First Suicide Due To Bedroom Tax Reported

Also, I apologize if that sounds harsh. I don't mean to. It just particularly bugged me when it said she wrote "Don't blame yourself... blame the government!!!!"... that's just so dumb. And so petty. And so immature and... damn!!

The idea of somebody killing themselves over one tax (as opposed to just moving or getting a lodger or getting a job or... I don't know, any of the other million options) is just so crazy.

And I guess many guys feel this way because we would be the ones trying to get the suicidal person to snap out of it and be more constructive BEFORE she actually did it.

After she did it it's more like "OMG I can't believe you actually did it..."

 

When i was a kid, i thought people who took their own life, were selfish, now im older, i see how desperate and sad those people really are, ike sitting talking, just isnt a way out...
I dont mean like people trying to get attention because they cant ask for help...
I cant imagine being just so sad you would not want to be alive...but i know it happens...
I ersonaly would go down the lodger thing, not everyones cup of tea i guess...

 

How nice it must be to be in your position, and to be able to ladel out advice to those stupid poor people who just dont try.

A few things to consider -

Getting a lodger - quite apart from anything else, have you considered that the type of "second bedrooms" getting taxed are often very small. More box rooms than bedrooms. Who wants to live in that kind of situation ?

Secondly, the occupants of social housing (who the tax hits) may not be allowed by the terms of their tennancies to sub-let or take lodgers.

Thirdly, as the people hit by the tax are those receiving benefits, the extra income from any rent received would alter their whole situation, and they would quite probably end up worse off than before.

Four - "just move" - just like that. Jeez, you do live in a fortunate world, don't you ? One not bothered by concepts like the lack of affordable housing, more to the point the lack of affordable rented housing, and the lack of one-bedroomed affordable rented housing.

Five - get a job. It may not have penetrated your bubble but - around two-and-a-half million unemployed as against half-a-million jobs. You work it out, Einstein.

You don't mention what the rest of your million options are, perhaps you might condescend to enlighten us stupid people so we might benefit from your wisdom.

Personally, I wish the government might be a bit more assertive when it comes to going after those corporations that pay no tax, and the rich who employ accountants so that they can side-step paying their dues.

Still, it's much more easier to hit those at the bottom, isn't it ? Do you really wonder that people might resort to suicide ?

 

And just to underline the point...

From: Unemployed Tyne & Wear
http://unemployedtynewear.wordpress.com/2013/11/20/impact-of-bedroom-tax/


Thousands of North East families are facing a bedroom tax bill of almost £20m.

According to new figures, by August – four months after the controversial spare room subsidy policy was introduced – nearly 30,000 of the region’s households had been hit by the new fees.

Each faces losing out on an average of £679.14 in housing benefits each year – though the picture is worse for people in County Durham, Newcastle and Sunderland, which are among the top 10 hardest-hit areas in the UK.

The National Housing Federation claims that 51% of households affected by the bedroom tax were unable to pay their rent between April and June. Their North East external affairs manager Monica Burns called for the policy to be repealed.

“These new Government figures show that the bedroom tax is affecting thousands of people in the North East – for many, there isn’t even anywhere for them to downsize to. There simply aren’t enough smaller social homes available, and the cost of private rented housing is rising.

“The North East is particularly hard-hit, with the highest proportion of people living in social housing affected by the bedroom tax in the country. The Government says discretionary housing payments will help those who cannot downsize, but there isn’t anywhere near enough money.

“The bedroom tax is trapping many people in homes they can no longer afford and where they are struggling. It is unfair, badly designed, and must be repealed."

 

I used to hold the opinion that suicide was cowardly and pathetic, until I went through a period of severe depression. Now I understand the mindset of someone who sees that as their only option. Luckily I had a strong support network, and it was never something that I really considered. If I didn't have that network and didn't have financial support (I was able to get short-term disability payments from my government for a couple of months), things may have been different.

 

Do you know how they worked out these figures?

Notes to editors
The National Housing Federation surveyed 51 housing associations who between them had a total of 63,758 tenant households affected by the bedroom tax. Of these, 32,432 have gone into arrears or further into arrears between 1 April and 30 June.
38 housing associations responded who between them had 43,989 tenants overall affected by the bedroom tax. 11,064 (25%) of these tenants went into arrears for the first time between 1 April and 30 June
Federation analysis of CORE data, The Bedroom Tax: Some Home Truths, National Housing Federation, March 2013.

http://www.housing.org.uk/media/pre...-families-hit-by-bedroom-tax-pushed-into-debt

There is currently little reason for Housing Benefit claimants in the social rented sector to move from accommodation which is too large for their needs. The match between the size of accommodation and the household is irrelevant for calculating Housing Benefit entitlement for the vast majority of these Housing Benefit claimants. This could be seen as inequitable when compared with the operation of Housing Benefit in the private rented sector. It is unfair to allow Housing Benefit to pay for more rooms for claimants in the social rented sector than it would pay for if the claimants were in the private rented sector. In these circumstances it would be reasonable for under occupying claimants in the social rented sector to make some contribution towards more generously sized accommodation or to move.

https://www.gov.uk/government/uploa...al-sector-housing-under-occupation-wr2011.pdf

After, lets say a year or two, do you think this picture will have changed?

 

Probably not ..its still not good enough...
It has in my opinion, to be changed across the board...
There are pensioners in three bed room homes, families in bungalows!
It all wants changing correctly, and fare..

 

Changed across the board?

I'm not aware of a massive issue with O.A.P's in three bedroomed social housing...

Plus...

http://www.emptyhomes.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/11/regionaltotals-stats2012-1024x315.jpg

December 2011, there were approximately 3.3 million Housing Benefit
claimants living in the social rented sector.

...and

They are building approx 120,000 new homes a year (in part to keep people working)


It is madness...

 

I can't help feeling that the OP has conflated the issue of suicide with the government policy in order to make a political point. The 2 are unrelated and the tenuous conflation rather tasteless IMO. People who are close-to-suicidal can be "pushed over the edge" by any number of misfortunes, real and perceptual.

Tragic though the suicide is, it does not abrogate the fact that small families living in state subsidised housing which is disproportionately large for their needs is both unfair to those who do need large houses and to those who pay the taxes to provide the subsidy.

I didn't read the whole thread or the links. Maybe someone made this point upthread.

 

Nobody has made that point.

Perhaps because the lady left a note:

'In the letter to her son, Steven, 27, she had written: “Don’t blame yourself for me ending my life. The only people to blame are the Government.”'

The OP posted an article. So, to be fair, it was the article not the OP.

Op's article: 'Politicians have said that people should just move if they can’t pay the bedroom tax as if this is the easiest thing in the world for those with nothing. Yet there are no smaller social housing properties for people to move into.'

In another article (BBC) it said:

'The council said Mrs Bottrill had two successful bids for properties and as far as the authority was aware, she was going to move into one of those.'

'A Solihull Metropolitan Borough Council spokesman said they did not know if Mrs Bottrill had applied for discretionary payments.'

'Mrs Bottrill's son Steven said: "It feels like a dream... they've put all this pressure on her and I've lost my mum now."'

I don't know how much pressure she felt before the changes were implemented...
I presume she knew months in advance.

'People who are close-to-suicidal can be "pushed over the edge" by any number of misfortunes, real and perceptual.'

You are not allowed to take anything else into consideration.

OP's article:
'Yet when the same events occur in the lives of someone not just working class, but on benefits, the reaction of some is to immediately start a hunt for character or lifestyle flaws in the recently deceased. “She can’t have been poor, she had a cat” was the astonishing reaction of one person on twitter to news of the suicide of a grandmother driven to the desperate act by the bedroom tax.'

'I didn't read the whole thread or the links.'

Read the first couple of posts...

There is a lot wrong with them...

But, the lady did kinda put the blame on the government (and I presume the issue being her rent)

 

In that case you might want to read the Citizens Advice Bureau's report Punishing Poverty ?

https://skydrive.live.com/view.aspx...50&app=WordPdf&wdo=2&authkey=!AJTbB-gzwsSCayQ

Although about another government policy (benefits sanctions for the unemployed) it reaches the same conclusion regarding the fact that policies enacted by the government do drive some people to consider or actually attempt suicide (amongst other things).

Rather tasteless ? Yes, it is, isn't it ?

As tastless as cutting a whole sector of society adrift to sink or swim, merely because they're not rich enough ? You decide.

 

You obviously have NO idea of these issues.. Lucky you. Hope you never have to have any idea.....

 

Who will be supporting your child? You or the government?

 

From The Void, http://johnnyvoid.wordpress.com/2013/11/25/another-tragic-atos-death-rip-jacqueline-harris/

Not Bedroom Tax, but closely related...

Another Tragic Atos Death: RIP Jacqueline Harris

A woman stripped of benefits after being found ‘fit for work’ by Atos has taken her own life the Bristol Post reported today.

“PARTIALLY-sighted and only able to walk with the aid of a stick, Jacqueline Harris suffered crippling pain due to slipped discs in her back and neck. Her mobility was reduced further when a dog savaged one of her wrists.

“Despite being in agony which strong pain relief could not ease, the 53-year-old was deemed to be fit for work following a government health assessment and told to find a job.

“Her sister claims the verdict that she was ineligible for disability benefits drove her to take her own life earlier this month.”

Predictably both the DWP, and Atos have attempted to wash their hands of the affair. There will be no apology for this tragic loss of life and Atos claim it is nothing to do with them: “we do not make decisions on people’s benefit entitlement, nor are we involved in the appeal process.”

If this were a banker, or businessman who had been driven to suicide over a Government policy then this story would be on the front page of every newspaper. When a yuppy jumps out of a skyscraper, or a celebrity has a breakdown, we are all invited to share in their tragedy. The rich ‘feel’ things more than the poor the media narrative suggests.

Meanwhile reports of suicides due to welfare reform are shrugged off by right wing newspaper columnists as the “act of someone in a fevered, unstable state of mind.” If the poor cannot cope with their poverty then that is a personal failing, not a problem with how society is structured.

Only the wealthy might be troubled by losing their income – the horny-handed working class are expected to get on with things, make do and mend, or queue outside foodbanks with a stiff upper lip. Hunger and homelessness is just a triviality compared to a dent in the investment portfolio or having to sell the second home.

When campaigners have warned that Atos Kills this has not been hyper-bole. The problem is that the ruthless assessments for sickness and disability benefits kill the wrong people to have any major media impact. There is more sympathy for the squeezed middle-classes having to cut down skiing holidays than there is for people driven to desperate acts due to having nothing at all. Atos merely culls in the eyes of this Government and those who support them, and many of them see nothing wrong with that.

 

Seems to me that in doing that they are pulling the rug out from under their own feet. If this unfortunate lady was in a 'fevered and unstable state' it's clear enough that she should never have been declared fit to work.

If a person was in such a state, it's very hard to see any employer taking them on. And hard to see how they would avoid almost immediate sanctions if they had to sign on for JSA.

This country is sick.

 

Atos are evidently miracle workers when it comes to declaring the sick and disabled fully fit and able to work.

I suspect that if you wheeled a corpse in front of one of their "experts" they'd declare it fit for work.

And of course the sickest joke of all is that there isn't enough proper paid work for the fit and healthy, let alone hassling those who deserve a bit of compassion.

 

One of the major problems arising from the Bedroom Tax is that there is nowhere affordable for people to downsize to even if they wanted to.

So it's encouraging to see loveable cheeky-chappie Boris Johnson is taking steps to combat this.... or maybe not. Business as usual - with the emphasis on business.

From The Void http://johnnyvoid.wordpress.com/2013/11/26/boris-plans-to-build-27000-unaffordable-houses/


Boris Plans To Build 27,000 Unaffordable Houses A Year To Ease London’s Housing Crisis

Londoners should brace for themselves for an influx of toffs whilst the poor sleep on the streets if Boris Johnson’s latest Housing Strategy is given the go ahead.

According to the Mayor, 42,000 new houses a year are planned for the capital over the next ten years. Many of these houses will be bought by global super-rich vultures who seem intent on buying up London properties as investments, not homes. Most of the rest will go to highly paid professionals. 5,000 will be built for ‘long term private rent’ at the current soaring market levels. Of the total number of new homes Boris plans to build a mere 15,000 a year will be ‘affordable’.

Yet even this will mean nothing to the hundreds of thousands of low income Londoners desperate for decent and secure housing. 40% of these ‘affordable’ homes will be ‘low cost home ownership products’. The Mayor’s own report admits that the average annual income of people who access these schemes is £33,000 a year – over two and a half times the salary of someone working full time on minimum wage and £7,000 more than the amount of out of work benefit a family of any size can now receive in London.

For those not on £33,000 a year – which means most of London – that will leave 9000 homes a year. That is less than the 14,500 households that were accepted as homeless in London in 2012/13 and they represent the tip of the iceberg. As the Bedroom Tax and Benefit Cap bite the number of homeless families is likely to soar. There will be nowhere for these families to go if Boris gets his way.

And even these 9000 new homes will not be anything like the kind of long term social housing that is so desperately needed. These new homes will be on fixed term tenancies and the majority will charge an ‘Affordable Rent’ – which can be anything up to 80% of market rents.

Half of these homes, just 4,500, will be set at “discounted” rents. But this according to the Mayor means: “set at the lower of up to eighty percent of market rent or the local housing allowance (LHA).” The lowest Inner London LHA rate for a three bedroom property is £305.77 a week in South East London whilst in Inner North, East, South West and West London LHA rates are set at the maximum payable under housing benefit rules – £347.48 a week.

For a family with three children who are out of work, this would mean an income of just £150 a week once rent is paid. These families will not be able to afford to stay in the capital If you are unable to work due to sickness or disability, are unemployed or have caring responsibilities then you can fuck off out of town as far as Boris is concerned. As the report says: “access to these homes would be targeted to those in work in the first instance”.

A development in Stratford announced last year and aimed at low income workers was charging £323 in ‘affordable rent’ a week just for a two bedroom flat a long way from the centre of the capital. This is more than could be earned in a week even for someone on the much touted Living Wage. The so-called Living Wage isn’t even enough to pay for an Affordable Home. That politicians of all parties trot out these glib phrases with a straight face shows just how out of touch the political class has become. What is transparent bollocks to the rest of us is a credible housing strategy to these clowns.

You can read the Mayor’s proposed housing strategy at: http://www.london.gov.uk/sites/default/files/London Housing Strategy consultation version_0.pdf

 

Fair points. As I said I didn't read the article or the thread. However, the corollary (I think that's the right word) is that the gubmint must not do anything which upsets people in case they choose to take their life because it affects them. I'm going to sound like a politician here but government is about taking hard choices and I still believe that conflating suicide and the "bedroom tax" to make the political point is in poor taste.

 

I've posted my whole quote below as you seem to have quoted my opinion and missed the salient point...

I've bolded the argument I'd expect you to refute. I expect many people kill themselves for many reasons and quite how the CAB can deduce which of those kill themselves because of government policy and government policy alone eludes me. I don't doubt that perception of an "uncaring" government could be one of the straws on the camels back. Mr. Frankenstein's posts do seem to be overtly political and therefore I imagine prone to a political bias.

 

Ok...Ok...they are all liars and are only doing to make the government look bad. Got us all bang to rights, guv.

Leaving a note actually saying that they were taking their lives because of unbearable pressure resulting from the Bedroom Tax can obviously not be taken as gospel because they were obviously only trying to make the government look bad.

The people who told the CAB report that they had considered suicide as a result of government policies were obviously lying in order to make the government look bad.

The idea that anyone actually needs to try to spin government policies in order to make them look bad is rather novel. They look bad because they are bad - no spin needed.

I would suggest that any comment on political issues would be, by definition, political.

I'm not sure what political bias you'd ascribe to me, but please do let me know.