefits are & how much fraud goes unchecked, they’d revolt!!!
If liberals had their way, most men would be aborted shortly after birth, with a few kept as sperm donors. They would be terminated shortly after providing enough seed.
You have a legitimate concern. I can’t tell you how many young people I’ve heard say things like: “no one needs a house that big”, “no one needs a car that big”, “no one needs that much ______”. I always make a point of saying if they can pay for it they have every right to it. I don’t think they hear a word I say though. It is indoctrination they’ve received from early childhood.
I recommend seeing the movie Doctor Zhivago (1965).
It is scary to think of the term “underoccupied” being thrown around by government beaurocrats.
It is what happened with the Lenin revolution in Russia, all property became the property of “the people” - true communism. All property was appropriated by the government.
That is one scenario. The other is akin to 3rd world countries, where your BMW is bulletproof and you drive through poverty in and out of your fortified, gated property every day.
Either way, not good.
Well since the UK is not creating any jobs (net or otherwise), cutting them off the dole will only fuel crime and the underground economy... Smooth move libtards...
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