Tuesday 30 April 2013

Post Of The Month

This month, I'm selecting Fahrenheit211, for this one.

16 comments:

Tatty said...

If this blogger had concentrated on Philpotts I might have agreed but for the fact it descended into an "media reliant" attack on the disabled - who by a happy coincidence and easy bandwagon hop also happen to claim benefits and oh-my-gosh sometimes fraudulently so they ALL must be at it- then no, I don't.

Fahrenheit211 said...

Unfortunately Tatty, there are a lot of people who do take the piss with disability benefits. The very fact that nearly everyone in my circle has at some point encountered someone who is taking the piss either by talking up the severity of illness, especially mental illness shows me that something is badly wrong with the welfare system.

It is highly unlikely that we have more people unable to work than we have had in the past. There is a lot of slack and slackers in the welfare system and the problem is widespread.

The thing that makes me most angry about the current welfare system is it discriminates against those who have paid in and favours those who have not or who have arrived from overseas.

Bobo said...

There are 2.8m people on the dole, and at any one time less than half a million vacancies. People like Philpott, and there are a LOT of people like him, are 'vile', 'worthless', (insert your epithet of choice here). But they are products, symptoms. The result of a deliberate policy that accepts an imbalance of jobs to jobless. The result of a policy that sees no more worth in a class of people than to consign them to a pointless and nihilistic existance. There are families which have not had a member in full time employment for three generations now.

But there are 2.2m more people than there are jobs. Whose fault is that? Mick Philpott's?

Martian said...

There's only one comment, so far, on that post and it exposes the fatuity of the writer's claim. 'Post of the Month'? Yes, if what you mean is the best example of sanctimonious, short-sighted, reactionary drivel in the past 30 days. "878,000 Britons who have dropped their benefit claims ..." Where did that figure come from? IDS? Or somewhere reliable?

Twenty_Rothmans said...

Gee, I wish I could post comments from my office during the day.

Jobs for people on the rock and roll are scarce, yes. But why did they keep on voting for a government that kept squeezing in cheap labour from abroad?

Now you've created something even worse - a government squeezing handouts and continuing to entice cheap labour in something that only a tertiary syphilitic could come up with on crack - to woo the ethnics to the Tories.

See, the old Tories weren't too big on the dole or ethnics.

Then someone from Labour came along and said, hey, that's okay, I'll call them benefits. Like profits, like revenue, right? So you keep on. In the meantime, look at these poor people, let's help them too.

So the poor people from afar started moving in but that's okay, they weren't taking your job, you were on DLA. Let the good times roll!

Now Darren's 17, he's got to find a job. Only there ain't any. And Chanteuse is getting a right bullying from them slags down the road. And the council says this five-bedroomed house is too large for the two of you.

So it's Tory Toff Cameron and his Tory Eton mates what have done this, alright?

I am off to my local, where, regular as clockwork, DLA **** will arrive and enjoy lager with a scotch chaser to start. This worthless layabout, whose spittle I'd not use to shine my shoes, carves out his worthless, pointless life at your expense - and mine.

You might ask - who am I to criticise?

My worthless, pointless life is self-funded.

Tatty said...

Fahrenheit 211 - Unfortunately, you presented a discredited media claim as fact.

At least one thing that is wrong with the welfare system is the way it's falsely portrayed in the media and the lengths that people like yourself who believe it...or know someone who knows someone that fits the stereotype...ould like to go in order to fix it with no regard whatsoever to the truth or the effect it actually has on the peope concerned.

The likes of Philpotts would survive their JSA being sanctioned on the say-so of a snot-nosed teenaged DWP advisor attempting to appease public opinion.

Many genuinely disabled certainly would not...and have not.

You perpetuated A Myth...and one of many myths that surround the issue of disability welfare. That's MY problem.

JuliaM said...

"...but for the fact it descended into an "media reliant" attack on the disabled ..."

It's not an 'attack on the disabled' to insist their entitlement to benefits is checked and rechecked, is it?

"The thing that makes me most angry about the current welfare system is it discriminates against those who have paid in..."

Indeed! And so discourages 'pay your own way' mentality. All the better to ensure a need for a huge State apparatus.

"The result of a deliberate policy that accepts an imbalance of jobs to jobless."

Because that way lies huge State employment?

"Where did that figure come from? IDS? Or somewhere reliable?"

I see a lot of criticism of IDS (almost as if he were Satan incarnate) but I see no alternative options being put forward by his critics. Why so?

JuliaM said...

"So it's Tory Toff Cameron and his Tory Eton mates what have done this, alright?"

Spot on! Though it WAS a Conservative government that had the bright idea of splitting off the 'can't work' from the 'not currently working' figures.

How well that worked, eh?

"...one of many myths that surround the issue of disability welfare. "

But it's not a myth!

Fahrenheit211 said...

Tatty said: "Fahrenheit 211 - Unfortunately, you presented a discredited media claim as fact. "

I'm afraid that I disagree on that. The figure I used of nearly 900,000 was figures released by the DWP and reported by the Daily Telegraph amongst others.

You may or may not have an issue with the accuracy of official govt figures but the figures are certainly not media myths. Also in my life I've seen too many disability scams and heard too many tales of how to beat the ATOS assessments (always use a walking stick, dont' carry a handbag, create a panic attack, do not be coherent etc etc)to disbelive the DWP figures.

I do believe that a caring society should look after those who cannot through disability look after themselves, but we now have a system that is gamable by, and generous to the cunning but impenetrable and mean to those who are genuinely in need.

Tatty said...

It's not an 'attack on the disabled' to insist their entitlement to benefits is checked and rechecked, is it?

Dunno about you but... when looking at solutions to welfare benefit fraud... then I certainly view it as "an attack on the disabled" to be shoving them through the doors of ATOS every few months or so in wilful ignorance of and/or direct contradiction to medical evidence more than freely available from that other government department - the NHS.

At best you could call this checking and re-checking "inefficient" and it's certainly costing the omnipresent Taxpayer millions.

Around 40% of appeals against DWP decisions to stop disability benefits are upheld and in no small part due to the fraudulent activities of ATOS's own testing centres - oh the irony. Not to worry though.

Google around a bit and check out IDS bringing in a system in October 2013 called "Mandatory Review" before any appeal will even be "allowed". Take a good look at just what *that* entails...in short though it's a legal bar to claiming ANY benefit of any kind while they make their minds up what they will "allow"...and the dangerous precedent it sets for us all.

But it's not a myth!

Fahrenheit 211 almost requoted the DM verbatim.

I say "almost" since not even the DM had the nerve to state it as a "fact" but presented it as a "claim". If you speak English then there's a huge difference in the meaning of the two words.

Which is only one reason why, YES, "the fact that there have been 878,000 Britons who have dropped their benefit claims rather than having their fake so-called ‘mental illness’ or ‘bad back’ conditions exposed by medical examination" IS a myth.

I never believed it on the face of it anyway and have since seen it discredited but yet to see it proven. Have you ? In the interests of half decent debate then I'm happy to be corrected.

Tatty said...

Fahrenheit 211 - "The figure I used of nearly 900,000 was figures released by the DWP...

...though the "reason" for such was entirely your own (unsupported and prejudiced IMHO) opinion.

"we now have a system that is gamable by, and generous to the cunning but impenetrable and mean to those who are genuinely in need. "

But but but...this is what the likes of you demanded...with your opinions an all that...

What...you didn't think it would happen ? Oh dear. Think before you blog. Maybe. Just a suggestion.

Fahrenheit211 said...

Tatty if you have a more accurate figure than the 878k figure I would be glad to see it. You say it has been discredited if it has could you supply a reference?

Yes I do quote the DM but only when what the DM is printing looks reasonable or is something like a court report where accuracy in reporting in more likely.

Like it or not the welfare system is abused the question is by how much? There are people out there who do deserve to be helped but there are also a considerable number of people who really do not deserve to be helped. There is nothing wrong with kicking wasters off of benefit.

Tatty said...

Fahrenheit 211 - " if you have a more accurate figure than the 878k figure I would be glad to see it. You say it has been discredited if it has could you supply a reference?

It's not the figure that has been discredited but the oft-repeated and reason that has been discredited. If you missed that bit through some fault of mine then I do apologise. I tried to make it as clear as humanly possible. I even made the type all bold and everything.

As for a reference...do your own googling, you lazy sod.

"Yes I do quote the DM but...

I said "almost". No defence neccessary.

"There is nothing wrong with kicking wasters off of benefit."

Providing it's done properly. It isn't.

Fahrenheit211 said...

Tatty, I certainly agree that those who need to be kicked off benefit should be kicked off properly. However I stand by my assertion that there are a considerable number of piss takers who are only now, because of changes in disability based benefits, being revealed as piss takers. Unfortunately previous governments foolishly moved people from unemployment benefit to disability type welfare and started a cycle of growth in this area of welfare. It is now time to right that wrong and let disability welfare be solely for those who really cannot work or who need assistance in working.

Tatty said...

Fahrenheit - So long as you agree the system is also targetting disabled people it has no business whatsoever harrassing (which you did earlier in the discussion)...and aren't insisting that your quoted "fact" is actually entirely factual (nope, no assertion of that)...which was what I disagreed with in the first place... we can politely shake hands and walk away.

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