[Ignitionnet]

It being so late I'm feeling rather lyrical.

Welfare is a safety net, to catch people when they fall and stop them hitting the ground. It must never be a trampoline that puts people in places they wouldn't normally go.

Housing Benefit is the big thing here. Some who previously made 300GBP/week couldn't have afforded 400GBP/week rent, why should they be able to live in a property of that cost when others are paying for it for them?

As a disclaimer though I think that benefits such as HB and JSA for the unemployed should be paid as a sunsetting % of the previous 2 years income prior to becoming unemployed and this fund should be ringfenced, that way at least some of an individual's taxes feel more like an 'insurance' and less like throwing money into a bottomless pit and people neither gain nor lose massively from spending a brief period on welfare, with the sunsetting encouraging a return to work sooner rather than later.