Just read it.
Apparently only applies to council and housing association tenants?
Didn't realise that.

He'll be happy but disgusting Tory scumbags all the same.

Like Saddened, I don't know the precise ins and outs of the policy.

What I will say, though, is that it is unfair that I cannot afford a spare room but have to subsidise other peoples' spare rooms.

This sounds like the kind of policy which will throw up the odd harsh or exceptional case, however I actually think the government are right to address this issue.

And not the hundreds of thousands of our poorest citizens that JC's link refers too?

[i"But if you have bitter jealousy and selfish ambition in your hearts, do not boast and be false to the truth."[/i

Figures can be distorted to say almost anything.

One such 'poorest citizen' is begging for sympathy in my local rag this week. He has children from a previous (unmarried) relationship,who stay with him and his new (unmarried) partner for only 3 nights a week. Therefore, the bedroom he needs for his first lot of children is to be 'taxed' because, officially, they are not counted when calculating his housing benefit.

Behind nearly every story is a social failure. Sometimes it's the State's fault; more often than not it's the claimant's. The one thing which is certain is that 100% of the welfare bill is picked up by the taxpayer, who may have their own problems to deal with.

I see what you did there, with your 'odd exception' from your previous post.
Good work.

Incidentally, is it all them bastads running about being the real issue that's playing with your head?

But you aren't - and that is the whole point.

Its coincidental if someone takes council or HA property that under the NEW rules falls into the category of having an "extra" bedroom, the plain and simple fact is there are insufficient numbers of "correctly" roomed dwellings to satisfy the NEW rules.

Let me give you an example - you are a two parent, two child family, you have a boy aged 9 and a girl aged 8 years, you apply for LA or HA accomodation and you are in receipt of housing benefit, they offer you a three bedroomed house which being of a typical british standard is two double bedrooms and what we normally call "a box room", you accept it because it means that your children can have their own bedrooms.

From April 1st your housing benefit will be reduced by 14% because, according to the NEW rules your two children should be sharing one bedroom, despite the fact the the LA or HA never offered you a two bed unit and cannot offer you one still.

Just to rubber stamp the arbitory and punative nature of the NEW rules, if your two children were two boys and aged 14 and 15 then your housing benefit would still be reduced because some fekkwit decreed that they too should be sharing one bedroom.

This new housing benefit rule should have been laughed out at the first cabinet meeting, should have been rejected at the second meeting with a whisper in Camerons ear "Margaret wants to ask if you remember the poll tax", but we've reached a point where there are no new ideas in Plan A, no more screws to tighten, the presumed slack in public services that the whole shaky policy was based on has been proved to be somewhat smaller than envisaged then when it was all the rage at Oxford during those PPE debates, its time to step up the divide and conquer tactics - I dread to think what rhetoric is to follow in the next few weeks to try and justify their plan, or u-turn as the case may be.

Well they've got you hooked, good and proper.

If you lived in Poland in 1939 you'd be pointing out your local Jews to the police as "social failures".

Probably gone to ask the almighty why he allowed them 6 million defenceless men women and children turn into smoke?

Either that or he's gone to feed his rabbits.

Why shouldn't two teenage boys share a room???

And if the HA of LA can't offer you suitable accommodation, why not look to the private sector?

Have you heard of Godwin's Law?

Do you think social housing might be less expensive than renting from a private landlord generally, possibly, maybe?

Maybe, but many manage it.

And how would you think that many of the poorest and those on low incomes manage to do that?

[i "You covet and cannot obtain, so you fight and quarrel."[/i