Tories say the obese should ‘lose weight or lose benefits’. Pot, kettle, black
This man receives more than £150,000 from the state per year, and is warning other obese people to lose weight or lose benefits.
Looks like he’s desperate to lose his own when they come up for review in May!
The Conservative Party seems determined to sink itself into the deepest, blackest hole ever created by a political organisation for itself.
While other parties unveil attractive policies designed to bring voters onboard, the Tories have said they want to remove benefits from people they have decided are fat. Here’s the Independent story, and for good measure we’ll throw in the BBC‘s coverage too.
You might be thinking to yourself, why not? They’ve already attacked people on Jobseekers’ Allowance, ESA and DLA as scroungers; they’ve pushed pensionable ages back by years; and they’re about to attack people who are on pensions, already. Why not continue proving what a bunch of spoiled little schoolboys they are by picking on fatties as well (oh, along with druggies and alkies)?
Perhaps because, as ‘Neti’ pointed out on Twitter: “Medication can mean that people gain weight and not be overeating.”
Exactly so. It seems the Tories are spoiling for a fight with the British Medical Association which, in 2013, said calls by Tory-held Westminster Council to cut the benefits of overweight people who refused exercise regimes were “draconian”.
Here’s another voice from Twitter – John Wight: “Tories now attacking obese and others on sickness benefit. Another wheeze designed to appeal to smug middle classes.”
Quite. Adding insult to injury is the fact that the policy has been announced by David Cameron, himself no stranger to a large meal.
… Or drink.
“It is not fair to ask hardworking taxpayers to fund the benefits of people who refuse to accept the support and treatment that could help them get back to a life of work,” he said.
Fair enough. So if Cameron can’t slim down by May 7, we’ll know that he doesn’t want the support of our public money any more and he wants to go back to a life of work.
His career was in public relations, unless the memory cheats.
It seems likely he may have blown his chances of going back there.
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Pickles …..
From the outset, I would like to say that I am not a supporter of the PM or his party. Or any of the others for that matter. I have a huge dislike of mis- and dis- information. Be that from the government, a political party or whoever. Those establishments are very good at it and get stick from alternative thinkers. Quite rightly too IMO. However, in this case, it is the alternatives who are guilty, IMO. You cannot compare a politician’s salary (for doing a job, whether you like how he does it or not) to unemployment or any other benefit. They are paid to do a job, we hope they’ll do it well. Leave or get thrown out of the job and you can get a pension dependent on your age, years of “service” and other parameters. Most if not all get another job when they leave politics. The “scroungers” will, for as long as they can get away with it, do nowt but still expect their “income”.
The standard response is that both benefits and MP salaries are paid from public money.
Brings to mind a certain song that ought to be sung about them by Carter USM: You fat b*stard. The song was written about a particularly vile slumlord. I think it can be safely applied to them as well.
I think hard-working taxpayers need some answers on non-paying tax corporations and HSBC especially.
Has Eric agreed to go on a diet as well?
Gets dafter by the minute!
x
If the poor are going to be pilloried for being over-weight I think it would only be fair if rich fatties paid more direct tax quid pro quo. Seriously though, is the DWP going to appoint a staff to weigh and monitor how much weight benefit claimants gain or lose? The Tory world seems half Kafka and half Lewis Carroll.
Oh! And if drug addiction could be gotten rid of by threatening the addicted with loss of benefits don’t you think North America would have twigged decades ago and moved all unemployed drug addicts and alcoholics off their poison and into gainful employment as clean-living pillars of the community? David Cameron and his crew need to lose some of the fat between their ears that they call brains!
Perhaps they could start by setting an example and stopping Eric Pickles’s parliamentary expenses.
For those of us suffering from the CFS spectrum (although I’ve never had a formal diagnosis) it was the comments towards the end of the newspaper articles about claimants refusing treatment that worry us the most.
We know that it’s impossible for those who are the most incapacitated by their illness to engage in the exercise programmes that are suggested; not only impossible but actually dangerous.
Let’s hope that this is not the case.
As stated in your article some meds can cause weight gain, and thats an awful lot of meds eg drugs used to treat epilepsy, some of which are also to treat anxiety and the neuropathic pain, such as that found in multiple sclerosis. Even getting out of bed and dressed is an achievement for some people. Getting to the Black and White Ball would be impossible, even if invited
These may be some of their targets for getting to the gym. Another crazy idea from rich fat people, so thats ok.
I’m glad I didn’t spot this yesterday. It would have put me right off Valentine’s day activities.