Councillor inadvertently holds up wrong letter.......................

[mk1]

It is a stupid spiteful 'tax' introduced with no other aim than to save money and placate the right wing knobs by looking as if you are 'doing something' about welfare claimants.
An act  than can force someone from a cheaper 2 bedroomed terraced house into a dearer 1 bedroomed matchbox flat is stupid and I defy anyone to say it isn't.
A large number of the cheaper rented houses in Hartlepool are these 2 up 2 down  terraced houses and I know it was next to impossible for a single person to get the rent paid that landlords were asking for 3 bedroom or larger house.

[DRiddle]

wish your reply was for all to see on the front of the hartlepool mail tomorrow night

bang on the button mr riddle.

Thanks Stokoe. The other issue of what Councillor Akers-Belcher said (that I couldn't even be bothered to counter as it was so crazy) is the idea that this 'tax' takes £1.2 million out of the local economy...... it doesn't.

That claim is based on the premise that the people losing the benefit due to the extra bedroom(s) will NOT have the money to spend locally. The fact is around 80% of all the spending of the poor (using the Labour Governments OWN measure of what it is to be poor) is spent on goods and services that are NOTHING whatsoever to do with the local economy.

Utility bills, petrol, food ate at home and so on. Are Tesco going to go under if a few less quid is spent? are N-Power or Shell going to feel the pinch if people turn their heating of a bit earlier or walk when they don't really need to use the car? No.

Even entertainment is subjective in terms of it being local. Will sky tv cease to exist if one or two people have to down grade their subscription? None of that is 'local money'.

The idea that this will hit the local economy is rubbish, and about as 'true' as the idea that getting rid of the Mayor will save over £1 million.

Also, speaking as somebody who has been personally 'gagged' by the local Labour party in recent weeks, might i suggest to the local Labour councillors that you concentrate on silencing one or two within your own ranks whose comments of late are potentially far more damaging than anything I might say.

To publicy state "We ain't paying a penny" is throwing down the gauntlet to Her Majesties revenue and customs.

I'd imagine that's never a good idea.

[Rebel]

The Mail's video of today's protest ... p.s. did Mr Akers- Belcher really intend to dress up as Napoleon? ... 

http://www.hartlepoolmail.co.uk/news/local/protest-against-bedroom-tax-1-5503385

I don't think Angie needs a hi viz jacket to make herself seen...

[not4me]

Wouldn't you think that if the local labour lot had any sense they would have told Ms Wilcox to stay  in the attic for a while and kept her out of the public view.

[whatabouthisthen]

How safe is the voting system in the Mail? I've just voted yes (as a check) in the current one re bedroom tax and, despite my vote, it came back as 0 0%. It should have counted my one yes vote! Is it controlled from the Kremlin?

[steveL]

good question - there was a now famous poll on the hospital issue which The Mail had to withdraw because it had been got at. I can't remember what it was about exactly but I think the poll ended up showing that we all wanted the hospital to close or something equally bizarre. Interestingly, The Mail did nothing to investigate who was behind the vote rigging even though it would possibly have qualified as the story of the year.

I did hear a rumour afterwards that Trust Chief Exec Alan Foster had gone on the sick soon afterwards with repetetive injury synrome - but it was only a rumour. 

[Stig of the Seaton Dump]

Did anybody else notice that in the Mail picture with the two lasses holding up a poster about surviving on £2 a day that they are stood in front of their social housing as well as a Land Rover Discovery, Ford S-Max and Honda HRV ...they must cost more than £2 a day to run.

When Georgie Porgie talks about funding tax cuts ..is the bedroom 'tax'  the way he is funding the £100K real tax cut to his millionaire friends ?

[tankerville]

With regard to the 'signed petition' when a similar petition was presented to H.B.C. signatures needed to be verified to show that they were authentic. Many were not.

These included members of their own families, children of school age and even babies. I could stand at the bottom of the ramp and anyone would sign for deportation, slavery, capital punishment, free sunglasses for guide dogs for the blind.

Incidently I think the H.B.C. petition was for the retention of Hartlepool General Hospital.

This again is another Labour ploy to keep themselves in the public eye. pathetic just pathetic. roll on the May 2014 Elections.

I'm voting P.H.F. maybe along with a few more we may see a change in the towns fixation with voting Labour because my aunty Nellie always did.

[Private Fraser]

Silly me. I thought that was a rehearsal for a very low budget version of Les Miserables! Did he really need a megaphone? There was such a poor turn out he could have passed a note round.

[fred c]

Theres a show off in everyone..... it`s just that the "The Mob" like to show off more than most, it gives them a sense of their own self importance, & in their minds..... theres no one more important.

"The Mob" with the support of the mail have become legends in their own minds, each & every photo opportunity elevates the status in which they hold themselves.

No wonder the towns in the S**t

[mk1]

I watched a newshow the other day and we had the usual 'wefare claimants are scum' knobs baying in the background. They never blinked when one  guest used the actual numbers to make a point-80% of all benefits are paid to-                               .
                                                                   .                                                                                       

.                                   .      People in Work                            .                                .                            .

Also well over half of all Wefare Payments go to.                                                          .


.                                    .        Pensioners                                  .           

When you check you will find payments made to the unemployed are a  small part of the total.


Howzabout that then guys 'n galls?                   

[steveL]

I think I saw the same programme with Michael Burke. It was interesting that so many pensioners, who were obviously very comfortable financially, wouldn't entertain the idea of not claiming some of their universal benefits - including those who spent their winters in the Med who still insisted on claiming their winter fuel allowance.

However, just like these people were not typical of the majority of pensioners, for whom the winter fuel allowance must be a real help; neither are the minority of benefit recipients who really are scroungers, typical of the majority on benefits. We've had a three-year campaign by the Tories to label all benefit claimants as scroungers - I would have hoped that most people who use this forum were clever enough to see through it.

Labour's problem has always been its refusal to deal with the minority who give the majority a bad name - because there's votes in it, frankly.

Nothing more typifies this hypocrisy than a woman who spends her holidays in the Bahamas bleating on about the bedroom tax while operating her very own unique version of a furniture project.

http://www.channel4.com/programmes/dispatches/4od#3497716

[steveL]

I wouldn't be so sure of that. The tactic normally used in these circumstances is ' now that we've through all of that pain, don't blow it all now by voting for the other side'. It's worked quite well in the past.

Whatever people are thinking about the current lot, the polls are currently suggesting even fewer  think Labour should be trusted with the economy again.

Talk about being caught between a rock and a hard place!

[fred c]

Got theat right P............. Demonise those on Benefits wether they are entitled to them or not, typical tactic of this government.

The 5 Year interest free mortgage loan will help some people onto the housing ladder, but it will enable an awful lot more to buy a second home with the help of hard pressed taxpayers who are struggling to pay a single mortgage.

Quote steveL

I wouldn't be so sure of that. The tactic normally used in these circumstances is ' now that we've through all of that pain, don't blow it all now by voting for the other side'. It's worked quite well in the past.

Whatever people are thinking about the current lot, the polls are currently suggesting even fewer  think Labour should be trusted with the economy again.

Talk about being caught between a rock and a hard place!

On the point raised by steveL.... that is what they are aiming for, but i saw an interview with a fella from the Institute of Fiscal Studies the other day who expressed the opinion that "Hard Times" are likely to be with us for years after the next general election.

[Lucy Lass-Tick]

I too suspect that we face a long period of austerity.  Without wishing to be too negative, could it be that the economy of Europe is basically broken beyond total repair, at least as far as a complete return to boom times? Just look at Japan.