[...] these are the figures for the number of children for which child benefit is claimed for each of these regions:13,613,265 of them in total, yet I remember quoting far fewer in an article a few months ago. So I checked the ONS figures again and, yes, they show the total number of under 16s in the UK for 2009 to be 11,166,900.
England 11,495,395
Wales 642,965
Scotland 1,031,795
Northern Ireland 443,110
That's benefit being paid for 2,446,365 more kids than there are in the population! Or - at the current rates of £20.30 for the first born and £13.40 for others - between £1.7bn and £2.6bn per year.
Now, I realise there are anomalies such as ex-pats claiming, and EU nationals working here who qualify, but by the same token there will be ex-pats being paid out of other countries' funds and so these things should cancel each other out to a fair degree. A 2.5m net gain of kids seems to be an unusually large figure for our HMRC to have to cater for.
I feel a FOIA request coming on.
22 comments:
Child benefit is paid to most under 18s as far as I know. From HMRC:
Your Child Benefit can carry on after your child reaches 16, if they're staying in full-time, 'non-advanced' education at school or college, or starting an 'approved' training course. Find out what this means, when your payments will stop, and when you can get a Child Benefit extension if your child is under 18.
Fucking John Terry and Ryan Giggs. Bastards
What DOB says.
As a matter of fact, slightly more Child Benefit goes unclaimed than is overclaimed, and the saving is more than enough to run the administration costs of £bugger all. It's the simplest benefit and hence the cheapest to administer and the hardest to defraud.
How do we know how many kids back in Poland etc. the people that work here actually have.
Do they have to produce a photo of them or what ??
There are vast numbers of children in Pakistan for whom child benefit is paid in Bradford.
They are rapidly expanding the schools in Bradford to accommodate them all but, guess what, the classes are never full because the kids (if they exist at all) are back 'home' being married off to cousins, to produce yet more claimants with genetic disabilities, thus increasing the family 'take'.
And which politicians are brave enough to tackle this silent scandal ? They're all keeping their heads down to save their postal votes.
Anonymous, Polish people living in Britain cannot claim child benefit for children living in Poland. You only get child benefit for children who are living with you.
DoB: Thanks for the info, saves the FOIA effort. :)
So, if I read that right, child benefit continues if on a scheme which equates to something a bit like an apprenticeship. Yes?
@Dick Puddlecote...This should help you:
http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/childbenefit/keep-up-to-date/when-child-aged-16/index.htm
A friend of my fathers worked at a registry office in manchester one day 12 asian families registered the same baby
as one family brought it out they redressed it and another family took it back in maybe that has some bearing on your figures
@ anon 01.02
I wonder why no one has thought of that before? Sounds a bit BNP to me.
The last Government admitted that child benefit was paid to kids NOT living in the UK if the parent had worked in the UK for 1 year. They also admitted that not one child had been checked.
"Fucking John Terry and Ryan Giggs. Bastards"
:D
If there is one pointless universal benefit, this has to be it. Most of us pay taxes to one state drone, to have some given back by another. Better and cheaper idea, abolish it and cut taxes.
That would of course reduce state power and dependence on it, so don't expect the establishment rushing this one out any day soon.
XX Junican said...
@ anon 01.02
I wonder why no one has thought of that before? Sounds a bit BNP to me. XX
If you mean "invented" or "urban myth", forget it. The gypoes here do it all the time. They run it in shifts at each end of the U-Bahn or S-Bahn lines. One will go the length with the bastard. Then the other will go in the opposite direction, but using the same bastard.
Strange how these bastards never, EVER cry and scream and shit themselves. I have tried time and time again to get the boss to get a court order for blood tests for tranqulizers. But as yet, the courts will not play.
Hey, here's an idea. Fucking stop paying child benefit to anyone. Just scrap it. If you've got the money for children than go right ahead and pop one out. If you can't afford it then don't have one, though without being squeezed for taxes to pay not just for your own child benefit but also the wages of the smarmy cunts employed to hand your own fucking money back to you being able to afford kids would be that bit easier. You'd also stop any baby swapping games that people may be playing to screw more money out of the system.
Child benefit does in deed go up the age of 18 if the child is in any sort of education. It was introduced when men were paid weekly in cash to ensure that the mothers at least had some money to spend on the children. Clearly no longer necessary
DP,
I expect extra children all come from the finger counting aloud activities our hyper efficient civil service.
A few years back at the Public Sector IT Awards (I think it's called that...) IIRC is was held at the Grosvenor House Hotel I can't even remember who won - EDS or Crapita - but I remember that it was for - administering the Nation Insurance system and in the acceptance speech, the smug drone CEO that delivered it wittered on about the "80 million customers" of NI. That's right - 33.33333% more than the population - nobody blew a rasberry or jeered....
The pitful performance of these people doesn't even deserve the description innumerate - they are morons, plain and simple.
The best of luck with your FoI - they'll give it to the dimmest farthest away bulb to fulfil.
XX Gordon the Fence Post Tortoise said...
the smug drone CEO that delivered it wittered on about the "80 million customers" of NI. That's right - 33.33333% more than the population - XX
You have not taken into account all the bloody Irish Tinks that claim benefit in about ten different towns.
Last year I attended a talk given by a local registrar to our Family History Society. Whilst the lady did her best to avoid any accusations of racism, it became very clear that she had to be very careful these days to see all the documentation when registering a birth and frequently a mother would come along with a baby which she claimed was born at home without a NHS midwife. I guess that at least 50% of the population in her registration district are of non-UK origin and an extra child can be worth quite a bit, not only in terms of child benefits, but many other benefits including housing.
@ FT.
Hi.
Dip fingers of child in indelible ink??? Racist, I suppose!
Take picture of baby? ALL babies - to stop fraud?
Stamp birth cert? What birth cert?
No. My complaint about Anon was the specific 'Asian' connotation. It seems odd that no one in the Manchester Office stopped what was happening when it was noticed. The reason I mention BNP is that I have seen the occasional comment, here or elsewhere, which has originated from racist sites. I am not saying that Anon is wrong. I am just saying that there is no need to specify a race - that's all! By the way, I would not include the word 'gypoes' as a racial group, though I understand that the EU does.
I have an Auntie whom I reported for signing on, and claiming for bastards in Wallasey, Runcorn, Birkenhead, and Chester. When it got to court, the N.I admited they knew she had been doing this for five years.
So it DOES happen, even with whites.
However, the media here has been FULL of examples of Polish, and Roumanian (See more of which, further down) and Turkish newspapers, with regular (weekly) articles, on "How to fiddle the German dole system" (Only in the respective language). They also give "advice" on France, Holland and the U.K. So don't get complaicent.
"Gypoes" is an awkward one. It is a particularly English word, with no translation/equivalent in any other language. As you will know, it is applied to all sorts of travellers, VERY few of whom, until recently, actually ARE gypsies.
Irish tinks, Hippy convoy, circus/fairground people. ALL get called "Gypoes". So it would be difficult to see HOW a court could justify a "racism" charge for using it.
However, those on the Berlin U/S-Bahn lines are as close as you will get to REAL Gypoes. Mostly claiming to be from roumania and points East when questioned. But have a VERY curious look on their face when caught by me. See, I KNOW what a broad Manchester or Geordie accent sounds like. So, I always spend a few hours with them in the cell block, asking them.....politely how come gypoes from Roumania speak like Bobby Charlton, or a Picadilly cab driver in the 50s.
I stand corrected. Amazingly, it seems that citizens of EEA countries who are working in the UK can get child benefit for children still living in that EEA country.
Good grief.
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