Is anyone buying Labour’s promise to get Britain Back to Work and to reform its super-soft benefits system? I’m not. This Government doesn’t have the stomach to crack down on Benefits Britain and these promises to get legions of people back to work are just bluff and bluster from a floundering Government that’s desperate to come up with at least ONE policy that the British people can get behind.
And at the start of the week Starmer, for once, sounded like he meant business when he hinted that people who kept being offered jobs but wouldn’t go back to work would have their benefits stopped. “About bloody time,” we all thought.
But then when the Government actually explained what it’s laughingly called the “biggest employment reforms in a generation”, it became clear they’re nothing of the sort.
All they amount to is a renaming of Job Centres (they’ll now be called National Jobs and Careers Service) a few apprenticeships and an army of mental health staff whose job it is to coach an army of idlers back onto work.
Which they will fail miserably to do because idlers who don’t want to work – wont , as long as the benefits keep on coming and as long as the rules are so lax they can game the system however they choose.
And this is the fault of successive governments – who have made it too damn easy for people to claim benefits when they’re not actually entitled to them.
This country currently has 2.8million people out of work due to long term sickness and a further 9M people who are economically inactive, although Liz Kendall the Work and Pensions Minister who’ll be spearheading the Government’s new plans says we mustn’t call them “economically inactive” because apparently it’s dehumanising.
How the Hell is it dehumanising to call someone economically inactive when that’s exactly what they are? And of course this is why I don’t believe this Government has the guts or the intention to cut our £100billion benefits bill.
Because when you have wets like Liz Kendal running the show who thinks every single person out of work is a victim – the problem is never going to be solved.
Kendall has already confirmed the benefits bill is set to rise by £26billion by the end of this parliament. And the sickness benefits bill is set to rise by another £1.3B before the Government even starts its welfare review so it’s not looking good.
And if the Government is so determined to start reducing this humungous bill why won’t it set a date to do exactly that. But it hasn’t. Nor will it say how much its Back to Work plan is going to shave off that bill. And that’s because this is yet another uncosted policy that isn’t going to work.
The Tories had they still been in power were set to make £12billion worth of welfare savings. Labour has made no attempt to even match that.
Until people are told “you’ll be offered three jobs and if you don’t take them your benefits will be stopped” the scammers will carry on scamming.
There’s been a generational shift in this country’s attitude to work. My parents would rather have had cut their arms off than claim benefits. I remember a time when both of them had two jobs because one job each didn’t bring in the money they needed to pay the bills.
I come from a poor working class community and most of the people in it felt the same as my Mum and Dad. Being on benefits equalled shame to them NOT because society made them feel like that but because their own work ethic did.
They passed that attitude on to me. I’ve had jobs since I was 15 and even now I know that if I needed money I’d take any job to get some. Thats not what happens today. If people don’t want to work – they don’t have to because they know Benefits Britain will look after them.
Of course I’m not saying everyone on sickness and disability benefits is swinging the lead. Many are genuine cases who simply can’t work. But that isn’t the case for great numbers of them. Many of them claim sickness benefit when they’re not sick for the simple reason we’ve made it easy for them to get away with it.
Why isn’t this “sickness” phenomenon happening in other parts of Europe – because it isn’t. The answer is that lazy cowardly Governments let it happen.
And get this …. taxpayers currently spend £292million treating ADHD, which has risen by 41,000% since 2013. So how come multi millions of people now suffer from ADHD. The short answer is they don’t but they’re claiming benefits for it anyway.
The fact is that in 2024 millions of people simply don’t want to work. And the forecasts say that by 20230 there will be 4million people on long term sickness benefit – that’s 60% higher than before the pandemic.
And before all the liberal lefties start screaming about the Hellish stresses, strains and anxieties people are having to live with in the 21st century it should be pointed out that in the not too distant past we had generations of people who’d lived through six years of a world war – of fighting, being bombed to beggary and half-starved.
Then there was the decades-long aftermath of that when Brits were literally trying to re-build a country. You can understand people suffering from depression and anxiety in those circumstances. What’s harder to understand is being triggered” because someone said something nasty to them.
And please lets stop talking about the 1million young people – aged between 16-24- who don’t have a job and aren’t even looking for one – like they’re victims and special cases.
I’m sick of hearing how they’re facing probs no other generation has. That’s tosh. They’re facing the kind of stress and anxieties that everyone faces and for the majority it sure as Hell shouldn’t stop them from getting a job.
Stress and anxiety are a normal part of working life. Hell they’re a part of life in general. No-one escapes them but most of us manage to still work through and deal with them.
We’re even hearing stories now of people – young and old – who are turning up at Work Capability Assessments with self-diagnosed mental health conditions and not properly diagnosed ones – and Yes, they’re getting benefits.
That’s something Labour could nip in the bud right now – but it won’t.
Until this Government understands that not everyone claiming benefits has a need to or a right to nothing will to change.
Employers are crying out for people to come and work for them and we’re told THAT’S why we have to import tens of thousands of foreign workers.
Actually we don’t. All Starmer and Co have to do is give a short, sharp message to the 9million “economically inactive” – “Take the jobs that are out there – or lose your benefits.”
That’ll sort it……
