A report from the Joseph Rowntree Foundation yesterday found that a single person renting a modest council house would need to earn £13,400 before tax to achieve what the public - according to research - regard as minimum living standards. A couple with two children would need £26,800.

Recent figures showed that there were 10.7m people (including 2.9m children and 2.5m pensioners) living below the government's defined poverty line - 60% of median income before housing costs are taken into account (the figures are 13.2m, 3.9m and 2.1m when housing costs are taken into account).

But for just about every conceivable group this line itself is well below what the public consider to be minimum living standards.

 I would pick up on the 'renting a modest council house' part of that. Housing costs are one of the major factors and for many people 'renting a modest council house' on lower salaries there is no council housing stock to be rented out (I'm in London so although it might be different in other areas - I have my doubts). 

If I didn't have to spend the amount I do on housing, I imagine I'd be able to survive on a much lower wage, but I'd rather that they had measured the cost against private rented accommodation which is a much more realistic expectation today. 

blimey, I have just done some quick sums and found this amazing. The report says a single parent which i am should live adequately on £210 a week i minused money for rent, council tax, water, electricity, and food and am left (on this £210) with £15 a week. I did not include petrol of other car costs, money for my childs many school trips. i am wondering whether they did this research before the daily cost of living began spiralling out of control.

i also belive that many social and personal problems are impeded by poverty and that poverty should be addressed instead of putting sticking plasters on things instead.  

Peter Kilfoyle MP described himself as self employed today and and as such opposed public scrutiny of his expenses. Another MP whose name I did not catch said that he could not do his job on his basic salary, and that he relied on the extra £24,000 expenses to do so. Last week the former Militant MP Terry Field died. He was regarded as a throwback when he said that he was a working MP who would only draw the average manual labourers wages. The difference between then and now is that Labour MP's see Parlaiment as a career and not a place to tackle the fundemental inequalities in our country. They are unaccountable and self serving. No wonder that people like me will be on strike this month and won't be detered in standing up for my right to a decent wage and our clients right to live with dignity and not in poverty.

What amazes me about todays society is that so many can be classed as living in poverty yet still be wearing designer clothing and treating themselves to top of the range games and activities. I know someone who has a large plasma TV and a beautiful leather sofa suite totalling about £3,000. This person (a family member) has 4 children and neither she nor her partner work. They are  claiming just about every benefit known and are currently being assessed for help with various local charities.The children only wear designer labels and get the new team strip as soon as it hits the shops.The council are threatening to evict them because of the condition of the house and garden. They cant afford to fix up all the damage they have done to what was a brand new council house.

Are you saying that this one personal example negates the notion of poverty in our country? What is so shocking about people claiming "every benefitknown"? Surely the point of benefits are that people should calim them? If the people you know are claiming benefits they are not entitled to, than that is fraud and you have a civic responsibilty to report them, not compalin about crminalty as if it proves that benefits are too genereous. Your example seems to me to be about a family who are not only irresponsible, but also thoroughly obnoxious. This does not mean the welfare state should be dismantled as a result. If we live in a capitalist society and encourage consumerism, than people will behave selfishly. But then we are not allowed to look beyond the "PERSONAL" in social work these days are we?

Nihat, I don't think Anne was accusing this family of being criminals, but she does raise an interesting point about the suitability of the welfare system, and what Tony Blair once described as the "perverse incentives" of state benefits.

Under the proposals set out by work and pensions secretary James Purnell, in the government's welfare reform green paper, mum and dad would be expected to "intensify" their efforts to find employment after three months of claiming benefits, and take on community work on a full-time basis after two years. "The longer people claim, the more we will expect in return," Purnell said.

Whether job-seekers will be able to look for jobs while litter-picking is a moot point (see Neil Bateman's blog here), but the long-term misuse of benefits, which is what Anne seems to be describing, will only be stopped if claimants are reminded that they must fulfil their side of the bargain too. Job-seekers' allowance is just that - an allowance allocated to help people get back to work.

I do not have any problems with engaging in a critique of the welfare state or the current structure of state benefits. I just find the notion of benefit claimants proving they are “worth” it to be no different than the Victorian version of the “deserving poor”. If people claim benefits they are entitled to however ‘feckless’ they may be, they are doing nothing wrong. I see no demonisation of Richard Branson for paying no tax in the UK, so I can live with plasma TV’s on the state. What bothers me is that we seem to forget the history of why there are so many people claiming Jobseekers or Sickness benefits. I hate to come all left-wing in a desperately unfashionable way but I remember the justification for unemployment as a tool for controlling inflation and the use of Incapacity Benefit to keep down the numbers  who would have otherwise been deemed unemployed. The benefit system was meant to be used for short periods when people were in need and I see no problem in going back to that notion of the Welfare state. It’s not claimants who have made the current system what it is. Successive governments have made it their policy to keep people welfare dependent so I wait in breathless anticipation to see how Mr. Parnell ensures he will get “more….in return” from benefit claimants. The "perverse incentives" that worry me more involve arms company bribes, utility privatisations which increase shareholder ptofits at the expense of cold older people, the selling of healthcare to foreign owned and unregulated corporations and the willfull disregard of citizen opinion when starting unjustified wars.

On very quickly scanning this discussion (or more correctly the way it is being sidelined) two thoughts spring to mind.

1. Comparing these so-called work for your benefit schemes, I am minded of the 1996 Welfare Bill in the USA.  This was brought in by Clinton and many of his aides were at MIT wih many of the architects of 'new labour' some of which still in cabinet.  This bill stated that a person could only have 2 years continuous welfare and no more than 5 years of welfare in his or her life. 

2.  A report in lat few weeks stat thated benefit fraud ran to £2.7bn per year.  Yet, £1.8bn (a staggering two-thirds) of this was error by the benefits agencies and only £900m was fraudulent attempts by claimants.  So, what if these peron had to work for benefit and it was then discovered that they weren't entitled to benefit because of benefit agency mistake?  Would government then have to pay these claimants / non-claimants the going rate for the work they had done (but not supposed to have done if you get my drift?)

Finally, the JRF figures presumably did not include the 20% plus fuel increses announced this week so these figures need revising - as would benefit rates, and benefit scale rates (HB) so the poverty line figure needs to be far higher than the JRF one.

By referring to my family as obnoxious and hinting at criminal elements and fraudulent claims you have showm your true colours. Is this how you see clients? My point was simply that poverty today can be quite luxurious for some people. My personal opinion has not been mentioned and i would thank you to keep yours to yourself.

'What amazes me about todays society is that so many can be classed as living in poverty yet still be wearing designer clothing and treating themselves to top of the range games and activities. I know someone who has a large plasma TV and a beautiful leather sofa suite totalling about £3,000. This person (a family member) has 4 children and neither she nor her partner work. They are  claiming just about every benefit known and are currently being assessed for help with various local charities.The children only wear designer labels and get the new team strip as soon as it hits the shops.The council are threatening to evict them because of the condition of the house and garden. They cant afford to fix up all the damage they have done to what was a brand new council house.'

I think your response to 'Nihat Erol' is a bit 'rich' - if your family member has acquired such luxuries whilst on benefits then why can they not 'afford to fix up all the damage they have done to what was a brand new Council house.'? It is my understanding that there are legal obligations involved in renting property and it is an Offence to not leave the property in a good condition. So it would seem that if their actions are not 'criminal' (which they may well be) they are at least, immoral and irresponsible.

I don't think that it is anything to do with the Benefits System but rather the less desireable elements of human behaviour. You have made known YOUR family member's situation so I'm afraid others of us may well wish to give OUR opinions based on what YOU have said about YOUR family member. If you don't wish such opinions then it is probably best not to expose their actions in the first place.

Anne - in putting the facts of your family's circumstances in the public domain you will find that people will make judgements based on what you say - even those who may not voice them - and of course 'claiming every benefit available' is not criminal - however if your family member's house is in a bad enough condition for them to be at risk of eviction then there are undoubtedly a lot of people who might consider them to be, shall we say, someone they would rather not live next door to.  My own neighbour (opposite) was evicted three weeks ago and it has taken the council over a week of working there every day to fix the damage and neglect.  Every service from builders to plumbers have been turning up.  Whilst they never bothered me or did me any personal harm I can guarantee that many of my neighbours are glad to see the back of them.

But you also say of the family you refer to that they can't afford to fix their house (and you showed your own judgement on this when you referred to it's original condition).  Without knowing how the house was damaged the implication I read in your post is that they caused at least some of the damage.  They chose their actions that may have led to cause the damage to the property and they are still choosing how to respond to the damage and how to spend their money.  If designer clothes and expensive furniture are more important to them than house repairs they are choosing to take the risk of eviction.  That is entirely their choice.  If the damage was caused by others from outside then there are other options available for funding the repairs, but they would have to choose to take that action.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not the banner waving sort who says that parents shouldn't smoke but should spend their money on food and clothes. I accept that it's not that easy and smoking is an addiction, and can be an important part of belonging to a social network; and that pets, hobbies and social activities are all important parts of daily life that need to be funded.

My point is that whilst our circumstances may not be of our choosing or our own fault, how we respond to them and how we deal with them is something we choose.  Each choice we make builds the foundation for the next choice and so on, so it is not always easy to change.  Choices are not always about making physical changes, sometimes they are the emotional choices we make in how we cope with a situation.  However that is the root of social work, helping people make the choices that protect the vulnerable.

Back to topic.  There will always be relative poverty wherever there is a free market economy.  Even as you raise the incomes of the poorest members of society the wealthier will still be able to raise the game and spend more so pushing up prices and reinforcing the gap.  How individuals define what is important in their lives, how they view money and how they choose to spend it has an impact too.  Doesn't mean everyone should stop trying to fight for the rights of the poorer members of society though.