Universal Benefits
Yesterday’s banana skin, predicted by this Blog, is fully reported across the media today. I do not understand how clever politicians and bright civil servants get themselves into this kind of tangle. It needs to be sorted out quickly. It is right to take child benefit away from the better off and HRT payers is about the right point to axe it, but it must apply per family. Single parents cannot be worse off, nor can those where one partner chooses to look after the children be penalised for giving more attentive parent care. This flies in the face of everything that the coalition, especially the Tory part, stands for.
On the broader front of the concept of the universal benefits, the Financial Times sees them as no longer appropriate. I think it is not the concept but the application which is at fault in the twenty first century. They were, after all, introduced before the twentieth century was half way through. The nub is this. Benefits should be universally avaiable, but paid only if there is need.
If you are ill the NHS is there for you, no matter what your wealth, but you only use it if you need it. A direct financial benefit must likewise be claimed by anyone if they need it, whatever their background or previous situation, but should not be paid if it is not needed. The judgement must be based on the financial position of the claimant, just as the NHS assess the health need.
Thus it is right to stop child benefit for those who do not have a fundamental need of it (as opposed to finding a freebie useful), stop winter fuel allowance, free bus passes and state pensions to those for whom these things are unnecessary. This includes the modern day overpaid and pensioned top civil servants. To carry on means that once the current fiscal emergency is over, people on low incomes are having to pay more income tax to fund the luxuries of the better off and there is less money for good quality public services. This is morally wrong.
We need a grown up approach to making fair judgements about the purpose of the Welfare State. We also need to take every single person earning less than £15000 a year out of income tax altogether. We cannot do that yet. If we do not stop throwing benefits to people who do not need them, we will never be able to do it.
People who stridently demand equal treatment because they have worked hard and done well need to remember that when they flick a switch the lights go on, when they flush the toilet everything flows away, when they empty their trash it is collected. They can dial 999 for the fire brigade or an ambulance and they can drive on roads which are maintained at least to a reasonable standard. None of these things would be possible, as well as a good deal more, if those responsible were not willing to work for much lower earnings than the aspirational class. Thus the obligation is established and the social contact made. The more acquisitive life demands you take less and contribute more. That is what keeps the free society from imploding.