IDS Iain Duncan Smith Archives - ... on a quiet day, I can hear her breathing

Universal Credit forces people to use foodbanks

Universal Credit ~~was~~ is Iain Duncan Smith’s project to do away with many ‘legacy’ benefits for them to be replaced with one benefit. Affecting low-paid workers as well an non-workers, UC is a terrible mess and not fit for purpose.

It is disappointing that Citizens’ Advice Bureaux have accepted £51M (39?) from the government to advise UC claimants.

Foodbank use to soar after next stage of universal credit, Trussell Trust warns

GOVERNMENT plans to move more people onto universal credit (UC) could lead to a huge increase in those turning to foodbanks to survive, the Trussell Trust warned yesterday.

The charity, which runs more than 400 foodbanks across Britain, said that demand in areas where UC has been in place for at least 12 months has increased by 52 per cent, compared with 13 per cent in areas where the new benefit has been in place for three months or less.

Benefit problems are the main reason for referrals to receive emergency food supplies, the trust said, adding that people moving onto UC account for a rising proportion of foodbank referrals.

Waits for the first payment and the shift to the new system have been blamed for causing hardship.

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Post author:dizzy
Post published:9 October 2018
Post category:benefits IDS Iain Duncan Smith politics universal credit
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Hungry Britain

A little dated but there’s no reason to suspect any improvement. No tax avoidance here.

Post author:dizzy
Post published:12 April 2016
Post category:austerity benefits IDS Iain Duncan Smith politics
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New Statesman: When David Cameron became Tory leader, he wanted to end child poverty. Now he just wants to stop measuring it

Now you see it… Now you don’t. The government’s rustled up a party trick for the kids this Christmas. They’re going to make 3.7 million of them disappear.

Britain’s children aren’t going anywhere, of course, particularly those who are growing up poor. But with a legislative sleight of hand, the government plans to quietly give up on the targets to end child poverty enshrined (with cross-party support) in the Child Poverty Act 2010.

And with it, they’re hoping to magic away any mention of child poverty at all. The Social Mobility and Child Poverty Commission will become the Social Mobility Commission. The Child Poverty Act will become the Life Chances Act.

All this is more than a little politically convenient. Apart from a solitary BBC Today programme interview with Iain Duncan Smith last year, which left presenter Evan Davis audibly flabbergasted, not even the Government claims it is on track to meet the child poverty targets.

Indeed, the latest available projections, from the Resolution Foundation, warn child poverty will rise from 2.3m children to 3.3m by 2020 – a figure that will be even higher once the poverty-producing impact of the Summer Budget and the Autumn Statement is totted up.

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I suppose there may be a few chimneys left for them to sweep and the poverty will keep them small enough.

Post author:dizzy
Post published:10 December 2015
Post category:austerity David Cameron IDS Iain Duncan Smith politics
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Shall we start a new series ~ A DECADE AGO TODAY?

W(h)ell it’s coming up for it, no?

A decade ago today …

I’ts coming up for G8 at Gleneagles, 7/7 and you can’t go down here, we haven’t let those undesirable lefties die yet, terrorism BS, the murder of Jean Charles de Menezes.

There is an issue here. It is that corporate media participated in this absolute BS. Corporate media participated – it’s more than participated in – more like were ever so willing and ready to usurp democracy and support Fascism.

edit: Corporate Media loved that Alasister Campbell BS. Well he was still there wasn’t he – Alasister the people’s princess Campbell?

It’s terribly dangerous down there. There are people dying and we’ve got to let them die to get the numbers right. Oh not those sisters from Kentucky of course. No, we only let those people die that we want dead. Don’t imagine that we don’t have such terrible trouble identifying who we want to die of course – they don’t have wallets full of credit cards or mobile phones. Oh no, we couldn’t possibly identify who takes a day or two to die.

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and we’ve got to get the numbers right

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for the

53rd victim

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of the Londond bombings

17/6/15 I think that I’m probably not going to do that actually. It’s there for anyone to investigate – I think that it’s actually quite blatant. I find it very weird that people are wanting to believe people that have proved themselves repeatedly to be totally untrustworthy. Isn’t that weird? I think that it is.

Perhaps the real point is that if you want to know the real truthy reality about things it is not at all difficult. Basically you investigate for yourself. A tiny bit of your own investigation is often enough. Don’t we know that nation states do terrorist atrocities? 911? There is one state where their speciality is bus bombings … and then they take it on tour.

Why do people want to believe such so discredited sources? Think about it for a moment. This person has been proved to be so divorced from the truth and yet you want to accept it without question? The SAS caught in Iraq dressed as Iraqis with a car bomb? That John Reid is such an evil bstard. Charlie Hebdo? Oh FO. It’s almost as if you deserve it.

Don’t you realise that the governments are the terrorists? They do it so that they stay in power by keeping you scared. Can’t you see that?

Terrorism provides them with a distraction to so absolutely useless they are. Iain Duncan Smith with universal credit that hasn’t worked for so many years. Do you think that perhaps he just wants to kill disabled people? That may be a more realistic conclusion. The Health and Social Care Bill. What absolute nonsense that was. Was it intended to FU the NHS? Was that the intention – just feck it up so much?

3am 17/6/15 I do hope that people recognise that the BS they get from corporate sources is exactly that, that governments are evil and rule through using deception and fear, that democracy is an illusion, etc.

I used to refrain myself by the concept of democracy. When you analyse it, it seems just an illusion of representative democracy – voting machines with hanging chads and the New Labour tarty’s promotion of absentee (postal) voting.

The police have been killing people with impunity.

A foreign state has been killed a poor innocent person on the tube and Ian Blair, Tony Blair and all the rest of them have covered it up …

Hardly a democracy, is it?

3.25 Total cnuts: Ian and Tony, Reid, the blind cnut, Clarke, I’ll think of some more. They were in government, they’re not anymore. I wonder if they thought they had omniscient loins when they were in government. Tonee and his flatmate are paedos. Er, I’m not just saying that because I hate them.

3.32 I want hard techno

Post author:dizzy
Post published:15 June 2015
Post category:David Cameron IDS Iain Duncan Smith John Reid
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Some thinks …

Thinks to be ammended, changed

Thing(k)s have moved on now since I was politically active.

I think (consider) that it was well out of order that I was (am) considered a suspected terrrist through legitimate political activism. edit: the point here is that legitimate political activists are (were?) labelled and persecuted as terrorists – and consequently subject to arbitary execution – instead of being recognised and respected as participants as should be the case in any democratic society.

It’s outrageous that totally innocent, unsuspecting people were killed for the Neo-Con New Labour project. It lead to the absolute fallacy of UK suicide bombers. The governments of that era are the terrorists and there is evidence of that. Almost a decade ago now and look what they have created … edit: The governments are still the terrrists – Charlie Hebdo BS.

It’s also outrageous that none of them have been held to account for their not only outrageous but clearly so illegal actions. Rendition, state-sponsored terrorism, just plainly covering-up for a blatant murder at Stockwell tube station. edit: I could call it a state-sponsored execution and I know what state did it.

,,,

TBC

3.50 13/6/15 And now we have these incompetent upper-class twats who appear to be lacking in legitimacy (elections). edit: The problem is that if they were not legitimately elected then … are any laws passed legitimate? if they’re not a legitimate government, what of attempts to displace them?

They’re very keen on blaming poor people instead of bankers and their rich mates. Iain Duncan Smith seems very keen on killing people.

edit; They like killing foxes and badgers.

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3am 14/6/15

It’s very dark isn’t it? Has it always been this dark and disgusting?

I regarded Tonee as totally insane and installed into his position. Is this continuing? Are leaders of the Labour Party installed by a greater power? and it follows according to their agenda?

Maybe we should ask those labour party members that attend bilderberg meetings? They won’t tell you actually.

They do plan decades ahead. I’m pleased and proud that I played my part in knocking those plans off course. US official policy as prescribed by PNAC was to fight many wars on many fronts. That didn’t work did it?

PNAC policy appears to be total domination of everything. I oppose that.

4.08 14/6/15 PNAC policy is also fake manufactured terrorism. I oppose that too.

Post author:dizzy
Post published:13 June 2015
Post category:David Cameron George Osborne IDS Iain Duncan Smith neo-con politics the filthy rich
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Some light Christmas reading

A few politics articles for light Christmas reading …

Why are taxpayers spending £60m on a bridge for Joanna Lumley?

The bridge has been sold as a new public right of way by Johnson. In reality it is anything but. TfL’s business case suggests that just 0.03% of all those using the bridge will be people making new trips. The rest will be either tourists or others already on the Southbank.

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So who will benefit from this bridge? Well according to the business plan, the biggest benefit of the bridge will be to “residential property values”. Incredibly, they estimate that the bridge will raise local property values by an estimated £84 million.

So excellent news for the tiny number of wealthy property owners in central London. Not so good news for the millions of people struggling to afford the cost of their monthly travelcard to work.

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TfL bury Boris bike fare hike under the Christmas tree

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The cycle hire scheme, perhaps Boris Johnson’s most notable achievement as mayor, has so far been serially underused, with a complex hiring mechanism turning potential users away.

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Promised “at no cost to taxpayers” it remains substantially subsidised to the tune of millions of pounds a year.

A poor value-for-money sponsorship deal with Barclays and a complex hiring mechanism, means that it has so far failed to generate anything like enough revenue to cover its costs.

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Iain Duncan Smith to meet Universal Credit target in 700 years’ time

Ian Duncan Smith promised that more than a million people would be signed up to his universal credit scheme by April 2014, with twelve million signed up by 2017.

However, new figures released today reveal the DWP currently have just 17,850 people on their caseload.

This means that at the current rate of progress, it will take them almost 700 more years to meet their original target of twelve million.

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Christmas cannot be captured in fairytale endings, Archbishop warns

[T]he true spirit of Christmas cannot be captured in fairytale endings, the Archbishop of Canterbury will tell the faithful.

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Life-size cardboard Ed Miliband cutout ‘held HOSTAGE’ after being ‘stolen’ from County Hall

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A statement from Worcestershire County Council read: “We are aware that a life-sized picture has gone missing out of the Labour room within County Hall.

“Staff and elected members are working closely to ensure that it is returned and this situation is concluded.”

The cut-out is the same height as the Labour leader – at 5ft 9in.

It is alleged that prior to its disappearance, some staff members turned the cardboard Ed around so people walking past could only see his backside in the window.

Post author:dizzy
Post published:25 December 2014
Post category:Ed Miliband George Osborne IDS Iain Duncan Smith politics
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Conservative and Lib-Dem-Conservative attacks on disabled people

We’re NOT all in this together: the story of the closure of the Independent Living Fund from Moore Lavan Films on Vimeo.

Post author:dizzy
Post published:26 November 2014
Post category:David Cameron IDS Iain Duncan Smith Nick Clegg politics
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Appeal against the bedroom tax!

There’s a judgement that says a bedroom is a room furnished as a bedroom or used to sleep in. All bedroom tax decisions can be appealed. Time is running out to appeal.

The Bedroom Tax is Dead here’s why | SPeye Joe (Welfarewrites)

Bedroom Tax – Finally Killed by Plain Old Common-Sense?

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The effect of this outbreak of common-sense is that, potentially, any or all of the original Bedroom Tax decisions taking effect last April are wrong – as councils cannot have known the actual situation and were making decisions based on an assumption that the rooms concerned were bedrooms. What’s more, despite the time elapsed since then, these decisions are still appealable – appeals can be accepted up to thirteen months after the date of the original decision. This clearly makes it important to act quickly. Anyone in any doubt about the correctness of their Bedroom Tax decision should write to the local authority decision-maker and seek an appeal in their own individual case. But this must be done soon – it will probably be too late by April.

The implications of this legal development may even go so far as to invalidate all of the decisions. If a room isn’t habitually used as a bedroom, it may fall outwith the normal everyday definition of the word – and therefore beyond the scope of the legislation as it stands. Technically, in order to assess whether a particular room qualifies as a “bedroom”, the local authority would have to go out and inspect it. In practice, this would be a task on a scale made impossible by limitations on resources. But unless a property has been thus assessed, then no decision can properly be made.

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Post author:dizzy
Post published:11 February 2014
Post category:IDS Iain Duncan Smith politics
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UK politics news

Recent UK politics news articles

Post author:dizzy
Post published:4 February 2014
Post category:Ed Miliband IDS Iain Duncan Smith new authoritarianism politics
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Commentary and analysis of recent political events

That Conservative, illiberal Nick Clegg is keen to do the Tories’ work

Clegg leaves the door open to further welfare cuts

George Osborne has made it clear that he plans to introduce “billions” more in welfare cuts if the Tories win the next election, including a possible reduction in the £26,000 household benefit cap and new limits on child benefit, but where does Nick Clegg stand? At the Deputy PM’s final monthly press conference of the year, I asked him whether he was prepared to consider a reduction in the benefit cap in the next parliament. He told me:

It’s not something that I’m advocating at the moment because we’ve only just set this new level and it’s £26,000, which is equivalent to earning £35,000 before tax…I think we need to keep that approach, look and see how it works, see what the effects are, but not rush to start changing the goalposts before the policy has properly settled down.

The key words here are “at the moment”. While Clegg again declared that he believed the priority should be to remove universal pensioner benefits from the well-off (“you start from the top and you work down”), he was careful not rule out a cut in the level of the cap.

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Spiked has a good article on modern slavery being make-believe and Theresa May’s Modern Slavery bill addressing a non-existant problem. This blog has addressed slavery not existing. Spiked are on the Want to make a worthwhile donation this Solstice? page.

Firefighters to strike on Christmas Eve and New Year’s Eve. Tony Blair intervened directly in a firefighters’ strike while the FBU was headed by a Labourite idiot. Strange to see Blair referring to the “real world” since he was a total stranger to it.

Home Secretary Theresa May fails to provide any evidence that the Guardian’s publishing the Edward Snowden leaks have damaged national security as claimed by boss of MI5, Andrew Parker. Keith Vaz, chair of the home affairs committee told May “What you have given us today, and what we have heard so far, is only second-hand information. Mr Parker and Sir John are making statements in open session and nobody knows what the follow-up is.” and “Everyone is appointed by the prime minister … They are asking questions of each other, and giving answers to each other … That is exactly why we need to see them [the agency heads]. But you don’t want us to see them at all.”