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  1. Dantey | May 13 6:42am | Permalink
    Mr Cameron, you say, that "You shouldn't be better off out of work ... than you are in work, working hard trying to do the right thing for your family.". Have you thought as to WHY people who are on benefits are better off than on work? It could be because work actually doesnt pay enough to be more than the benefits they receive. And if they DO go into work, their benefits will be cut off and they will essentially be earning less. I am sure there are many people who would want to abuse the benefits system but if you would look at the numbers they would be very very few of the total percentage of the total benefits receivers. The main problem is NOT benefits. PLEASE STOP DEMONISING THEM! The main problem is too much private debt, skewed tax systems and privatised public utilities(amonst many others). Please stop being so dogmatic about people on benefits not wanting to work.
  2. Joel Ylanen | September 5 3:10pm | Permalink
    Interesting new way to display an article !
  3. Wolfgang S. | April 16 10:03pm | Permalink
    its interesting to see the results of Thatcher reigning. Finally it need to be said that it is possible the reverse. It is possible to have a large middle class.

    I believe it would now be time to regulate more, time to tax big companies and time to built up manufacturing. Giving people jobs is not impossible. It is just beyond Thatcher policy.
    It seems this Baroness has done huge damage to your society.

    Being conservative does mean to feel responsible for workers. Otherwise you just end up in oligarchy.
  4. W1992 | April 16 4:02pm | Permalink
    I'm enjoying the new look of this article.
  5. Aspblom | April 16 3:55am | Permalink
    So, apparently people in the UK expect to live their lives being paid for by those who work and the rationale is that they do not have skills. Well, please do not acquire any skills, and do have children for the workers to support so that these children can grow up skill-less like mom and dad.
  6. AdamD | April 12 7:44pm | Permalink
    Like the authors, I am incandescent that this government should take most from the poorest communities. They should cut benefits and take the most from rich areas. Perhaps all the cuts could take place in Kensington.
    That such a stupid summary of this data should be permitted in the FT is incredible. The presentation is more a leftie propaganda piece than some attempt to inform.
  7. Anthony Dunn | April 12 3:40pm | Permalink
    Cutting current expenditure is one thing - to reduce or eliminate the "structural deficit" but if this country is to have any kind of economic future, this requires investment i.e. an expenditure that generates a future revenue stream. There is sadly, only too little evidence of that taking place in either the public or private sectors. If we are genuinely living in a global economy, why should the "little local difficulty" currently taking place in the UK and the €-zone prevent them from in investing in products and services which can be sold to the emerging BRICS economies?

    Perhaps a representative of these UK corporate bureaucracies might care to offer an explanation for the fact that they are not investing?
  8. Shelley F 1066 | April 11 9:21pm | Permalink
    Well, that's interesting reading. We run the shop- 1066 Cake Stand pictured towards the end of the article. In Hastings, East Sussex. Queens Road (pictured) is a little way out of the town centre, certainly it' s not the High Street, as suggested but it does offer an affordable rent for our start up vegan cake shop. We believe Hastings has more independent shops than is usual - maybe that's the answer?
  9. ladylaff | April 11 4:27pm | Permalink
    Can someone explain to me how heaping more misery on already long demoralised people and communities and reducing the overall pot of disposable income is meant to create more private sector jobs? I simply don't understand the logic.
  10. Captain Willard | April 11 1:25pm | Permalink
    Sorry..Martin I meant Stabe!!
  11. Captain Willard | April 11 1:24pm | Permalink
    @ Martin Slade
    Thanks for your reply Martin. Its still a bit frustrating for us over here in NI, I suspect we are probably one of the poorest areas in the uk.
  12. Martin Stabe, FT | April 11 1:05pm | Permalink
    @Jona No, that's not correct. Number of LSOAs in an authority area depends mainly on the size of the authority's population. The biggest local authority, Birmingham, also has the most LSOAs, with 639. 54% of these are in the poorest quintile nationally. Wiltshire is not far down the list with 285 LSOAs, but only 1.8 per cent of those are in the poorest quintile nationally.
  13. beakerandbunsen | April 11 12:49pm | Permalink
    "And the winner is.... London!" was the famous tag line when the IOC awarded the olympic games to the city, but in reality this phrase may as well be trotted out on a daily basis. The politicians, sitting in Westminster; the quangos dotted around the Mall; the megacorporations headquartered on the Strand; the national press located in Central London all have one thing in common: to advance infrastructure and quality of life in London.

    I have lived in both Blackpool and London and the difference in infrastructure and investment are large and stark.

    Pause for a moment and contemplate public transport (I could mention a number of different infrastructure projects, but this is just an example): London has a heavily subsidised underground and bus network. It has huge, multi billion pound investments recently completed or in progress such as the orbital railway, Crossrail, countless London overground and underground stations. London will also be the major winner from HS2.

    Compare this to the chronic underinvestment in Blackpool: it costs more for a return journey from my mother's house to the town centre than to get a bus travelcard in London. There is no direct train service from the station to the South East, and simply to go to Manchester takes 75 minutes on the fastest service.

    This underinvestment has had two effects:

    Firstly it has stymied economic growth in Blackpool. Tourism (Blackpool's economic driver) is hit because people can't visit the area as easily, but also enterprise is deterred from entering the area. Even political parties don't use Blackpool for their annual conferences any more, and this is as a direct result of chronic underinvestment.

    Secondly, it has resulted in a huge migration of skilled labour from the area towards London. This isn't (for the most part) because people are attracted by the bright lights of London but is driven by the necessity that underinvestment has created. Indeed, from the graduates of my age range (early 30s), my only friends still living in Blackpool are teachers.

    The above two effects are self-reinforcing and circular.

    So I guess the question is, with all the vested interests located in London, how can this cycle be broken?
  14. Martin Stabe, FT | April 11 12:46pm | Permalink
    @Captain Willard Complete data for these measures were only available for England, Scotland and Wales. Northern Ireland is excluded because it is not directly comparable.
  15. james smith | April 11 12:39pm | Permalink
    Thanks FT, I hadn't realised that those communities with the highest proportion of people on welfare would be the biggest losers from benefit cuts (how much did you pay for this work by the way? - next time give me a call and I will do you a deal for other groundbreaking pieces of work you may require).
  16. Jona | April 11 12:33pm | Permalink
    @Martin Stabe Clear, thanks! Local authorities with the highest proportion of poor neighbourhoods also have on average more neighbourhoods.
  17. Captain Willard | April 11 12:09pm | Permalink
    What about N.Ireland....I pay my subscription to the FT to fin out whats happening in all of the UK as well as the world! Serious note to the FT ...please let me know if you can include NI or do you not have the figures because we have our own assembly?
    Cpn Willard (ret)
  18. Martin Stabe, FT | April 11 10:44am | Permalink
    @Jona The statistic is what proportion of neighbourhoods ("lower-level super output areas", technically) within each local authority are among the poorest 20 per cent of LSOAs nationally. The average of this statistic across Britain's 379 local authorities is 15.1 per cent. This measure ranges from 81.8 per cent in Newham to 0 in 81 local authorities.
  19. Cookham | April 11 10:16am | Permalink
    Warehousing the low-skilled is a destructive and cynical policy that helps no one in the long term. Yes, it makes billions for the slumlords and Walmarts of this world who receive most of the cash paid out as benefits, and gains a few votes for certain political parties, but paying people to be unemployed in Blackpool while jobs go begging in the South East makes no sense. Houses in the Blackpool area sell for over a million pounds based on this benefit economy. Truly private business just cannot compete when the cost basis has been pushed to such absurd levels by government spending.

    There's also a big problem with the analysis presented here. Housing Benefit is not the same as cash for the benefit recipient. The money is actually going to the landlord, very few of whom probably live in places like Blackpool. The money doesn't stay in the local community, but ends up in places like Surrey and Buckinghamshire which this analysis describes as being unaffected by the changes in the benefit system.
  20. Jona | April 11 10:13am | Permalink
    On average, 15.1% of the neighbourhoods of local authorities in Great Britain are among the poorest 20% in Britain. I wonder where the other 4.9% are?
  21. moj | April 11 10:07am | Permalink
    The current system is unfair to people who actually work. It was insane that someone on benefits was able to live somewhere that someone not on benefits could only dream of living. The standard of living of someone on benefits has to be lower than someone who is on minimum wage, otherwise there is no incentive to work.
  22. Steve2020 | April 11 9:51am | Permalink
    I don't understand how reducing welfare benefits spurs private industry to generate more jobs. Taking money out of the economy cannot generate more jobs. Does "making work pay" mean reducing benefits below some hypothetical pay rate such that people move into work and off benefits? Jobs have to match peoples skill levels not just be driven by financial incentives. That is where the mismatch is, reducing benefits will not magically make people fit into jobs.
  23. gbuk01 | April 11 8:04am | Permalink
    I wonder if the UK, through its current apathy towards politics, realises what is actually happening. In recent days we have heard about the effects Mrs Thatcher’s policies had on certain communities, but is this approach continuing? When Mr Cameron took office, he made the comment, ‘They (meaning the UK population) will get the country they deserve’.

    Other changes, in the last 30 years, have also contributed to a skewed political situation in the UK. What appears to have gone unnoticed, by the voting population, is the evolution of our politicians and the basis of our democracy. Andrew Neil’s programme ‘Posh and Posher’ highlighted the near exclusive privately educated base for UK politicians. This shift has excluded the possibility of modern politicians coming from backgrounds which have an experience of living as the less advantaged in our society, so a certain attitude, on the whole, is already guaranteed. The political parties can then choose candidates which will deliver a desired attitude and approach. An example of this being Mr Clegg’s comment on a Sunday morning political show – ‘I’ll remain a Liberal Democrat whilst I am in Parliament’. So what are his actual political beliefs?

    Whilst we may believe we live in a democracy, I believe we are living in a well manipulated political and organised political agenda. Yes, we can vote, but the desires of our elite have already been guaranteed before that point is reached. We can see the change and desires of our elite by the recent changes in social class ‘labels’. When you are classed as not even being ‘working class’, in the UK, an attitude has changed which sees a devaluation of some individual’s stance in society.
  24. Burakm | April 11 2:03am | Permalink
    It's this kind of research and analysis of how the reality on the ground and the rhetoric of the Politicians wishing to implement such changes are worlds apart that makes FT worth every penny I spent.