Political Rant

Well, we've not had one for a while, so....................

My partner is about to go 60, and will qualify for her state pension from September. She recently got a letter through from DSS giving her a pension forecast as to how much the state will give her a week to live on. I will conceal the figure for a short while.........

She has worked since leaving school at 15, bar around 4 years when she had her 2 kids, and around 35 of those have been in full time employment, and she has paid her taxes and the like. When returning to work after having her 2nd child, the government at the time - yes, it was Labour - were encouraging mothers to return to work to fill the jobs that were available by offering them the opportunity to pay what was called Married Woman's Stamp, which was basically a lower rate of National Insurance contributions, so she, like many women of the time, took up the offer and went back to work.

She has predominantly worked in public services, working with the disabled, working with people who have mental health issues, working with refugees, working with children in care or troubled families.

So, her pension forecast came, and she will, after working for 45 years, be paid a pension of 9p per week!! 9 pence a fucking week!!

What an absolute outrage. 45 years of paying taxes, of paying the government recommendation of MW stamp, of working in public services, and the Government say she has to live on 9p a week. For fucks sake.

And why 9 pence a week. The official answer was 'because you haven't been paying full National Insurance contributions'. Erm, hang on a minute, YOU fucking told her not to pay full NI contributions. YOU brought in the fucking legislation to - basically - fool women into paying smaller contributions so that you could rob them as pensioners. You dirty bastards.

Now what really really REALLY gets me mad about this is not the fact that she will only get 9p a week, not the fact that she was hoodwinked by a government that was back then a party that supposedly looked after the working man - yes folks, its true, Labour was once the party of the working classes who looked after those that weren't high fliers - but the fact that shows to me why our society has become some fucked up caricature of civilisation which is on the road to oblivion, and maybe, an uprising.

If she had chosen to stay at home, have loads of kids, never work, never contribute to society other than swell the population, just smoke and drink and take the piss out of the benefits system, she would have been eligible to claim the full state pension. So, instead of contributing thousands and thousands of pounds during her working career through taxes and National Insurance contributions, which qualifies her to 9p a week, she would have been better bleeding the system of housing benefit, unemployment benefit, free NHS prescriptions and dental care, council tax rebates, child benefit and the like that runs into thousands of pounds each year and then qualifying for all the benefits at a pensionable age.

What the fuck is that all about??

How fucked up are we that we penalise those who try to help others, who try to better themselves, who try to contribute to the running of the country, yet we reward those who constantly take the piss out of us all on a daily basis??

Those throwing out child after child and never working or trying to do anything worthwhile for anybody bar themselves get the rewards?? Fuck me, that is the most backward logic I have heard for a long long time.

This government is an absolute disgrace, and those who shape political thought should hold their heads in shame. We have created a society that doesn't give a fuck, but don't need to give a fuck, because the rewards for that far outweigh the rewards for trying to do things properly. Failure is celebrated more than success. Making no effort is thought higher of than trying to do something. Staying at home all day bleeding the country dry is rewarded throughout your life yet working with the GENUINELY vulnerable people in society earns you poverty in older age. What the fuck is going on????????????????????????????