New Events

National

no events posted in last week

Blog Feeds

Public Inquiry
Interested in maladministration. Estd. 2005

offsite link RTEs Sarah McInerney ? Fianna Fail?supporter? Anthony

offsite link Joe Duffy is dishonest and untrustworthy Anthony

offsite link Robert Watt complaint: Time for decision by SIPO Anthony

offsite link RTE in breach of its own editorial principles Anthony

offsite link Waiting for SIPO Anthony

Public Inquiry >>

Human Rights in Ireland
Promoting Human Rights in Ireland

Human Rights in Ireland >>

Lockdown Skeptics

The Daily Sceptic

offsite link The Jobs Bloodbath is Only Just Beginning Wed Jan 08, 2025 15:18 | Sallust
If Rachel Reeves thought companies could easily absorb the extra ?24bn in NI charges she is about to see she was very much mistaken. As Next replaces till staff with self-scanners, the jobs bloodbath is just beginning.
The post The Jobs Bloodbath is Only Just Beginning appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.

offsite link The Grooming Gangs Scandal is the Tip of the Iceberg of Public Sector Failure Wed Jan 08, 2025 13:00 | Dr Rowena Slope
The grooming gangs scandal has horrors all of its own. But it's also the tip of the iceberg when it comes to public sector failure, where managerial bureaucracy has killed compassion and common sense, says Dr Rowena Slope.
The post The Grooming Gangs Scandal is the Tip of the Iceberg of Public Sector Failure appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.

offsite link Keir Starmer Will Order Labour MPs to Block Grooming Gangs Inquiry in Parliament Today Wed Jan 08, 2025 11:11 | Will Jones
Keir Starmer is set to block a national inquiry into child grooming gangs in Parliament today, ordering his MPs to oppose an amendment tabled by Tory leader Kemi Badenoch that would trigger a new official inquiry.
The post Keir Starmer Will Order Labour MPs to Block Grooming Gangs Inquiry in Parliament Today appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.

offsite link Declined: Chapter Three: ?Papers, Please!? Wed Jan 08, 2025 09:00 | M. Zermansky
Chapter three of Declined ? a dystopian satire about the emergence of a social credit system in the U.K., serialised in?the Daily Sceptic ? is here. This week: the Government clamps down on "anti-health extremists".
The post Declined: Chapter Three: “Papers, Please!” appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.

offsite link The Psychoses of the Established Political Parties Wed Jan 08, 2025 07:00 | James Alexander
The Labour party suffers from a psychosis of not having any ideas of its own from later then 1890. The Conservative Party psychosis is the compulsion to 'dish the Whigs'. That's English politics, says Prof James Alexander.
The post The Psychoses of the Established Political Parties appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.

Lockdown Skeptics >>

Voltaire Network
Voltaire, international edition

offsite link After Iraq, Libya, Gaza, Lebanon and Syria, the Pentagon attacks Yemen, by Thier... Tue Jan 07, 2025 06:58 | en

offsite link Voltaire, International Newsletter N?113 Fri Dec 20, 2024 10:42 | en

offsite link Pentagon could create a second Kurdish state Fri Dec 20, 2024 10:31 | en

offsite link Resolution condemning the glorification of Nazism Tue Dec 17, 2024 11:08 | en

offsite link How Washington and Ankara Changed the Regime in Damascus , by Thierry Meyssan Tue Dec 17, 2024 06:58 | en

Voltaire Network >>

Rent Allowance-More Stealth Cuts?

category national | public consultation / irish social forum | other press author Sunday September 20, 2009 11:08author by Greg T - None (Independent left) Report this post to the editors

Highlighting recent changes to the rent supplement scheme as well as other disturbing developments.

As if June's cut wasn't enough, ( see: http://www.indymedia.ie/article/94053 ) waiting period of up to several months for rent allowance assessment to be completed are going to result from recent changes to the rent supplement scheme . This development may make things next to impossible for any newly unemployed without significant savings, in the meantime more and more people are undoubtedly going to become homeless.
http://www.corkindependent.com/local-news/local-news/co...nces/
(It's nice to see a Labour TD taking action on this issue). As if that isn't worrying enough, just been told by someone I know (coincidentally also in County Cork), that new Rent Allowance claims are not being processed at all in her area. This person was basically informed (informally) that her claim was a waste of time and that due to staff shortages new applications will not get seen to. Sounds suspiciously like yet another stealth on the sly cut. Meanwhile the NAMA plans to bailout the rich continue, gombeen politics as usual. If anyone else knows similar stories they need to be highlighted immediately. Affected people need to kick up a fuss or they will be (conveniently) forgotten.

Related Link: http://www.corkindependent.com/local-news/local-news/concern-about-rent-allowances/
author by shoegirlpublication date Mon Sep 21, 2009 17:35author address author phone Report this post to the editors

Isn't the whole point of rent allowance so that people in EXISTING rented accomodation are subsidised, not so that people who are currently receiving a social welfare payment can choose to change their existing accomodation at a whim?

That said, the changes are harsh on anybody who otherwise would be facing the scenario of having no roof under their head - for example if their landlord is selling up or if the family home is no longer a safe place for them.

Forcing low income households into the market sector should never have been a solution in the first place - accomodation should have been made available via social housing, not via giving guaranteed profits to market landlords at obscene overpriced rates and pushing up demand artificially for private rented property through engineering artificial shortages in social housing through non-provision. (But then spending billions on private sector rents instead? Doesn't even make financial sense if you take into account that the cost of housing rent subsidised households over the last 10 years has probably already far exceeded the cost of actually providing them with permanent council or housing association homes?)

The current policy of locking in this form of "non-provision" by long term leasing from private landlords is doing nothing more than subsidizing the worst kind of profiteering landlords.

 
© 2001-2025 Independent Media Centre Ireland. Unless otherwise stated by the author, all content is free for non-commercial reuse, reprint, and rebroadcast, on the net and elsewhere. Opinions are those of the contributors and are not necessarily endorsed by Independent Media Centre Ireland. Disclaimer | Privacy