Benefit shortfall

I think there's a problem with the benefit system, I've been trying to get on some for many weeks, they have me running round in circles right now. I have no income and they aren't showing any signs of giving me any soon. I think I will starve before they pay me anything. Crazy but true is also the access to these hundreds of food banks around the country, not one person I've spoken to knows where or how I can get referred. My power will be off in about 2 days too. No the current benefit system is too confusing, too much emphasis on job hunting/cvs and not enough on actually feeding and supporting those in need. On the plus side I'm down a couple of dress sizes already!

Anyway, after all this guff I have made my plans to shuffle off this mortal coil!!! It is the best and only option.

I am damned if I am going to justify myself to some nobody who doesn't have a clue what my disability means to me.

I lived in the United States many years ago and I can see many meeting of minds in today's Britain and the USA then.

I can no longer see myself a part of Autism.UK as many members and trustees hold wildly different opinions to my own.

I resign. God help you all. Don't lose your job and don't get sick!!

There's an awful lot of playing on words and disingenuity with regard to this subject, and it's just awful.  Although the press and right-wing spokespeople claim that Social Security is rife with fraud, the statistics actually say otherwise; and though I've heard so much anecdotal evidence about "everyone knows one" and "the man down the pub" and "they look alright to me", I don't know anyone who's actually playing the system.  I do, however, know many people who are being failed by the system but in spite of that are trying to find work only to find that there is none.  Yet all the press has to say is "benefit scroungers, we must make life harder for them".  Which is one of the key reasons I think the UK press is dangerously irresponsible and toxic.

This is a subject I find to be extremely distressing.  It's been awful: it's awful having the presumption of guilt and the bar being raised so high when we need to contest it; it's awful being viewed as almost sub-human; it's awful being told we're a drain on society and a waste of taxpayers' money.  To be honest, if euthanasia was an option I would've taken it by now.

Vometia, I couldn't agree more with you!! The replies from some of our fellow 'members' are phrased to almost come from Conservative Central Office!!

I as a person on benefits and I am housebound with Aspergers and Bipolar ,I am about to have my benefits halved each month as I don't fit the criteria for the new PIP benefit.

Forget about the 27k ceiling, I have been on benefits of £140 per week, that is being halved to £70 per week. I am still obliged for this money and I wouldn't want it to be taken away from me.

I am not the worst case, there are lots more worse off than me but have a little compassion and not allow worthy benefit claimants to be merged with the few who are abusing the system.

As for Cheryl Gillan voting for the benefit cuts package and not wanting the benefit cuts to affect people with Autism is a wry play on words?!!! 

Nobody actually get an "income" of 23 grand though: on the rare instances that amount actually adds up, most of it goes to private landlords.  It's pretty misleading to say that people are choosing to live a life of luxury on benefits, and seems to be intended to distract attention away from the real problems of tax-dodging and the like.  Trouble is, the disabled and sick are easy targets and it's very easy to write them off as probably malingerers, and it doesn't help when "welfare" conveniently includes the cost of pensions, tax credits, housing benefit and loads of other stuff.  It's all deliberately missing the point though, and meanwhile I get crucified by the likes of Atos and find myself afraid to actually admit to anybody that I have a chronic illness as it gives one pretty much instant pariah status.

I have to say, this forum is one of the last places I'd expected to find myself on the defensive against the rather unpleasant assertions of benefits scroungers and "welfare as a lifestyle choice" and it seems in rather poor taste.

I don't think that many people "choose a life on benefits as a lifestyle", that really sounds like it's straight out of the pages of the Daily Mail.  I am quite worried about the way that the press and certain elements within government have spent years vilifying and persecuting some of the country's most vulnerable people (and many of us may be counted among them) and how many people have bought into it.  It's not the disabled, sick and unfortunate who caused the financial crisis, but a person might be forgiven for thinking otherwise these days.