Out of the Biscuit Tin...

Andrew Sparrow’s rolling coverage of all the day’s political developments as they happen, including MPs debating the gay marriage bill at report stage and latest developments in the ‘swivel-eyed loons’ row

MPs are voting on the second reading of the bill (essentially the most important one) in less than an hour. Someone tried to sabotage the bill at the last moment but it looks like we’re through the woods, with an amendment to start consulting on opening civil partnerships up to heterosexual couples. So whoopee!

revengeroadtripmixtape:

senpai-has-noticed-you:

sometimes i think i’m arrogant but then i remember that julius caesar was kidnapped by sicilian pirates and when they demanded a ransom of 620 kgs of silver he got mad because he thought he was worth more than that and made them raise it…

iandsharman:

mercuryphoenix:

gnimaerd:

iandsharman:

1. Benefits are too generous

Really? Could you live on £53 a week as Iain Duncan Smith is claiming he could if he had to? Then imagine handing back 14% of this because the government deems you have a “spare room”. Could you find the money to pay towards council tax and still afford to eat at the end of the week?

2. Benefits are going up

They’re not. A 1% “uprating” cap is really a cut. Inflation is at least 2.7% . Essentials like food, fuel and transport are all up by at least that, in many cases far more. Benefits are quickly falling behind the cost of living.

3. Jobs are out there, if people look

Where? Unemployment rose last month and is at 2.5 million, with one million youngsters out of work. When Costa Coffee advertised eight jobs, 1,701 applied.

4. The bedroom tax won’t hit army families or foster carers

Yes it will. Perhaps most cruel of all, the tax will not apply to foster families who look after one kid. If you foster siblings, then tough. But these kids are often the hardest to place. Thanks to George Osborne and IDS, their chances just got worse. And even if your son or daughter is in barracks in Afghanistan, then don’t expect peace of mind as the government still has to come clean on plans for their bedroom.

5. Social tenants can downsize

Really, where? Councils sold their properties – and Osborne wants them to sell what’s left. Housing associations built for families. In Hull, there are 5,500 people told to chase 70 one-bedroom properties.

6. Housing benefit is the problem

In fact it’s rental costs. Private rents shot up by an average of £300 last year. No wonder 5 million people need housing benefits, but they don’t keep a penny. It all goes to landlords. 

7. Claimants are pulling a fast one

No. Less than 1% of the welfare budget is lost to fraud. But tax avoidance and evasion is estimated to run to £120bn.

8. It’s those teenage single mums

An easy target. Yet only 2% of single mums are teenagers. And most single mums, at least 59%, work.

9. We’re doing this for the next generation

No you’re not. The government’s admitted at least 200,000 more childrenwill be pushed deeper into poverty because of the welfare changes.

10. Welfare reforms are just about benefit cuts

Wrong. The attack on our welfare state is hitting a whole range of services – privatising the NHS, winding up legal aid for people in debt and closing SureStart centres and libraries. All this will make life poorer for every community.

The shit that is going down in the UK right now - what our government is doing - is really fucking terrifying and it makes me angry that so few people seem to be aware of it internationally. That you’re still getting Americans who are all ‘OOOH I’M SUCH AN ANGLO-FILE I LOVE SHERLOCK AND DOCTOR WHO I WANT AN ENGLISH BOYFRIEND THE ACCENTS ARE SO HOT’ whilst being totally unaware that our ‘great’ british government is currently deliberately, systematically and pro-actively destroying the welfare state.The Conservative party are actively persecuting the poor - they are taking away EVERYTHING that makes this country a reasonably safe, stable place to live. And no one seems to be able to do anything to stop them.

All the safety nets, all the basic systems that just about manage to keep people from starving to death on the streets are being taken away. We’re not just talking about cutting off access to higher education to all but the richest students (which they already have done), or fucking the education system in general (which they are doing) or creating massive tax breaks for the rich (which they have done), or repealing human rights act (which they are trying to do). We are talking about leaving people to starve to death on the streets. Basic, basic things that keep people fed, clothed and housed - the very last, bare minimum supports - have gone.

We have become a country where the government can run you out of your house and into debt because you have committed the great crime of being poor.

THAT is what ‘great’ Britain is today. 

Everything about this makes me so cross - our government and our media is targeting the most vulnerable, using them as scapegoats, pushing all the blame onto the poor, and everyone is going right along with it. The amount of times I have had to put people straight because they’re bitching about how people are ‘living in luxury at the expense of the tax payer’, or how people are ‘abusing the system’, or how people on welfare are somehow subhuman (the whole demonisation of the working class, the use of the word ‘chav’, taking the deaths of six children and twisting it to fit an anti-welfare agenda).

What makes me more cross?

People are letting this happen. PEOPLE ARE LETTING THIS HAPPEN. 

They are believing it. They are not questioning it. I feel like I’m standing in a crowded room screaming the truth at the top of my lungs, and everyone is either ignoring me or laughing at me and telling me to grow up. 

Why do we continue to let them get away with this? Let them hide things, manipulate us, target us, screw us over so royally, when the truth is so blatant and so easily accessible if only people would care to look, would care to give a damn, would care to not believe everything that is forced down their throat. 

I thought, with the Hillsborough report coming out at the end of last year, which exposed the almighty level of cover up, of blame-shifting, of scape-goating and of re-writing the truth that the higher institutions and media are willing to engage in order to cover their own arses and continue doing what they are doing, I thought with that all coming out that people would begin to see. 

But they don’t. 

WAKE UP PEOPLE. WAKE UP WORLD. I AM TIRED OF SCREAMING AT YOU WITHOUT YOU LISTENING. WE ARE MORE THAN THEM. WE ARE BIGGER THAN THEM. WE ARE MORE POWERFUL THAN THEM. WE CAN CHANGE THINGS, BUT ONLY IF YOU SIT UP AND LISTEN. 

Reblogging my own post again for all the excellent commentary.

One thing this excellent post neglects to mention is that the top tax rate in the UK has just been reduced from 50p to 45p per pound, apparently because the 50p rate wasn’t raising enough revenue. The government are trampling on the poor and vulnerable and giving themselves (and those who caused all our problems in the first place) a considerable tax break while they’re at it.