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I never said there were 2.6 million on Unemployment Benefit, I said there were that many on Sickness Benefit and most of them will get the other Benefits that usually come with it. I heard this a few months ago and am confident that is the figure. A lot of them could work.

There are some communities around Britain where if you got a job you would be frozen out of the community. There are parts of south and east London like that and this is true in other parts of Britain aswell. Remember that woman Karen Matthews who was from somewhere in the Midlands who pretended her daughter Shannon had been abducted? She was from a community like that.

I have experience of these sorts of people, I stumbled across a colony of them in London some years ago. I was actually disliked because I had a job. These people told me they had 'opted out of society', and that people (like me) who work were 'playing the system'. Basically they were a bunch of lazy scroungers who don't want to get up until the afternoon and tried to find a way of justifying it.

The explanation put forward by these people who refuse to work and condemn those who do, and who are only part of the social group they are in because of the fact they have this thing in common, is laughable and completely full of holes. What's ironic is that it's them who are 'playing the system' because they are totally supported by that very system where as someone who works is largely self-reliant. Also this business of 'opting out of society' - you don't see them opting out of the Benefits system do you? There are a lot of people like this in Britain and how their attitudes will be changed I do not know.

David, I have no idea how much benefits people claim, but I can tell you things I have observed.
The woman who stays next to me has 7 kids Her house is privately owned so I presume somebody must be paying the rent .Her kids are well behaved and polite so I'll give her respect for that and I noticed about 3 weeks ago that 2 new satellite dishes had gone up. When I speak to her she usually has a cigarette in her hand though not always. She does not work and she does not appear to have a steady partner.
She has no visible means of support so I'll make a rash assumption and say she's on benefits.
I don't have an issue with that, but exactly why should the taxpayer have to pay for her reckless breeding. Her last arrival was only a few months ago so it is possible that another one could arrive this year. Women can make a mistake and get pregnant ----- but 7 times?
If benefits are so tight then how exactly does she manage to afford 2 new satellites ---- possibly tuned to freesat but even that costs money. I believe that a packet of fags costs around ?5 now and I would hardly call them essential. She seems like a decent girl but I believe she is playing the system but so far I have yet to see her with a walking stick(maybe she hasn't got that one sussed yet)

"so I'll make a rash assumption and say she's on benefits."

Quite.

I'll give you a little scenario David about assumptions.
I?ve just taken ?200 out of the hole in the wall.
I turn round and a large man has a large knife and an outstretched hand. I?ll assume that he wants my money so I either kick him in the nuts, give him the money or try to run.
Would I be wise in making my original assumption?
Or would you say that it's maybe a sensible deduction ?
I expect you'll tell me that he's collecting for the Red Cross and the knife was only to cut me a sample of cheese he has in his pocket.

[quote]I never said there were 2.6 million on Unemployment Benefit[/quote]

Actually, you did: Unless 'it' is referring to something else?

[quote]I said there were that many on Sickness Benefit and most of them will get the other Benefits that usually come with it. I heard this a few months ago and am confident that is the figure.[/quote]

What's the figure? 2.6 million on sickness benefit or 2.6 million unemployed? If you mean the former you're wrong. 2.6 million is the overall number of unemployed, which includes those on sickness benefit. If you mean the latter then if you're only talking about those on sickness benefit the number for all unemployed people is irrelevant, so why quote it?

The latest figures at hand are thus:

Guardian website (left-leaning media) says the latest figures show just under 2.5 million unemployed.

The Telegraph website (right-leaning media) says the latest figures (Dec '10) show 2.46 million unemployed. The amount of long-term unemployed (so would more likely include people who are claiming sickness benefit) is quoted at 663,000. In my previous posting, working out from other sources, I quoted 702,000 long-term unemployed so I was actually being overly cautious with the numbers because I didn't want to give the impression I was using the lowest numbers I could find to back up my point.

If you want to bang on about people claiming sickness benefit, fraudulently, then I don't see how the overall unemployment figure of 2.6 million is relevant. Unless you think all the 2.6 million unemployed are some how on the fiddle. My guess is that unlike me you chose some big number you'd read and used it, wrongly, as something to back up your point (paranoia?) about the mythical millions taking money out of your pocket so they can toss it off all their life.

By the way, we are still at the lower end of the unemployment scale in Europe. Only the Netherlands and Austria can boast of a much lower unemployment rate, with Germany being just slightly lower (7.4% for Germany and 7.9% for the UK as of March '10). I wonder what the French and Spanish equivalents of Max Tranmere, Porn Historian, Rodders, Dick Moby and Yawnfuck have to say on their work-dodgers? One is afraid to speculate! Chin-up, I say!

Before I forget, the figures I got: and .

[quote]There are some communities around Britain where if you got a job you would be frozen out of the community.[/quote]

I don't believe you. No. Not one bit.

[quote]Remember that woman Karen Matthews who was from somewhere in the Midlands who pretended her daughter Shannon had been abducted? She was from a community like that.[/quote]

So you KNOW that if Karen Matthews had a job she'd have been 'frozen out' of her community, do you? You know people up there? It's taken me 2 mins to find out that Karen Matthews's boyfriend (Craig Meehan) was a fishmonger and the guy who hid Shannon (Michael Donovan) was a labourer and delivery driver for an engineering company (despite apparent learning difficulties). Now, there's a lot of bad things these people have done but for fuck's sake, Max, don't accuse them of things they're innocent of! Are you saying the reason they did what they did was because they had jobs and the neighbours ridiculed them so much it drove them to it? Jesus wept, Max.

[quote]I have experience of these sorts of people, I stumbled across a colony of them in London some years ago. I was actually disliked because I had a job.[/quote]

"A colony of them."? Strange terminology, Max. You sound like some Victorian explorer in the deepest Congo who's just discovered a new tribe, or a microbiologist describing a strange bacterial strain that flourishes inside the bladder of the Toggenburg Goat. Yes, your terminology says an awful lot about you, Max. Maybe it wasn't because you had a job that they didn't like you. Maybe............just maybe you're a bit of an unlikeable character. Maybe they guesses you looked upon them as some sort of bacterial infection?

[quote]The explanation put forward by these people who refuse to work and condemn those who do, and who are only part of the social group they are in because of the fact they have this thing in common, is laughable and completely full of holes. What's ironic is that it's them who are 'playing the system' because they are totally supported by that very system where as someone who works is largely self-reliant. Also this business of 'opting out of society' - you don't see them opting out of the Benefits system do you? There are a lot of people like this in Britain and how their attitudes will be changed I do not know.[/quote]

I don't deny that there are people like this in the UK (and across the globe). All I'm saying is they're in nowhere near the number many on here either say, fear there are, or imply.

7 kids............hahaha!

[quote]I turn round and a large man has a large knife and an outstretched hand. I?ll assume that he wants my money[/quote]

Or the fucking apple back, that he was peeling when you took it off him. Hahaha!

Snap

[quote]What's the figure? 2.6 million on sickness benefit or 2.6 million unemployed? If you mean the former you're wrong.[/quote]

I was wrong. Should have checked my source against others!

Sam, the link you posted above refers to a previous comment of mine, I've just re-read it, aswell as the comment on that thread two lines above it, and I see very clearly that I stated there are '2.6 million people on the sick'. A lot of them could work and are just using it as dole. It is more secure and it pays more too.

Much of this is Thatcher's fault, she did everything she could in the 1980s to try and get the huge numbers of people that she put out of work onto Sickness Benefit as a way of massaging the unemployment figures. People who had nothing really wrong with them were put on it so the figures didn't look as bad as they were.

Regarding the people I used to know in London who were career Benefit subscribers and who judged and disliked others who didn't work, this genuinely happened. These are the kind of people who turn up to oppose the building of motorway by-passes with their dreadlocked hair and their cut-glass public school accents. They are almost all midldle-class drop outs.

The common-denominator between them is that they've 'opted out of society', as they laughably put it, and you are a sell-out if you work and 'play the system'. Totally ridiculous and non-sensical, as I said earlier. They so want to find a way of justifying what they do but can't - as they are completely financially dependant on the very system they have supposedly opted out of.