campaign against welfare cuts and poverty

[BigTom]

Yeah, although I've got to say that since timeline for pages came in, all the pages I admin have noticeably dropped in traffic, and birmingham against the cuts twitter overtook facebook for followers and I get more feedback from there now (although still more referalls from facebook).

 

[stuff_it]

Yeah, although I've got to say that since timeline for pages came in, all the pages I admin have noticeably dropped in traffic, and birmingham against the cuts twitter overtook facebook for followers and I get more feedback from there now (although still more referalls from facebook).

The only reason I tend to stay off Twitter unless there is something happening is I find it can be a bit of a bandwidth hog, where I'm paying £5 per gb on my dongle atm for pre pay....

 

[treelover]

juts been reading that just like in the olden days, people are now identifying ATOS doctors, staff, addresses, etc and spreading the info around on social media, can't possibly condone such behavior though.......

 

[Frankie Jack]

The only reason I tend to stay off Twitter unless there is something happening is I find it can be a bit of a bandwidth hog, where I'm paying £5 per gb on my dongle atm for pre pay....

Wow.. That's hefty. Who is the provider stuff_it?

 

[stuff_it]

Wow.. That's hefty. Who is the provider stuff_it?

3 - I can't get a long contract as I'll b in halls by the end of September and paying £140 for 9 months of 10GB unlimited badboy.

I'm going in halls, so little point getting a phone line installed to the truck.

 

[treelover]

You are paying 30' O00 grand for tuitions fees!

 

[stuff_it]

You are paying 30' O00 grand for tuitions fees!

No, £9k per year for tuition, plus another nearly £4k loan to live on (pay rent and buy books), plus another nearly £4k grant for food as I'm a pauper.

They tripled the tuition fees this year, innit.

 

[Frankie Jack]

Any Welsh lovelies need a bit of a lie down on

• • Wednesday, 29 August 2012
  • 17:00
• 
  Aneuren Bevan Statue, Queen Street, Cardiff
• As part of the nationwide protests against ATOS organised by Disabled People Against Cuts, we will be holding a mass "die-in" at the Aneurin Bevan Statue, Queen Street, Cardiff, to represent all the disabled people killed by ATOS. Please join us.
  
  The draconian DWP changes to disability benefits, carried out by ATOS, are driving disabled people to suicide. In addition almost 1,500 people a year have died after ATOS found them "fit to work" and stopped their benefits. A Channel 4 documentary recently revealed that the DWP requires ATOS to reject the benefit claims of 7 out of 8 disabled claimants, resulting in immense suffering, homelessness, or death. The mark of a civilised society is how it addresses the needs of its most vulnerable members. Given what is happening to tens of thousands of disabled people in Britain today, we can no longer claim to be a civilized society.

Facebook page.

And Swansea too.

Protest against ATOS in Swansea

• • Tuesday, 28 August 2012
  • 12:00
• 
  Grove House, Grove Place, Swansea
• 
  Disabled people, carers and friends -- on Tuesday the 28th in Swansea, take part in a national protest against ATOS, a company that’s sponsoring the Paralympics but wrecking disabled people's lives.
  
  Every week 32 people die after being found "fit for work" by ATOS and their inhumane computer-based tests.We are asking the whole of the anti-cuts movement to join us in our opposition to the company most responsible for driving through the government’s brutal cuts agenda.

Facebook Page.

 

[treelover]

Good news, but 'die ins' really have to be done with dignity, some of the student ones are embarrassing...

 

[Frankie Jack]

From DPAC website.

We are really keen to focus on Atos throughout the Paralympics,so any help from DPAC would be great.
I am really keen to speak to disabled people who have had the following experiencing with the WCA:

• Family member who committed suicide as a result of being found fit to work
• someone who turned up for their assessment to have it cancelled because no health professional around
• someone who has inaccurate information recorded by the assessor

I am totally open to anything new – so please do keep ion touch and pass on my details (work number please).
Many thanks
Nina Lakhani
The Independent
News Desk
0203 615 2103
n.lakhani@independent.co.uk
@ninalakhani

 

[Frankie Jack]

Welfare Reform. The dread of things to come. pdf.

The contributions to this short ebook have been written in the moment
of political campaigning. They bear witness, employ argument and offer
statistical evidence to challenge the way both Labour and the Coalition
governments have designed and implemented welfare reforms.

 

[Frankie Jack]

I've just stumbled over an ex poster (banned) from here I believe called Jonathan Bishop.
He's giving out advice on self employment and tax credits around disablity groups and pages on facebook.

You’re off Incapacity Benefit – what next?
I'm off to bed now, but, I'd appreciate your thoughts on his advice page. *quick glance seems to say similar to what Work Providers have been sussed as trying to get their 'customers' to do as far as self employment is concerned*

 

[BigTom]

I've just stumbled over an ex poster (banned) from here I believe called Jonathan Bishop.
He's giving out advice on self employment and tax credits around disablity groups and pages on facebook.

You’re off Incapacity Benefit – what next?
I'm off to bed now, but, I'd appreciate your thoughts on his advice page. *quick glance seems to say similar to what Work Providers have been sussed as trying to get their 'customers' to do as far as self employment is concerned*

He's wrong about 16 hours/week, though he may have been correct at the time of writing. It's only 16hrs for single parents now afaik, 24hrs for couples with children and was always 30hrs for anyone without children (or maybe dependents, no idea how tax credits might work for carers)
(caveat: there may be different rules for disabled people, but i don't know how they would do it, perhaps someone in receipt of dla only needs 16hrs to qualify).

He's right that tendering and looking for work counts but i think you'd need to show that it was part of a genuine business. I don't know the website mentioned but i think if you were just firing off random bids and not acting in the way that would be expected of a genuine business then you could probably lose your tax credits and be made to repay what you've claimed.

I'm not sure though if they can decide that even if you can evidence trying to find work you're not actually trying to run a genuine business so you're not eligible for tax credits.

It's a risk though and personally i don't like his advice because he didn't mention the risk of having to repay credits if caught. If his advice was that if you have a business idea you'd like to try, tax credits can be got even before you're actually getting paid work, it'd be fine, but that's not how i read the slant of the article.
I read it as saying that conditionality of tax credits is easier than jsa and easy to fake.

That he's not mentioned details of eligibility like needing to be over 25 or that kids/no kids affects eligibility is not a good sign in general.
Her also hasn't mentioned rates, wtc for non parents is 52/week, less than jsa.

Flakey info is usually a good sign of dodgy advice.. Though his main assertion is probably correct.

 

[BigTom]

http://www.direct.gov.uk/en/MoneyTa...qualifies/WorkingTaxCreditthebasics/DG_172730

ok, there are different rules for disabled people, so 16 can qualify you BUT

http://www.direct.gov.uk/en/MoneyTa...qualifies/WorkingTaxCreditthebasics/DG_172728

You don't have children

If you're not responsible for children, you need to work the following hours to get Working Tax Credit:
if you're aged 25 or over, you need to do paid work of at least 30 hours a week
if you have a disability and are aged 16 or over, you need to do paid work of at least 16 hours a week
if you're aged 60 or over, you need to do paid work of at least 16 hours a week

So I'm wrong about tendering for work, though I'm sure I've been told that if you are self-employed then I can count time spent pitching for jobs.

If you have kids it's different:

one of you is disabled and working at least 16 hours a week
one of you works at least 16 hours a week and the other is entitled to Carer's Allowance - even if they don't get any payments because they receive other benefits instead

cos it says working, not paid work.

 

[treelover]

Welfare Reform. The dread of things to come. pdf.

Good find, when was it re-published?, I see it features Jonathan Rutherford's excellent analysis on the genesis of the current welfare reforms:'New Labour, The Market State and the end of Welfare' including the seminal meeting/conference in Oxford in 2002 on 'malingering and illness deception' that amongst others was attended by David Milliband and of course UNUM...

 

[treelover]

Why was Bishop banned?

 

[treelover]

'In November 2001 a conference assembled at Woodstock, near Oxford. Its
subject was ‘Malingering and Illness Deception’. The topic was a familiar one to
the insurance industry, but it was now becoming a major political issue as New
Labour committed itself to reducing the 2.6 million who were claiming Incapacity
Benefi t (IB). Amongst the 39 participants was Malcolm Wicks, then Parliamentary
Under Secretary of State for Work, and Mansel Aylward, his Chief Medical Offi cer at
the Department of Work and Pensions (DWP). Fraud - which amounts to less than
0.4 per cent of IB claims - was not the issue. The experts and academics present
were the theorists and ideologues of welfare to work. What linked many of them
together, including Aylward, was their association with the giant US income protection
company UnumProvident, represented at the conference by John LoCascio. The
goal was the transformation of the welfare system. The cultural meaning of illness
would be redefi ned; growing numbers of claimants would be declared capable of
work and ‘motivated’ into jobs. A new work ethic would transform IB recipients into
entrepreneurs helping themselves out of poverty and into self-reliance. Five years later
these goals would take a tangible form in New Labour’s 2006 Welfare Reform Bill.'

excerpt from essay by Jonathan Rutherford, (see above post)

this summary says everything about current welfare policy, its ethos, philosophy and practice..

 

[Frankie Jack]

I think that site with the article on tax and this one are both JB inventions.
The Crocels Community Media Group
The Selivcel Project

 

[Greebo]

Why was Bishop banned?

It's complicated. IIRC, it was partly a banning and partly him flouncing off.

 

[Frankie Jack]

Good find, when was it re-published?, I see it features Jonathan Rutherford's excellent analysis on the genesis of the current welfare reforms:'New Labour, The Market State and the end of Welfare' including the seminal meeting/conference in Oxford in 2002 on 'malingering and illness deception' that amongst others was attended by David Milliband and of course UNUM...

I've loads of pdf that I saved links to and to my drive over the last year that I'm finally getting round to re-naming and sorting out. Hence the 4am find of that one this morning.

The Truth is Out There.. If I can just remember what the file abreviation means when I'm searching for it.

 

[treelover]

I think that site with the article on tax and this one are both JB inventions.
The Crocels Community Media Group
The Selivcel Project

yes, i think JB has recently moved further towards the dark side, as many do....

 

[treelover]

I've loads of pdf that I saved links to and to my drive over the last year that I'm finally getting round to re-naming and sorting out. Hence the 4am find of that one this morning.

The Truth is Out There.. If I can just remember what the file abreviation means when I'm searching for it.

its on Faceache now, not by me though, but spreading like wildfire, nice one...

 

[Frankie Jack]

That's the good thing about faceache. The speed that pics, files and articles move around at.

 

[Frankie Jack]

Cut benefits to bring down rail fares: MP

WTF..!!

The Coalition should cut benefits more to help keep down rail fares for commuters, a Conservative MP has said.
Mark Reckless, MP for Stroud and Rochester in Kent, said those who travel for work should not be facing an increase in ticket prices of up to 11 per cent.
"It is a question of fairness for those working hard to charge them so such," he told the BBC.
George Osborne, the Chancellor, is under growing pressure over the increases, which threaten to squeeze household budgets during the recession even further.

We should starve to stop fare increases now..!!

 

[Minnie_the_Minx]

Cut benefits to bring down rail fares: MP

WTF..!!


We should starve to stop fare increases now..!!

Anyone would think people on benefits don't use trains

 

[Minnie_the_Minx]

From DPAC website.

We are really keen to focus on Atos throughout the Paralympics,so any help from DPAC would be great.
I am really keen to speak to disabled people who have had the following experiencing with the WCA:

• Family member who committed suicide as a result of being found fit to work
• someone who turned up for their assessment to have it cancelled because no health professional around
• someone who has inaccurate information recorded by the assessor

I am totally open to anything new – so please do keep ion touch and pass on my details (work number please).
Many thanks
Nina Lakhani
The Independent
News Desk
0203 615 2103
n.lakhani@independent.co.uk
@ninalakhani

Could be interesting

http://www.facebook.com/events/217652368360892/

 

[Frankie Jack]

Anyone would think people on benefits don't use trains

I don't. I can't afford them.

 

[Minnie_the_Minx]

I don't. I can't afford them.

Well I try to avoid them due to cost but b/f has Freedom Pass so do occasionally as it may be quicker and less stressful for him even though I have to pay full fare

 

[BigTom]

Cut benefits to bring down rail fares: MP

WTF..!!


We should starve to stop fare increases now..!!

eh? what's the tory-logic behind this? how would cutting benefits bring rail fares down? Not at all explained in the article itself, benefits isn't mentioned? Is it because some on benefits get free travel and that money should be used to subsidise tickets for commuters?

 

[Minnie_the_Minx]

eh? what's the tory-logic behind this? how would cutting benefits bring rail fares down? Not at all explained in the article itself, benefits isn't mentioned? Is it because some on benefits get free travel and that money should be used to subsidise tickets for commuters?

Maybe all the money saved from cutting Incapacity Benefit and DLA will be given to the rail operators?