Labour would end demonisation of benefits claimants – kittysjones

Last Updated: January 8, 2015By

Benefits claimants are by definition going through a tough time; they may have lost a job, have an illness or disability or are in low-paid or part time work, or they are caring for young children or relatives, making it harder to work, writes Chi Onwurah MP, published on the kittysjones blog.

The only explanation for the inhumane way in which my constituents were being treated is that the employees of the Department and its agencies had forgotten – or had been told to forget – that benefits claimants were people, human beings with lives, loved ones and feelings.

I am not proud that I grew up on benefits. But I am not ashamed either. A Labour Government must and will put an end to this Government’s demonisation of those claiming benefits today.

Read the full article on the kittysjones blog site.

Follow me on Twitter: @MidWalesMike

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10 Comments

  1. Les January 8, 2015 at 1:24 am - Reply

    1st decent thing a coming from the Labour party for a very long time

  2. Thomas M January 8, 2015 at 2:57 am - Reply

    If the Tories treated those of a different skin colour as badly as benefit claimants it would be seen as racism, pure and simple.

    • Wayne Leon January 9, 2015 at 1:22 am - Reply

      They treat the British poor – both black and white – equally the same when it comes to Welfare [ in other words, abysmally, and less than human].

  3. Gary January 8, 2015 at 5:01 am - Reply

    As a former Civil Servant I was always conscious of my duty under the Civil Service Code. That being to carry out the wishes of the government of the day regardless of my own opinion. I was scrupulous in carrying this out and doing so without rancour. The problems were twofold. The regulations were skewed to suit a certain section of society and politicians would give direct instructions which broke the code, ie to lie and mislead. Civil Servants are put in the most difficult position. Carrying out actions that they know will not succeed, help or benefit anyone and at the same time ensuring they don’t allow themselves to be led astray by politicians in charge. Politicians who, against all advice, introduced the Tax Credit system in such a way as to cause the system to fail. Civil Servants did their level best to make this idiotic system work whilst taking the blame from politicians. T’was ever thus. This, of course, was under a Labour government. They all do it but the Tories do it in an ideological way. They hate the poor and disabled where the rest of us hate poverty etc. Please don’t blame the Civil Service for the failure of politicians. The Civil Service doesn’t choose its masters, the electorate does.

    • Mike Sivier January 8, 2015 at 2:11 pm - Reply

      This blog has published articles condemning the way Tories – in particular – attack the civil service.

  4. Jim Round January 8, 2015 at 5:41 am - Reply

    So are they going to stop the press from doing the same?
    Most recent is the case of “to fat to work couple” who spent £3k on a wedding.
    Right or wrong, these are the stories that wind people up.
    Very rarely do you hear any soloutions put forward, except cutting their benefits, but what good would that do?
    Benefit claimants aren’t the only ones to be demonised, immigrants, the disabled or anyone who looks “weird” also gets it.
    Attitudes need to change.

  5. Landless Peasant January 8, 2015 at 1:50 pm - Reply

    They’d better not let Liam Byrne back in then.

    • Mike Sivier January 8, 2015 at 2:06 pm - Reply

      I’m with you on that. He belongs on the other side of the House – along with a few other notables (or should that be “not ables”?) who are wearing the wrong colours.

  6. Landless Peasant January 8, 2015 at 2:49 pm - Reply

    Reeves pledging to scrap Sanction targets seems a bit of an empty promise as officially those targets don’t exist. It would be preferable if they pledged to scrap Sanctions altogether, then I really would be impressed and convinced to vote Labour. A pledge to double the dole by scrapping all costly/useless back-to-work scams might help matters too.

    • Mike Sivier January 8, 2015 at 4:46 pm - Reply

      Sanction targets haven’t been acknowledged officially but we’ve all seen the documents that show they exist. The pledge to scrap sanction targets means the targets in those documents will be scrapped, whether the current government acknowledges them or not.
      I’m with you on the back-to-work bloodsuckers and I’d like to hope that sanctions will be rendered increasingly irrelevant by Labour policies.

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