David Cameron wants to get even tougher with benefits cheats

[alp227]

Source: The Guardian

The Department for Work and Pensions has been forced by the prime minister into reconsidering an idea it had days previously described as "not workable" as Whitehall scrambles for policies to toughen up welfare.

David Cameron wrote in a Sunday newspaper that he wanted to look at going further in welfare reforms, calling for the child benefit payments of parents who play truant from school to be withdrawn.

He suggested a more ambitious welfare reform programme when he posed the question of whether the government should be "asking much more of people on benefits who should be looking for work – or imposing even stricter penalties on those who refuse job offers?"

Research has been published by the thinktank Policy Exchange showing that some jobseeker's allowance claimants spend as little as eight minutes a day searching for work.

Read more: http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2011/sep/04/david-cameron-tougher-benefits-cheats

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Erhm, bankers? Millionaires and billionaires stashing cash in offshore accounts? What about them?

[QC]

1. How about MP expense account cheats?

Like the one who charged a $12,000 TV to the taxpayers.

How about them?

[dipsydoodle]

2. Different category

Both are wrong.

[Ruby the Liberal]

4. How so?

Is the question not use of public funds?

One would think that tax cheats and corrupt politicians cheating on their expense reports would be a bigger financial problem than the pittance paid to those looking for work...

[ret5hd]

8. you just don't get it...

one of the groups is THEM...

the other group is, well, they ain't us, but they're not THEM.

[Ruby the Liberal]

12. Its a big club, and you ain't in it.

RIP George. How I would LOVE to hear a good old Sept 2011 Carlin rant right now about the current state of affairs. Hell, all he would have to do is walk up on stage, say, "I fuckin told ya so", bow and walk out - and I'd buy a ticket.

[dipsydoodle]

10. Both are wrong

but the amounts claimed by our politicians by cheating are dwarfed by those wrongly claiming benefit.

[Ruby the Liberal]

11. And tax evasion?

Nice to know that isn't a problem anywhere but here.

[dipsydoodle]

15. Fair comment

Figures are here : http://citywire.co.uk/money/tax-evasion-costs-treasury-15-times-more-than-benefit-fraud/a378274

So that's another which is wrong - fifteen times as wrong.

[PSPS]

3. "the thinktank Policy Exchange"

Research has been published by the thinktank Policy Exchange showing that some jobseeker's allowance claimants spend as little as eight minutes a day searching for work.

Policy Exchange is the UK equivalent of the Drudge Report. They are well known for issuing "reports" that are based on forged and made-up "evidence." And, of course, every "report" comes to some extreme right wing conclusion.

[ClarkUSA]

5. Bill Clinton may have some tips on welfare "reform" since that was one of his many DINO "successes"

[No Elephants]

6. DINO, DLC, New Democrat, Third Way. all aliases for the same mentality.

[No Elephants]

7. About Al From, founder of the DLC, Hillary Clinton and Europe's center right.

"In 1998, with First Lady Hillary Clinton, From began a dialogue with British Prime Minister Tony Blair and other world leaders, and the DLC brand -- known as The Third Way -- became a model for resurgent progressive governments around the globe. In April 1999, he hosted an historic Third Way forum in Washington with President Clinton, Prime Minister Blair, German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder, Prime Ministers Wim Kok of the Netherlands and Massimo D'Alema of Italy."

http://www.dlc.org/ndol_ci.cfm?contentid=1131&kaid=86&subid=191

and

"In 2000, at a speech at Hyde Park, President Bill Clinton said, "It would be hard to think of a single American citizen who, as a private citizen, has had a more positive impact on the progress of American life in the last 25 years than Al From."

Ibid.

[lunasun]

13. From didnt step down til 2009-long run - lots of destruction to Dem party accomplished

[No Elephants]

17. Technicality. He's just doing the same stuff out of his own company now.

Once the takeover of the Democratic Party was complete, the DLC would, understandably, have less of a role.

In my view, the DLC policies will not hold up long term. Therefore, the Democratic Party will either change back into a real alternative to the Republicon kleptocrats or will become history. But, I doubt if that is what prompted From to shift roles.

He thinks the DLC won over permanently, not only the Democratic Party, but many other nations as well. Or at least, that's what he purports to think. That's what I might say if I were a consultant, too, whether I believed it or not. And my scruples were not too bothersome.

[Mojorabbit]

9. I thought there was a job shortage there also.

If one has looked for months, I am guessing it eventually only takes that long to see if there are any openings.

[RyanPsych]

14. Ah yes- all those greedy poor people

just sucking up all our money

[Celefin]

16. 8 minutes?

Having been unemployed often enough,this line just cracks me up:

>>>'Research has been published by the thinktank Policy Exchange showing that some jobseeker's allowance claimants spend as little as eight minutes a day searching for work.'<<<

When you've been unemployed for more than a few weeks you have EVERYTHING set up for your job hunt. It gets very efficient. You know where and when to check. You don't waste time on writing the required 'three applications a week'... when you KNOW there are NO JOBS.
Or you send out generic applications to please your jobcenter and add a letter apologizing to the poor HR person for wasting his/her time sifting through hundreds of identical, unusable applications. I did that a few times and on two occasions actually got a 'thank you' email as response.

8 minutes a day? More like 8 minutes a week. Process optimization ;)
Guess what, when the job I needed finally appeared I spent a whole week on the perfect application and am now happily employed.

How about some ThinkTank research into the amount of time spent by politicians, bankers etc. on filling in truthful tax returns? Yeah right.

[Cool Logic]

18. The severity of punishment for the types of crimes that undercut the foundation of our society are

not sufficient to deter perpetrators.

I don't know about the UK; however, fraud will cost Medicare and Medicaid about $100 billion this year.

Bernie Madoff was sentenced to 150 years imprisonment and forfeiture of $17.179 billion, for Securities fraud, investment adviser fraud, money laundering, making false filings with the SEC, theft from an employee benefit plan.

If we are serious about eliminating the fraud in Medicare and Medicaid, we should institute similar sentencing guidelines for this type of crime.

[legin]

19. Arnold Rimmer strikes again

[Prophet 451]

20. There are barely any cheats

This is just Cameron looking to "toughen" rules by legislating welfare out of existence. Cameron and his party come from the school of "punish the poor and jobs will appear for them to take". Last time I was unemployed, we were being ordered to write letters to random companies begging for a job. What Cameron doesn't get is that you reach a point where it is simply not possible to look any harder. What'smore, this is all based on bullshit that cheating is common (it isn't) and that our welfare bill is unusual high (it's not).

I'm on disability and we're getting hammered as well. We now have the toughest disability test in the entire world and administered by a company known and proven to be utterly incompetent at best. The bastard scum Tories are trying to legislate disability benefits of existence by making the tests so harsh that absolutely no-one can pass them. There have already been suicides over this.