The benefits system is morally corrupt

This is not formally benefit fraud:

A scrounging father-of-two infuriated a judge yesterday after it emerged he has pocketed up to £16,000 in benefits – because he smokes cannabis.

Paul Holland explained he was on anti-depressants after taking the drug since he was ten.

But the 21-year-old’s addiction means he is able to rake in £60-a-week incapacity benefit on the grounds his depression means he is unable to work.

Despite his troubled childhood, he deserves to be famous, and to be reviled.

So who pays for benefits to this man, and probably to the Brighton squatters too?

"Patently" brings us this (doubtless pre-arranged) exchange in the Commons.

Question:

[...]In 2011-12, the pay-as-you-earn tax threshold will be just £7,475 a year. [...] the people paying tax—that is, paying tax to pay the benefits that others are in receipt of—are actually poorly paid and that a year’s pay on the national minimum wage is just £12,300? Will he join me in recognising that it is an issue of social justice that we should introduce the benefits cap?

Iain Duncan Smith

I agree with my hon. Friend. That point is also powerfully made by the fact that nearly half of all those who are working and paying taxes fall below the level of the cap. It is important to achieve a balance of fairness. I recognise that there are issues, and we have looked at ways in which the process of change in housing benefit can be done more carefully, for example. This is not about punishing people; it is about establishing a principle that fairness runs through the whole of the benefit system.

Recently Labour has favoured those already receiving benefits over others who deserve them more. But they're less visible.

So are those working, often earning less money than many on benefits get, and yet subsidising them.

Correcting this would be good morals, and good politics.

So there are at least three prongs:

1. Lower the benefit cap
2. Hit benefit fraud
3. Aggressively raise the threshold where people start to pay tax.