Self-sacrificing Tories scrap child benefit for themselves
Posted by Liam T in Uncategorized, tags: austerity britain, benefits, Tories
Barely a day now passes without the Tories declaring a new front in their ongoing ‘austerity’ offensive – a vicious, ideological drive to destroy everything the working class has gained over the past sixty years.
Usually manifesting itself in welcoming headlines across the Tory press, today’s targets are, predictably, the unions, strike action, and, hang on a minute… “middle class benefits”?
Read on and plans are laid out to withdraw child benefit – worth £20 a week for the first child, and £13.40 for any others – from everyone earning enough to be on the 40% or 50% tax brackets, in all the richest 15% of the population.
As the Chancellor George Osborne himself puts it: “We are going to withdraw child benefit from higher-rate taxpayers. It is a big decision for us but we think it is absolutely necessary and fair given the financial situation we face. These are going to be families where there is a higher-rate taxpayer – about 15% or so of families – and we are going to say it is very difficult to justify taxing people on much lower incomes in order to pay the child benefit to some of the better off in our society… we think this is fair and it means we are all in this together.”
Sounds fair enough really – if there’s going to be cuts anywhere, surely it should be on stuff like this: benefits for folk who don’t really need them? While this is true, to an extent, it’s not something that anyone concerned about the future of our welfare state, or working towards a more equal society, should welcome. Beyond the state pension, which surely even the Tories wouldn’t dare step into the territory of scrapping, child benefit is pretty much the only universal benefit left, meaning that everyone, regardless of income, gets it. It was introduced in its first form in 1945 following Labour’s landslide election victory, alongside a whole raft of other social reform, including the NHS itself. It’s been revised since then, but the basic principle – that the state will help financially with the upbringing of every child in the country, has remained the same. Until this government was elected, that is.
By straying into the territory of attacking benefits, even for the rich, the Tories are setting out to undermine the very fabric of the welfare state. Osborne has been quick to say that he’s obviously very regretful about having to do this, and in a better economic situation he would not be carrying it out. But the government have stated that the cuts being put in place just now are not just a short term measure – what we lose now is never coming back (no, not even if ‘Red Ed’ gets in next time round…). By scrapping the entire notion of benefits which everyone receives, they’re leaving the door wide open to further cuts – after all, who says those on the 30% or 20% tax bands really need child benefit either…
If the Tories were genuinely concerned about ensuring that ‘we’re all in it together’, as Osborne states, then a far more effective strategy would be to drastically raise income tax bands on the rich, to 70, 80 percent or higher, rather than eroding the welfare state. But, of course, this ignores what this is all really about: creating a façade that the ‘rich are suffering too’, in a bid to justify the far more harsh attacks on the working class which will be unveiled in the weeks to come.
SSY says: don’t take benefits from the rich, just seize their profits instead – got that George?
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I think we should be careful of allowing this to be portrayed as taking money off “the rich”, because it’s going to have a negative impact on working class people in the long run.
The most obvious thing is that the loss of one of the last universal benefits is really bad, because there’s so much to recommend universalism. It is the most sensible and efficient way of doing things, otherwise you need loads of bureaucracy and form filling, and anyone on here who’s had to deal with SAAS or the dole can tell you that leads to plenty of nightmares where fuck ups really leave you in the lurch financially. Forms are stressful (I personally find them really hard to get my head around) and discourage people from taking what they’re entitled to. There are thousands of children living in poverty due to there families not getting all the benefits they’re entitled to.
It all ends up costing more money than it saves in constantly having to mop up behind the failures of the system – look at all the people that have had their families’ tax credit fucked up, getting paid “too much” and suddenly they’re in debt to the govt. etc.
There’s loads of scenarios you can see right away – what about if someone loses their job, or a couple separate, and one is left taking care of kids with much less income? How long is it going to take them to prove they now are entitled to support? We should just stick with the idea that the state is going to put something toward every child growing up in the UK.
There’s already been loads of anomalies highlighted where people on really high incomes will keep getting it and people on a bit less will lose it:
“A household with one earner paying higher rate tax, and another who is not in work, will lose their Child Benefit. In contrast, a household with two earners on £43,000 will still receive it.
Households with incomes above £80,000 will receive the benefit, while those with incomes just over £44,000 will have their benefit cut.”
(Source: http://www.leftfootforward.org/2010/10/george-osbornes-child-benefit-cuts-will-hit-the-poor-hardest-in-the-long-run/)
There are a lot of other implications to this as well.
Parents who stay at home with children, while partners work are not entitled to JSA/income support. Child benefit is the only income that they receive. As stay at home parents tend to be women, this is a regressive step where women with partners who earn £44K+ have no entitlement to state support whatsoever. Moreover, child benefit is a “gateway benefit” ie it gives you access to others, one of the most important is the Home Responsibilities Protection paid to the person claiming which ensures that NI contributions are up to date and consequently access to a state pension.
While £44K may seem a considerable amount, and its certainly adequate to care for one child, for large families this is crippling. Someone with 6 children earning £44K pa will lose approx £4.5K net, or in other words they would require a salary increase of £6K to compensate. Coupled with the lowering of the tax credits threshold to £40K, this has a significant impact on anyone earning in the £40-£60K bracket. While certainly higher earners, hardly the super rich.
The main problem I see with this is that there are many many women out there who have very rich husbands, but who are stay at home mums with no income on their own. Child benefit is the only benefit paid directly to mothers. I bet a considerable percentage of those rich men with stay at home partners don’t let their partners see much, if any, of their money. So taking away child benefit as a universal benefit especially hits the emotionally and financially abused wives of men who earn over the threshold. Child benefit is a mums benefit and should stay that way and be claimable by all mums. Fucking tory scum.