Monster of 2012 starts the New Year as he means to go on
Posted by Mike Sivier in Benefits, Conservative Party, People, Politics, tax credits, UK
benefit, benefits, Conservative, Department for Work and Pensions, dunchurch, DWP, education, government, Iain Duncan Smith, Jeffrey Archer, Mike Sivier, mikesivier, people, perugia, politics, stranieri, tax credit, Tories, Tory, university, Vox Political, welfare
I see that Iain Duncan Smith is unrepentantly continuing his war against sanity.
(Yes, we can all see that it is those who receive welfare benefits that feel the pain, but it is the Secretary of State's own lack of mental health that we're witnessing whenever he makes a statement).
Yesterday he was banging the drum against the previous Labour government's tax credit system. I should remind you, for the sake of clarity, that I don't disagree with claims that tax credits were not a great way forward. The solution is for employers to pay employees enough money that they don't need to claim social security benefits or tax credits. The principle is simple: If you're in a job, you shouldn't need benefits.
Insanity Dementia Smith has a different point of view. Well he would, wouldn't he? He's mad.
Instead, he claimed that the tax credit system, introduced in 2003, was wide open to abuse, with fraud and error costing more than £10 billion. Oh, and just for good measure, he threw in some good old-fashioned Tory xenophobia by claiming that fraudsters around the world targeted the benefit for their own personal gain.
"Tax credit payments rose by some 58 per cent ahead of the 2005 general election, and in the two years prior to the 2010 election, spending increased by about 20 per cent," he said in a Telegraph article.
"Between 2003 and 2010, Labour spent a staggering £171 billion on tax credits, contributing to a 60 per cent rise in the welfare bill. Far too much of that money was wasted, with fraud and error under Labour costing over £10 billion.
"It will come as no surprise therefore that fraudsters from around the world targeted this benefit for personal gain. "
Enter Channel 4's FactCheck, whose representatives asked HM Revenue and Customs to provide the figures that support these claims. They could not.
Instead, we are told, in 2003-04, £16.4bn was paid, and the following year – the one that included the general election to which Mr Duncan Smith refers – £17.7bn. That's an increase of 8 per cent, not 58.
The total spent on tax credits between 2003 and 2010 – under Labour – was £147bn, not £171bn.
During that time, £11.16bn was lost through fraud and error, with only 1.27bn of that down to fraud – 0.7 per cent of the total.
Regarding error, as a former tax credit recipient, I can report that HMRC was diligent to the point of harassment when it came to identifying errors and recovering the sums involved. This created considerable problems for me – and many others, I'm sure – as I received notification several times, during my claim period, that I had received large amounts in error. I could not understand this. I had filled the forms to the best of my ability. My only conclusion was that the system was complicated and its administrators had been looking for an excuse to take back money.
The result was that I had to become extremely adept, myself, at using the system. I then used it against the administrators to point out errors that they had made, and won back something like £2,000 from them. For a person living on his partner's DLA and IB, and his own Carer's Allowance, that's a huge amount to have had taken away.
I wonder whether Mr Scream-at-the-moon includes money that had to be paid back after correct appeals in his calculation of error. If so, he's wrong again because that cash was owed to the claimants (as it was to me).
The claim that fraudsters around the world targeted tax credits is completely unsubstantiated as the system does not record the nationalities of claimants.
However: Everyone claiming Working Tax Credits must have a UK National Insurance number. Everyone claiming Child Tax Credits must be able to show they are on Child Benefit, for which they must produce a birth certificate for each child, thereby proving they were born in the UK. So it seems that, while the system may not record the nationalities of claimants, those facts do, in fact, play a part in determining each claim.
Mr Smith remains a disgrace to the government. What a shame David Cameron is such a weak leader that he can't even summon up the guts to throw him out.
STOP PRESS: What's this, in a BBC Newsnight press release that's just appeared on my screen?
"Aspects of Iain Duncan Smith's CV, relating to his education, are inaccurate and misleading, an investigation by BBC Newsnight reveals."
Do we have another Jeffrey Archer on our hands?
The investigation into the Conservative Party leader's education and early career – broadcast at 10.30pm on BBC TWO (Wednesday 18 December 2002) – was presented by Michael Crick, author of the best-selling biography of Jeffrey Archer. It seems we do.
It seems he didn't go to the Universita di Perugia in Italy, founded by the Pope in 1308, but to the Universita per Stranieri (University for Foreigners) which was founded in 1921 and did not grant degrees when he studied there in 1973. IDS did not get any qualifications there or even finish his exams.
He wasn't educated at Dunchurch College of Management either. This was the former staff college for GEC Marconi, for whom he worked in the 1980s. IDS completed six separate courses lasting a few days each, adding up to about a month in total. He quite clearly was not there for a sustained period of time and never earned a recognised qualification there.
Who's the fraud now, Iain?
15 thoughts on "Monster of 2012 starts the New Year as he means to go on"
leonc1963 said:
Reblogged this on Diary of an SAH Stroke Survivor.
Smiling Carcass said:
don't blame Mr. Smiff for being a maffs failure; I can't fickung smell.
Iain Gillingham said:
Perhaps we should take an indepth look at IDS, or Iain Drunken Smith as he was rumored to have been called by his sneering military comrades when he worked in the stores rather than the special forces as he has previously claimed.
he is a nob, always has been a nob and always will be a nob; if he was in the special forces, he's a special forces nob. no diifference.
I thought the fact as stated was, he was a stores nob, not special forces. Presumably, whenever someone of a lower class requisitioned something, he would say, "Here it is, Sir, you pleb." 🙂
Nigel Simmons said:
BROKEN BRITAIN UNDER TORIES .Smith – Failed ex Tory Leader 17/05/12
The man in charge of Welfare reform IDS states on his cv that he attended the University of Perugia when in fact he attended Univeris per Stranieri a fascist movement in Italy that did not award degrees.It also states that he attended Dunchurch College of Management which in actual fact was a weekend management course for GEC Marconi at their staff college.He was also involved in 'Betsygate' after dubiously claiming a salary for his wife from the public purse.He was one of the first politicians to back the war in Iraq and went to the USA to meet pro-war American government diehards.He has Japanese blood from his matrilineal great grandmother,so could we conclude that he is an honorable fascist looking after the welfare of our most vulnerable.(dubious moral standing)
http://www.brokenbritainundertories.com/history-of-protagonists.php
Darroch said:
Hmm. If you make a mistake on a form to claim benefits you get fined £50.00 whereas if you lie through your teeth about your education you first become leader of the Conservative Party and later Secretary of State for Work and Pensions. There truly is one rule for the rich and one for the poor isn't there?
Lindsay Rodgers said:
He's just so full of acronyms, so here's another one for for his CV,
IDS J.A.Bs.M.
Just Another Bull-sh*t Merchant
Angie said:
Yes I can say that the HMRC was diligent to the point of harassment when it came to identifying errors and recovering the sums when I was working in a school I had to claim Tax credits and they over paid me BUT it was not until I lost my last job in 2011 and started to get JSA that I was told about it,it go's back to 1996.yes they want it back but they are working with me so I can pay it back. IDS don't know what he's talking about I had to phone the HMRC every march and give them my final salary for the year so it was always a year behind.
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stevendurrant said:
good stuff, this is related.
Sorry if elements are a touch patronising. It's aimed quite broadly, i.e including non and new activists.
Pass about if you think it's useful.
Ta.
http://stevedrant.wordpress.com/2013/01/02/some-tips-on-tackling-tory-fibs-about-benefits/
I had this article flagged up to me last night and have bookmarked it for reading. From a cursory glance, you seem to have picked up on topics I have covered in previous articles, along with others – and I think this is welcome. For a message to get through, it needs to be repeated, and from several independent sources.
I'll have a proper look later in the day.
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