So Barnardo's chief Martin Narey thinks more children should be taken in to state care at birth. At a cost of five thousand pound a week to the taxpyer, for each child in care, is this really the sensible solution? Is extending the welfare state, which has contributed greatly to the ever expanding underclass, the correct remedy for feckless breeding? I think not. However, Mr Narey very bravely took a "judgemental" position by pointing out the obvious, that many people are not fit to be parents. However, the solution lies not in caring for the fruits of their loins but rather in ensuring that there is a lot less of their fruit about in the first place.
Instead, what should happen is that the state should remove incentives for those incapable of parenthood from becoming parents in the first place. Welfare benefits should be greatly reduced for those families and young people who breed simply to gain more in state benefits or simply to get to the head of the social housing queue. I can guarantee you that if there was less provision for the indolent and irresponsible to breed then they would do less of it. I have worked first hand with lots of young people who have told me they were getting pregnant to get a flat and an increase in benefits.
One young man I worked with in a supported housing project, who was expecting a child with his ex-girlfriend, (he has since left her and impregnated another of his ilk) refused to avail of the free condoms because as he put it, "I dont like them."
I responded, "Are you not worrying about becoming a Dad and all that entails and the expenses involved?"
"No not really, the benefits pay for everything. My ex already has a baby with another bloke and she got a flat from that and gets tax credits and benefits so it will all be allright."
As I said, he abandoned her and impregnated another girl in the project whom he also went on to leave. Now, if this lad and the women he slept with had to take financial responsibility for the consequences of not using contraception then they would be less likely to procreate. A good thing, if you ask me. It is not in the intersts of society or indeed humanity in general that the aforementioned young man should be extending his gene pool. A holiday in Chernobyl would do him the world of good.
Friday, 11 September 2009
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20 comments:
Good article but surely :-
"The welfare state is spending billions of pounds annually providing people who shouldn't be parents with the means to do just that."
should be
"The welfare state is spending billions of pounds annually BRIBING people who shouldn't be parents with the incentive to do just that."
BTW How many people with your work history are in Parliment? I would guess 0.
Monthly jabs?
Nah, just cut their balls off with a blunt knife.
Like you say, take away the money and the rest of it wouldn't be an issue.
If their kids have been taken in to care because they've been abused then they should already have been locked up where they can't bang out any more kids.
We already have the necessary laws without bringing in further state control.
I'm with you all the way apart from the sterilisation bit for that reason. My heart suggests that sterilisation is too, shall we say, mild?
Dear Winston,
You are SOooo damn right. Just yesterday I had the pleasure (not) of overhearing a 60 second conversation between a grandma chav (aged about 30), mummy chav (15 ish) baby chav and baby chav's 17 year old chav dad. I lost count of the number of times they managed to say the F word, they even managed "corof**kinnation street". Now I have an idea. What would happen if we offered mummy chav and daddy chav and all their mates say £10,000 cash and 2 weeks all expenses paid in Ibiza in exchange for their sterilisation? I reckon enough of them are down right daft enough they might just go for it.
I share your concern, but I think that the politics and incentives need thinking about. I think that offering every female over 16 years old a two thousand pound bounty if she consents to have a coil/IUD fitted. If/when she wants to breed she can have it removed for free if she has over 10 years NI contributions. She is welcome to have it removed at any private clinic, but she pays.
This way, those females who have difficulty making informed decisions will CHOOSE to take themselves out of the gene pool. £2000 is chicken feed compared to the costs of a pregnancy.
Both parents should have responsibility to pay for their offspring; if they come into money after 20 years, then they pay up. Which is the German system.
Thanks for your comments GZero. Although we dont fully agree I enjoy a good debate.
I dont support the death penalty under any circumstances because there will always be miscarriages of justice.
I believe that procreation is not a right. In particular I think certain people should be prevented from breeding. However, the best way is to remove the incentives. Sterilisation would only be used for the extreme cases such as parents who abuse their kids and they end up in state care.
We use to have a means of social control - it was religion and the stigma of being born out of wedlock. A lot of people have gone to great lengths to destroy that mechanism of control; to treat unmarried mothers the same or better than the married ones; the issue are no longer called "bastards".
Unfortunately those who destroyed the old rules never put new rules in place to stop the inevitable descent into animal rutting and ever shortening generation gaps as children beget children and the dependent class grows geometrically.
What can we do? Would stigma and public aprobation still work? Or do have to round them up like some sort of cattle drive and mass sterilse?
Methinks we should at least try the humane approach first. The new rules...
If you bear a child out of wedlock (non-religous marriage if you wish) then you must show the financial means to support the child - not on benefits - (grand parents' guarantee would be fine) or it will be taken and given to an actual married couple with their own financial resources and you won't see it for 18 years.
The problem, Winston, is that "removing the incentive" isnt that simple. In a civilised society we dont want to see mothers with young children homeless and destitute. It's why we push them to the top of the housing list and young single men to the bottom. The civilised society provides a bare safety net (most of us couldnt imagine rubbing along on child benefit and other social security payments), but it is more than a bare safety net for some.
We need to square the circle. We want everyone to be a contributing member of society with the expectation that as a caring society those with real needs will be succoured. Our present system encourages the feckless to produce children - who need far more support than our current system gives - but is sufficient to encourage the feckless to live their lives and blight the lives of their children.
It's easy enough in hindsight to say we should prevent the mother of baby Peter from having more kids, but as ever where do we draw the line?
We are in a bad place at the moment - but it could be worse: eugenics was practised until the 60s and 70s in some "advanced" countries. Sometimes I wonder if the solution is pushing for a Swedish style attempt to raise standards for all, at others I begin to wonder if temporary sterilisation is the answer. Note that given the morons who run social welfare policy (eg your managers) I dont think spending more would work, but sterilisation is abhorrent and I dont like the idea of homeless indigent mothers with children.
Which is why we have the status quo...
I must say that I disagree with Nationalist if he is advocating a return Religion as the regulator and arbitrator in the private sexual lives of people. One look at Irish social histroy from the time of their independence to the present day shows how that doesnt work either and how religious suppression of the sexual drive doesnt work and can actually lead to an increase in deviant and abusive behaviour.
I dont care whether a child's parents are married are not but rather that they are good parents. There have been plenty of bad parents who were married.
However, I agree that there needs to be some regulation on who does and doesnt have kids.
As someone who doesnt have kids, or ever want any for that matter, I do question this idea that everyone should have kids and not just the underclass either. Surely we all dont need to breed? It is this entrenched mentality in humans that has led to an overpopulated planet and that will lead to a depletion in resources to the extent that at some stage the planet will not be able to support us. At that point nature will cull us back to a more sustainable level. Current rates of consumerism coupled with ever increasing population trends is unsustainable and will lead to future environmental catastrophe. Within 100 years Id say humanity will be at a tipping point.
Forgive the poor grammar and spelling in the last post. Its 230 in the morning and I am wiped out and to lazy to correct it.
Hi Winston,
looks like Brown has been reading your blog. It seems as if the penny has finally dropped and the incentives for career sprog poppers will soon be removed. It's about bloody time. I actually agree with his proposals and I just hope Brown has the balls to impliment them.
Keep up the good work
Good comment.
After all Holland has some of the most liberal sexual laws in Europe but one of the lowest rates of teenage pregnancy. I have a friend who lives there and the state will not support teen preganacies, the family have to. About time we adopted the same attiude here. When I left the militiary I couldnt get to the top of the housing list for all the local pregnant teens leapfrogging me.
Hi Winston
I hope you're ok and that you'll find the time and energy to post again soon. We miss you:)
Lilliput
and there was I thinking that Narey was a swamp drainage engineer, when he's really just another bloody alligator fighter
I feel that as a society something is missing when you have to purchase a licence for a dog and pay additional insurances but no such regulations are in place for the raising of our future society. Whilst I think that sterelisation is a step to far towards eugenics I do feel that perhaps some sort of parental qualification should be implemented before undertaking the life long role as mother or father.
The current government have turned childbirth in to a job for the female youth of today who are well aware of the fact that they will be greatly rewarded for doing nothing more than opening their legs for any kev, gaz or del that comes along.
I am married, have two children, my husband works full time and I work part time, have never received benefits or tax credits and would consider myself to be a bad role model to my children (both girls) if I did so. So many of these young mothers are born to parents who have lived a lifetime on benefits and therefore have no real example of how they should live a fulfilling life. The benefits culture is completely to blame for the current situation. There should be a limit to how many years one person can claim "free money".
PS: I would love for the government to research the number of working households that own a 40" plasma TV! From what i can see, quite a large portion of tax payers money is feeding the profits of Comet and Dixons!!!!
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