I suspect that 'John from Pembrokeshire' has a different problem and cannot read properly, thinking that it's £400 / month.

Why do these people believe they ought to be handed it on a plate? That's what infuriates me.

See my previous post RE benefits.

I've had to close the link down, it's annoying the heck out of me!!

Can someone provide the link please

Actually for most people they are still capped by the assessment that they are given. A single person is only entitled to a rate for that area, and it is a lot lot less than £400. This will only really affect those with big families who get this because they have so many kids.

That will be closer to £1800 per month, since the benefits are weekly but the rent will be monthly (approx 4.5 weeks a month). For some parts of the country this will have no impact at all. It will be in London and the south east that will be affected. Even so most people would not even qualify for that level of benefit.

Glad to see the budget is designed to get results, not to pander to voters and unions.
Yes, I'll lose out, but everyone is going to feel pain from the overspending of the last decade.

All sounds pretty well thought out to me, yes we are all going to be poorer but it's the first positive step the country has taken in a long time to get us out of debt. Let’s hope it works and then we can reap the benefits in a few years time.

Agreed.

Interestingly, for all the Labourites ranting about how the budget is unfair, they all seem to have conveniently forgotten the fact that they got us into this mess in the first place.

Did they really get us into this mess? Or did they just exacerbate the mess that was inevitable?

Yes but they have pandered to the rich by not increasing Capital Gains Tax. Though Labour were fools to drop it. It fuelled a housing property bubble.

They promoted excessive lending as did the USA, high risk leading was a risk to far and when the loans stopped being paid back.... well we all know the rest.

No I was against the over spends for the last seven years. Gordon said he would balance the budget over the business cycle but kept changing the definition. I have also been very critical of the PFI's used to build schools and hospitals as an off balance sheet con of the sort that Greece got into trouble with recently. These are expensive and will at some point blow up in the governments face like an unexploded bomb. They could actually make the cutbacks even worse because the PFI's are commitments that they cannot get out of. I was also critical of the lack of effort to rein in the property bubble which in turn fuelled increases in housing benefits. Labour did many things wrong, but the coalition are not doing a brilliant job.