These are the bastards that are doing it to us

Yesterday the Tories and the Lib Dems announced their plan to cut pretty much everything decent in Britain, transforming our society into a bleak vision of a grey hell hole conjured up by the imagination of Charles Dickens affected by low serotonin. With £81 billion coming out of stuff you rely on, cuts no longer seems like the right scale of wound to talk about what’s happening here. The government’s spending plans which they revealed yesterday won’t just leave public services cut, they’ll look more like a crater. A gigantic fucking open cast mine.

Over the next couple of days we’re going to try and bring you a few different articles looking at the way the government’s Comprehensive Spending Review will specifically make things crap for youth. But in the meantime, let’s recap about exactly what’s going on here.

I know I’ve posted the above film before, but I think it pretty well sums up the situation we’re in, and is worth watching again. The Tories fundamentally have a philosophy of a dog eat dog world, one where society does nothing to help people with problems, whether they’re poor, young, old or disabled. Because to do that would make us lazy, you see. Their idea is that everyone should have to fend for themselves, because if we do we’ll work hard, and we’ll be too scared to stand up to the people with money who are making us work.

They also know however, that their viewpoint is an extreme one, one that will always lose the argument if discussed honestly with the majority of people. Most people think it’s fair enough that we pay taxes so that if someone is too ill to work, or is homeless, or is old and needs help to get by, we do something to help them.

So to get what they want, they have to sneak it in by confusing us. The lie they’ve been pumping us all full of is that Britain must pay back it’s debts now, and so there’s no alternative to cuts. As anyone who has been paying any attention by now knows, that’s total bollocks. Something else we’ll bring you over the next few days is the ideas we could use to get more people in work, give everyone better quality of life and deal with the massive social and environmental problems affecting our society. But the Chancellor George Osborne doesn’t want to know about those. According to him “there is no Plan B.”

The simple fact of the matter is that the Tories ideas are the ideas of the rich. The rich don’t want to accept the fact that their wealth fundamentally comes about because they have robbed the rest of us. So their philosophy is that if you’re poor, it’s your own fault. They hold the poor in total contempt. Which is why yesterday they announced government plans that will hit the poorest in society absolutely the hardest. Here’s some of the ways:

-As we already reported a couple of days ago, about half a million public sector workers will join the dole queue.

The government's vision for the future of job seekers

-Welfare: £7 billion is being cut from the welfare budget. That’s on top of £11 billion already announced in the emergency budget back in the summer. It’s going to get really hard to access benefits, with more means testing. There’s about 1.8 million people who will lose a grand because of this. If you’re on incapacity benefit, after a year you’ll lose £50 a week. They’ll also crack down on what kinds of conditions mean you’re certified as unable to work, because if they say you can work then you’ll only get benefits for a maximum of a year. People with partners in work face losing their benefit, depriving them of their only independent income. This is taking money away from people who may be in actually hellish personal situations, by a bunch of heartless fuckwits.

The unemployed are going to be made to work for their benefits under the government’s new ‘Work Programme’. This means you can be forced to do a lot of the same stuff as people on community service, except you’ll have to more work than they’re legally allowed to! This, of course, will all be delivered by private companies who’ll be making a profit out of the welfare system and getting workers under virtual slave conditions.

If you’re on Jobseeker’s and Housing Benefit, after a year your housing benefit will be cut by 10%.

-Pensions: By 2020, the government want us all to be working an extra year before we retire. I’m going to do a separate post on why this is so spectacularly a shit idea, but for now let’s just restate the obvious: the more well off you are, the longer you live. The poor die younger, and are being forced to spend more of their finite lives working, instead of the retirement that society promised them.

Can I retire now please?

Public sector workers are also going to be made to contribute an extra £1.8 billion to their pensions, meaning they’ll have a shorter, poorer retirement and less money now. Nice one.

The government has also changed the way it’s going to measure the rate of inflation when working out how much to increase pensions year to year. No prizes for guessing they’re changing it to a method that means less money, put on a jumper if you’re cold etc.

-Housing: Instead of calculating housing benefit by the average level of local rents, it’s now going to be 30% of the average. In other words, a massive cut, which will make potentially millions of people homeless. As Shelter in Scotland put it:

“This is at a time when nearly half of claimants are already making up a shortfall of almost £100 a month to meet their rent. By ripping out this support from under their feet it will push many households over the edge, triggering a spiral of debt, eviction and homelessness.”

They’re also going to build 270,000 less new homes for social housing, leaving literally millions of people on a waiting list desperate for somewhere to live. Housing is one of the areas where what they’re up to is most clear: they want people out of being provided for by the state, and into the private market at the mercy of landlords. To do this they’re going to end tenancies for life.

For single people under 25, the level of housing benefit was already really shite. Now they’re extending that shite level to 25-34 year olds as well, meaning the age it which you can be discriminated against for being young just went up 10 years!

-EMA: In England, they’re abolishing the Educational Maintenance Allowance, money that gets paid to you by the government if you stay on in school after 16. The idea of this is to allow people from poorer backgrounds to be able to afford to stay on rather than have to leave and get a job. The government already want to make it harder for working class youth to go to uni by raising tuition fees, now they want to take that option away altogether from many by making it impossible for them to stay in school and get the qualifications they need to do so.

Although this isn’t happening in Scotland yet, don’t celebrate. The SNP government have announced they’re going to be reviewing EMA in December, to see if scrapping it would be a way of saving money. Edinburgh council (a renowned bunch of tossers from many reasons, such as trying to shut schools, not pay their own workers properly and ruin the Old Town) have already announced that they’re not sending out forms to apply in January because it might not exist by then.

Threats to EMA are an area where SSY needs to stand up and be counted. Check out the SaveEMA campaign.

-Train fares are going to be allowed to go up at 3% over inflation, meaning companies like First and Stagecoach are rubbing their hands, the rest of us will be walking more.

These are just a few of the ways that the cuts are going to make your life worse, we’ll be bringing you more details the more chance we’ve had to digest the enormous plate of shit stew that was served to us all yesterday. But it’s important to realise why this is all happening. As I pointed out already, the first part of the reason is that the Tories and the other Tories Lib Dems want to shrink the state and leave us fending for ourselves. The other part of the reason is that they don’t like the fact that there’s whole areas of life that no one is making a profit from. They’d like to take services like the NHS and hand them over to private companies, usually run by some of their own close chums, in order for them to make a lot of money.

The NHS is one of the places you can see this most clearly. The government claimed that NHS spending would be “ringfenced”, i.e. it can’t be touched. But like most of the things that come out of their disgusting mouths, it was a lie. In fact more and more NHS services are going to be contracted out to private companies, meaning they’ll be making a profit out of us, and the standard of service will fall, with dirtier, unhealthier hospitals and unhappier workers.

The multinational corporations in charge of healthcare in the US know that everyone in America who can afford it has health insurance. For their business to expand, they need to be allowed into the market for healthcare in Europe, but who will buy from them while the NHS is free? That’s why the Tories ultimate goal is to get rid of the NHS, piece by piece.

A lot of this stuff doesn’t affect Scotland directly yet, because it’s stuff that’s administered by the Scottish Parliament. But don’t worry, they haven’t forgotten about us! We just get to have cuts next year when the parly budget is set. When you add it all up Scotland is losing about 3 billion quid as a result of yesterday’s announcement. Both Labour and SNP, while saying this is rubbish, have no concrete plan to deal with it, and whichever one of them gets in to government here after the election next year is set to pass on the Tory cuts in the budget they set. Just one of the major ways we can fight back against the declaration of war made by the Tories and Lib Dems yesterday is to make sure there are socialist voices who will really stand up to the cuts in the Scottish Parliament next year.

But more immediately than that, if you’re not planning on going the national Scottish demo against cuts on Saturday, then drop whatever else you’re doing, go here to find out about a bus from your area, and get in to the streets to let the Tories and Lib Dems know they can’t get away with this shit.

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?

By Andrew McPake

Gettin handouts can be so frustratin
Get in line son there’s five million waitin’
The Proclaimers, Cap in Hand

Dole queue under the Tories.

As a central part of actualising Dave Cameron’s glorious vision of The Big Society, the Con-Dem coalition has promised to sweep away the “cycle of dependency” that afflicts Britain’s “pockets of worklessness”. Announcing his new welfare strategy last week, Iain Duncan Smith decried the fact that a majority of benefit claimants have been claiming for nine of the past ten years, that in many areas some families have not worked in three generations and that 1 in 6 children in the UK are growing up in a household in which no one is working.

And you know what? Sitting in the midst of the largest of these “pockets of worklessness” – a barren tundra called Scotland – I agree with him. It is an absolute disgrace that across our land there are families in which three generations have never worked. It is disgusting not just because of the economic waste, but because of the inevitable social problems that arise from mass unemployment; a community in which there are ‘spongers’ will soon spawn an according number of ‘alchies’ and ‘junkies’. All of this amounts to a tragedy for our nation. But it is a tragedy that the Tories, for all their talk, have absolutely no intention of ending.

This may seem a curious assertion to make given that the Tories have only been in power for a few months. However, the following article will go on to show why the Tories were responsible for creating the very ‘underclass’ that they decry. Furthermore, I will also show how this group of hypocrites ideologically depend on the existence of long-term unemployment and that they are the least likely group of people to get the unemployed back into work. In short, this article will show why the Tories knowingly create the very ‘spongers’ that they spend so much time demonising. Read the rest of this entry »

"I've come to assess your disability claim"

From the Benefits and Work newsletter:

“Thousands will lose benefits as harsher medical approved

Tens of thousands of claimants facing losing their benefit on review, or on being transferred from incapacity benefit, as plans to make the employment and support allowance (ESA) medical much harder to pass are approved by the secretary of state for work and pensions, Yvette Cooper.

The shock plans for ‘simplifying’ the work capability assessment, drawn up by a DWP working group, include docking points from amputees who can lift and carry with their stumps.  Claimants with speech problems who can write a sign saying, for example, ‘The office is on fire!’ will score no points for speech and deaf claimants who can read the sign will lose all their points for hearing.

Meanwhile, for ‘health and safety reasons’ all points scored for problems with bending and kneeling are to be abolished and claimants who have difficulty walking can be assessed using imaginary wheelchairs.

Claimants who have difficulty standing for any length of time will, under the plans, also have to show they have equal difficulty sitting, and vice versa, in order to score any points.  And no matter how bad their problems with standing and sitting, they will not score enough points to be awarded ESA.

In addition, almost half of the 41 mental health descriptors for which points can be scored are being removed from the new ‘simpler’ test, greatly reducing the chances of being found incapable of work due to such things as poor memory, confusion, depression and anxiety.

There are some improvements to the test under the plans, including exemptions for people likely to be starting chemotherapy and more mental health grounds for being admitted to the support group.  But the changes are overwhelmingly about pushing tens of thousands more people onto JSA.

If all this sounds like a sick and rather belated April Fools joke to you, we’re not surprised.  But the proposals are genuine and have already been officially agreed by Yvette Cooper, the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions.  They have not yet been passed into law, but given that both Labour and the Conservatives seem intent on driving as many people as possible off incapacity related benefits, they are likely to be pursued by whichever party wins the election.

We know that many people will find this news deeply upsetting and even frightening and we know that some people will condemn us for publicising the planned changes or for the language that we are using to do so.  But we also believe that it’s not too late to stop these ugly plans in their tracks if claimants and the organisations that represent them act now.

With 1.5 million incapacity benefit claimants waiting to be assessed using the work capability assessment in the next few years and tens of thousands of people already on ESA and set to be reviewed annually, these changes will be of great concern to many voters – if they find out about them before polling day.

So, please spread the word in forums and blogs and to people you know who may be affected. Ask any disability charity you have a connection with to speak out now, before election day, against these plans.  You might also want to contact local newspapers and radio to warn people about the proposals.

And above all, contact not just your MP, but the other candidates in your constituency, and let them know you will not be voting for anyone who does not loudly condemn this shameful attack on sick and disabled claimants.

These plans really are a potential seat loser, but only if enough people know about them.

Sources

Building bridges to work

http://www.dwp.gov.uk/docs/building-bridges-to-work.pdf

Work Capability Assessment Internal Review

http://www.dwp.gov.uk/docs/work-capability-assessment-review.pdf

Addendum
http://www.dwp.gov.uk/docs/work-capability-assessment-review-addendum.pdf”

The 3 contenders for Chancellor of the Exchequer all agree on one thing – the budget deficit must be cut. This will require a variety of “brutal”, “savage” and “deep” cuts – but none of course, will affect you or your frontline services. It’s a bit like serial killer say he’s going to stab you repeatedly but you will still be able to go for a pint and a game of football afterwards. Most people don’t like seeing their school, hospital or for that matter job cut. But all 3 parties say they can make these brutal cuts without it really affecting the living standards of the population – how?

Well the Tories in league wi the tabloid press have said they” cut “non jobs” that are allegedly rampant in the public sector; gypsy co-ordinators, totem pole dramatists, carbon officers, etc. A lot of these jobs are basic admin stuff which have been made to sound fancy to stop the people working in them from forgetting that we are all middle class now. But a lot of them are tokenistic, designed to make it look like the Government are doing something about climate change, racism and discrimination in the workplace.

Ultimately though the Institute for Fiscal Studies estimates 14 – 24% cuts in non-protected departments are necessary to deal with the budget deficit. We gave £500 billion in a bail out to the banks – sorry folks, there aren’t enough walking coordinators and health and safety outreach guardian jobs to cut to save that kind of money.

One thing that can be cut, and doesn’t directly affect the mass of the population though is benefits. There’s already demands from the tabloid press to drastically cut “spongers” on benefits. There are parts of Glasgow, London, Manchester etc with large minorities of adults who are living on benefits – a lot of whom are also on disability benefit.

Disability benefit ranges from £47 – £70 a week, an increase from what you get on the dole, which is around £50 a week depending on your age. The Government can’t cut people’s dole easily, but it can force people who are on disability allowance on to the basic unemployment allowance.

New Government tests have been designed, with 70% of the applicants failing to qualify for disability allowance, and deemed fit to work. These tests have been condemned by charities like Macmillan, and the Citizens Advice Bureau for deeming those with terminal illnesses as being fit to work.

Here’s a few examples below,

A CAB in London saw a former engineer in his 50’s who was working as a driver. After feeling ill for a number of months he visited his G.P and was immediately referred to hospital where he was admitted with heart disease and required a triple bypass. About three weeks after he’d been discharged he started to feel extremely ill again. He went back to hospital and after a series of new tests was diagnosed with inoperable and incurable stomach and liver cancer. Although he was advised to continue taking regular exercise, he found walking and breathing difficult, was in constant pain and suffered a number of uncomfortable side effects from both his cancer and heart medication. At his WCA he was found fit for work on the basis that he remarked how he walked daily (although not far and not without discomfort) and could raise his hands above his head (once). None of his medical consultants could believe the decision. He recently appealed the original decision and was successful in being put into the support group for people not required to look for work.

Other examples are given, of one client with Parkinson’s disease who was barely able to stand, and whose speech was slurred but still cleared as fit to work. Another man who was shot at by a violent gang, and diagnosed with PTSD was declared fit for work. His test did not take account of any of his personal circumstances, but just asked him a series of yes and no questions. It’s not dissimilar from what was featured in the documentary The Trap, where people were diagnosed or cleared of complex psychological disorders on the basis of a questionnaire and nothing else. New Labour are quite literally working people to death to save money.

The welfare bill for the budget is massive, with £190 billion spent on social protection – the largest single cost – and a further £29 billion spent on personal social services. Since coming into power in 1997 New Labour have been attacked for this massive proportion of spending on the welfare state. But the reality is the benefits you receive today for being unemployed are lower in relation to average income than ever before. Benefits are now 10% of average wages, down from almost 20% in 1970.

New Labour’s massive welfare bill exists due to long term unemployment in urban areas all over the UK – who previously had no lack of people working, but were plunged into massive unemployment, poverty, ill health and crime as part of the transformation of Britain from a manufacturing country (with the union power that entails) to one based on finance services.

This transformation meant that the economic boom has passed over areas in Scotland with massive unemployment, and without any Government investment or control of the economy to make jobs there are thousands claiming benefits because the talents they had are now irrelevant to the modern economy.

Another part of the welfare bill is in tax credits. Tax credits act as benefits for those who work, but are paid very poorly. Contrary to the tabloids many civil servants who administer this service are themselves paid so low that they also claim them. Tax credits effectively act as a Government subsidy to employers who pay their workers such a low wage, the state has to step in to provide them with enough money to earn a decent wage.

You can expect the unemployed to face a sustained attack from whichever party wins the next election; cutting benefits, forcing the ill to work, making people work for the dole (and not a decent wage). Remember that the biggest welfare state claimant in the UK’s history is not single parents, immigrants, the unemployed or the disabled – it’s the banking system who took £500 billion. They’re the real spongers.