Work TV

Universal Credit is a payment to help with your living costs. It’s paid monthly - or twice a month for some people in Scotland.

If you already get benefits

Universal Credit will replace the following benefits:

• Child Tax Credit
• Housing Benefit
• Income Support
• income-based Jobseeker’s Allowance (JSA)
• income-related Employment and Support Allowance (ESA)
• Working Tax Credit

If you currently receive any of these benefits, you cannot claim Universal Credit at the same time.

Universal Credit is being introduced in stages across the UK.

ABC Comment, have your say below:

ABC Comment.Please watch the video below to see how UC is working out in practise:

Eight hundred thousand government workers’ lives have been thrown into disarray by the shutdown, with 380,000 workers on furlough and 420,000 who have worked without pay since December 22.

The American Federation of Government Employees, or AFGE, says it is illegal for federal workers to work without pay.

A US term: a furlough is the temporary laying-off of employees, usually because there is insufficient work to occupy them.

President Trump wants 5 billion from the public to build his border wall that he said the Mexicans would pay for as an election promise. 

ABC Comment, have your say below:

Our special thanks go to the Colchester Gazette & Standard that featured the ABC on New Years Day.

Our special thanks in particular go to reporter, Vicky Gale.

http://www.twitter.com/@Vicky_Gazette">@Vicky_Gazette

Image: Reporter Vicky Gale. 

Our article is here: https://www.gazette-news.co.uk/news/17328977.grant-shines-a-light-on-creative-careers-service/

ABC comment: have your say below: 

Happy New Year Everyone. Let’s make a wish - the end of Universal Credit and the end of this government and the end of their callous, cruel and sadistic campaigns towards the unemployed and the disabled. The end of ESA and PIP's medical testing and the hours spent filling out forms, attending tribunals and wrestling the authority's just to get enough to live on and to survive. 

 Let us stop the government and DWP from killing more of our citizens and bring an end to needless austerity and the extra cost burden thrown on the taxpayers by these useless interventions. 

More people in work in the USA has meant that one in six Americans are on food stamps. It is no different here. Work is no longer a way out of poverty, for some, it is a way into it. 

Things can only get better and so they must.

Have a Happy New Year and our Best Wishes go out to ALL those in these difficult times. 

ABC Team. 

A technical issue in the benefits computer system means some Employment and Support Allowance (ESA) customers will receive weekly payments instead of their normal fortnightly payments. 

This affects customers due a fortnightly payment on 8, 9, 10 and 11 January. 

As an example, claimants expecting a fortnightly payment on Thursday 10 January will receive half of their payment on Thursday 3 January and the other half on Thursday 10 January.

No one will miss out on a payment and customers do not need to take any further action. However, customers should take account of this split in payments while planning their financial needs and budget accordingly.

Normal fortnightly payments will resume on 21 January.

The Department for Communities apologises for any inconvenience caused.

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According to the Metro newspaper, a man who has worked his whole life a claims he was denied Universal Credit because he wasn’t a UK citizen – after he spent two years living in Spain. Former train manager Matthew Stockall, 38, returned from Benidorm to the UK last month after the breakdown of his relationship but struggled to find work.

He was later shocked to receive a rejection letter from the Department of Work and Pensions (DWP) which stated he hadn’t been living in the UK for long enough to claim – despite having been born and bred in Manchester.

Mathew had paid tax and NI for twenty years. The Habitual Residence test is carried out to make sure that, if you're planning to claim these benefits, you've a legal right to be in the UK (the right to reside) and you're intending to settle here for the time being (habitual residence).

Once you show that you have the right to reside, you must then show that you are habitually resident in the UK, Isle of Man, Channel Islands or Ireland (the 'Common Travel Area').

The habitual residence part of the test applies to British citizens returning to the UK after time spent living or working abroad, as well as to EEA nationals coming to the UK.

The rejection meant Matthew, who worked as a bar rep during his time in Spain, was forced to sofa surf and rely on friends and relatives for food and basic living essentials, living off just £20 a week. After contacting his local MP and reapplying for Universal Credit Matthew, who is still looking for work, was accepted to receive the benefit after a total delay of five weeks.

UK citizens living abroad may face this test on their return. Anyone going abroad for a period to work needs to be aware of this test.  

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Simon Collyer, ABC founder is busy doing battle with the DWP.

The Universal Credit (UC) online account in the Payments section has this statement:

YOUR PAYMENT IS BASED ON WHAT YOU'VE TOLD US AND COVERS THE PERIOD BETWEEN......

This is NOT true. Universal Credit is based on information given by the employer to HMRC (Her Majesty’s Revenue & Customs) and that information is given to the DWP (Department of Work and Pensions).

The DWP are making the Claimant responsible for information that they have no access to, and no responsibility for, and whose accuracy is the responsibility of the employer, HMRC, and the DWP, NOT [we argue] the Claimant.

It is difficult to see how the Claimant can be responsible for the accuracy of payment information when they cannot have access to the HMRC Real Time Information (RTI) system? This is the system employers use to report payroll information.

The ABC reports that the Irish Claimant Commitment is much fairer and has an equal section on what the claimant can expect from the government.

ABC Note: Unfair Contracts in law: Unfair Contract Terms Act 1977 (UCTA) A statute which imposes limits on the extent to which liability for breach of contract, negligence or other breaches of duty can be avoided by means of contractual provisions such as exclusion clauses. It is unfair in our view if claimants are forced to sign a contract or aggrement to assume responsibility for something they have NO control over. We are not lawyers and this is not a legal opinion. However this is hardly fair, one must agree...

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The Guardian have pointed out that Simon Burns, the minister responsible for rail, had been travelling to and from work from Chelmsford in a government car at a cost of £400 a day.

Burns claimed this was because he was not allowed to read sensitive papers on the train, but his claim was immediately contradicted by the Cabinet Office, although it was conceded that reading Red box matters in such an environment was not advisable.The cost to the taxpayer was estimated to be £80,000 per annum. 

Image: Simon Burms MP

ABC Comment: Sir Simon Hugh McGuigan Burns is a British politician, who served as Member of Parliament for Chelmsford since being elected at the 1987 general election until 2017 general election.

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Figures revealed under Freedom of Information show that bars and restaurants in the House of Lords sold 369 bottles of own-label champagne in 2017/18, with the luxury alcohol selling for £43 a bottle. 

The House of Lords also sold 292 bottles of prosecco and 25 bottles of rose champagne. 

All while one in 200 people in the UK are homeless.

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While benefit claimants visit Foodbanks over Christmas....

Image: The Rt Hon Amber Rudd, DWP minister. 

DWP minister Amber Rudd and was spotted having tea with actress Keeley Hawes, having tea together at The Wolseley.

Tea is £29.75 per person at the Woolsey, far beyond the 'budget' reach of those on Universal Credit. 

Hawes who started out as a model and has appeared in several pop videos appeared in many TV and big screen productions, stated that she is bisexual in 2002. 

Image: Actress Keeley Hawes

Image: The Wolseley in Mayfair.

The Wolseley is a café-restaurant in the grand European tradition on London's famous Piccadilly. With a spectacular Listed interior, the restaurant buzzes from early till late, seven days a week.

As well as eclectic lunch and dinner menus encompassing European classics, the restaurant serves breakfast, morning coffee, afternoon tea and an all-day menu.

Image: The Wolseley - anyone for tea!

In 1921 the English architect, William Curtis Green, was commissioned by Wolseley Motors Limited to design a prestigious car showroom at the site of 160 Piccadilly. The car company went bust.The building then became a branch of Barclays Bank. It was in July 2003 that restaurateurs Chris Corbin and Jeremy King came to acquire the building. 

Image: Marie Antoinette was the last Queen of France had a reputation for high living. Marie Antoinette was guillotined at 12:15 p.m. on 16 October 1793. The phrase "Let them eat cake" is often attributed to Marie Antoinette, but there is no evidence that she ever uttered it, and it is now generally regarded as a journalistic cliché

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