Lets make people on welfare live on vouchers!

People on the dole are not one homogeneous group. They generally break down into three groups.

A. Short termers. People who lost their job and will take up any employment asap in order to get off the dole.

B. Medium termers. People who want to get off the dole but only if they find a job which they feel is worthy of them.

C. Longtermers. Career dolists. Have never worked.

Category C should certainly not be receiving free cash on a weekly basis.

KomradeBishop wrote: »

Find a friend who want to buy goods that your vouchers are restricted to, trade them the vouchers for an equivalent amount money, vouchers fail to restrict what anyone purchases.[/thread]

Or shops begin taking them in return for smokes and drink, as used to happen with butter vouchers.

Deleted User wrote: »

Reading through some various posts on the forum and a strong group of people want to have a system where people on the dole survive on vouchers only!

I don't recall seeing any of this strong group, have you any links to them saying a 100% voucher system for every single item.

Vouchers for food would not only stop it being spent on drugs (mainly alcohol & nicotine), but also combat squandering and needless purchasing of overpriced stuff from rip off shops. Remember this...

Stheno wrote: »

The Irish Times have been doing their usual pre Budget articles, but I was shocked by todays article.

A single mother of four claims she cannot feed her kids healthy food as it is too expensive with 3 chicken fillets costing €7.50 and two baskets of strawberries €5 and it's easier to "It’s cheaper to buy a packet of 10 chocolate bars for a euro than give them some healthy snacks."

http://www.irishtimes.com/news/social-affairs/the-kids-are-going-to-starve-then-they-have-health-problems-1.1544207

I was shocked as I can buy two whole chickens which would feed a family of five for 2-3 days as main meals for that price, and if you shop in Lidl/Aldi (to which this woman has access, there is a large Lidl not far from her, there is plenty of good value, low cost fruit/veg. My local butcher does ten fillets for ten euro and three pounds of mince for 7.50

Is this an indication that investment in basic budgeting, and cooking skills may be worthwhile?

“Just say if there were cuts and if they said €20 or €30 goes off my income, that’s €20 or €30 off my shopping, so the kids are going to starve, so then they have all their health problems and I’ll be stressed out.”

The kids are going to starve because she cannot afford to feed them €2.50 chicken fillets.

it would piss many hardworking people off to see their taxes being squandered on buying food they could not afford themselves.

o1s1n wrote: »

I totally agree regarding the scroungers, but you cannot implement a new system which will penalize those who have worked all of their life.

How about a system that just targets 'dole lifers' instead?

Yes. Something should be done. Set a cut off at 6 years or introduce vouchers at 5 years on welfare.

I don't think we should continue breeding a welfare culture that is generational.

Most people use welfare to try and get work or education which is what it is meant for.

A voucher system that can't be spent on alcohol, cigarettes and gambling would be ideal and would help many of the problems latent in our society, especially in Dublin.

The vouchers could also only be spent in the state which would help curb money drifting across the border in northern areas.

We could pay them in Tesco Club coupons?

€188 is the max for a single adult.

One could go to the hatch, sign on, then collect the following coupons:

€100 for food
€50 for clothing/non-food/medicine
€18 for Alcohol and tobacco


And a tenner credited to a special "Non-worker" Leap Card with a star or something on it, so the card is easy to identify.

Seems fair enough.

[Deleted User] wrote: »

Strange that not one person advocating a voucher system has yet given any figure to the breakdown of the cost of survival be it on the dole or the voucher scheme.

The voucher would be 188 the same amount as the dole.

Deleted User wrote: »

What about all the other stuff, you know, ESB, Water ?

Paid directly by the social. They have an allowance obviously, and if they exceed the limits, the power/water shuts off.

But in the interest of fairness, the SW would supply a batch of candles and buckets (for rain water collection), to all customers.

Kermit.de.frog wrote: »

My opinion is that if you are receiving any payment (excluding pension) from the state i.e taxpayers then I don't think you should be allowed spend that money on smokes and alcohol.

Vouchers are the best way of doing that and could sort a lot of social issues too at the same time.

One of the things we're guilty of at an institutional level in this country is short-term thinking. I think a better system than what you've suggested could be put in place with a bit of investment which will cost money in the short-term but bring benefits down the road.

Let's install facial recognition technology in every retail outlet which sells tobacco or alcohol. Everybody who receives social welfare will have their photo taken when being put through central processing. Then if they attempt to buy either alcohol or tobacco they will be recognised. Red lights will start flashing, a loud siren will sound and a big metal cage will drop to the floor, trapping the scrounger inside.

They can then spend a few hours in the cage being publically shamed and thinking about what they've done. The length of time in the cage could increase with each offense. Obviously you'll have to feed them while they're in there. Perhaps some symbolical carrots, to go with the metaphorical stick which is the cage? Now I know what you're thinking, eventually all these carrots are going to cost us a lot of money...maybe have a three-strikes and you're out system. Poisoned carrots for serial offenders?

Beano wrote: »

well you havent mentioned them.

That doesn't mean I've forgotten them.

It would require an initial investment but as people are encouraged to leave the dole we'd be better off in the long term.