Tories propose to limit Child Benefit to 3 children

[aliceBB]

There is a lot of woolly thinking going on here.

 

First, it is nonsense to suggest that limiting child benefit to one or two (or however many) children will have a contraceptive effect on the feckless. They will continue to be feckless and have more children; it's what they do. Some of them would continue to fall pregnant, even if you offered them cash incentives not to. Short of forcible sterilisation (which is not an option in a decent society), there is not much you can do about it other than continue to try to raise their aspirations through education.

 

Second, nobody has another child just for the child benefit. It's £10 per week, for crying out loud. It will keep the child in nappies and then in shoes, but that's about it. It's hardly worth going through childbirth and the following 20 years for!

 

Third, however powerful your disapproval of irresponsible parents, please remember that their children (however many or few they have) did not ask to be born. If child benefit is meant to support a materially disadvantaged child with essentials, how can it be morally acceptable to deprive any child of food or clothing or warmth simply because he or she was born to parents who cannot fully afford to supply these? Why should first or second children be deemed worthy of support, but not their younger siblings? It's ridiculously arbitrary and unfair.

 

To take a child into care is traumatic and extremely expensive; child benefit is a relatively cheap way of supporting him or her without having to break up a family.

 

In the end, children are our future - all our futures. They'll be paying your pensions and looking after you in years to come, so it is probably a good investment to ensure they survive until adulthood with some sense that society means everyone contributing and everyone benefitting, albeit in different ways, at different times.

Edited March 5, 2015 by aliceBB

[Guest sibon]

No dissenting voices yet. Anybody out there who thinks this "picks on" large families as Labour's Anne Begg claims?

 

I'd go much further.

 

Make it means tested and disallow anyone with family earnings above £40K. If people have to apply for it, many won't bother. At the moment, it just arrives and so people accept it.

 

The same principle should apply to many pensioner benefits too.

 

I'll declare an interest here. The exchequer give me £80 something each month. I don't need it. I didn't ask for it. I don't even know the exact figure. It just arrives. I wouldn't miss it if it didn't come. I guess that I'm not alone.

 

Before forcing the real poor into food banks and soup kitchens, we really do need to look at the whole benefit system and ask some serious questions about the madness that we've allowed to proliferate.

[El Cid]

There is a lot of woolly thinking going on here.

 

First, it is nonsense to suggest that limiting child benefit to one or two (or however many) children will have a contraceptive effect on the feckless.

 

Quite a few months ago, it was reported that Spain had the lowest birthrate in the EU, the reason was said to be lower benefits. I believe that they have now change this, and they now give much larger incentives to all parents.

[aliceBB]

Quite a few months ago, it was reported that Spain had the lowest birthrate in the EU, the reason was said to be lower benefits. I believe that they have now change this, and they now give much larger incentives to all parents.

 

It is unclear whether you are agreeing with me or not.

 

Your use of 'Quite' suggests you are, but the content of your post suggests the opposite. Or do you mean 'Quite a few months ago' (as opposed to 'Very recently'?)

Edited March 6, 2015 by aliceBB

[Leah-Lacie]

We also never received this £500, it would have been nice though.

 

I imagine this is another one of those benefits aimed at the unemployed.

 

Every child got a voucher to open a child trust fund, if they were born between 2002 and 2011 (I think those are the correct years) then it got scrapped.

 

I think it was £250 if the parents were employed and £500 if they weren't

Edited March 6, 2015 by Leah-Lacie

[aliceBB]

Every child got a voucher to open a child trust fund, if they were born between 2002 and 2011 (I think those are the correct years) then it got scrapped.

 

I think it was £250 if the parents were employed and £500 if they weren't

 

I think the idea was that it would help pay for their university education.

 

Hollow laughs all round.

[Cyclone]

I'd go much further.

 

Make it means tested and disallow anyone with family earnings above £40K. If people have to apply for it, many won't bother. At the moment, it just arrives and so people accept it.

Means testing it would cost more than it would save, so what's the point?

 

It's already a requirement for those earning 50k+ to declare it, it's self declaration though, rather than means testing, which is far cheaper.

 

---------- Post added 06-03-2015 at 09:55 ----------

 

We also never received this £500, it would have been nice though.

 

I imagine this is another one of those benefits aimed at the unemployed.

 

It was a relatively lived scheme, the money went into an account for the children, not to the parents.

2 or 3 of my nieces and nephews have these accounts, the more recent ones do not.