Proud to pay my taxes

[English assassin]

Teenage mothers on £30,000 of benefits
23 May 2005
Three schoolgirl sisters who all had babies within months of each other are living rent-free in a council house on benefits worth more than £30,000 a year, it emerged today.
Julie Atkins and daughters Natasha Williams, now 18, Jade Williams, 15, and 14-year-old Jemma Williams survive solely on benefits of £600 a week, bringing them an annual income of about £31,000.
The girls told today how the fathers of their babies had no contact with their children and contributed nothing towards their upkeep, the paper said.
Youngest daughter Jemma was the first to fall pregnant, at the age of 12, after having sex with her teenage boyfriend. She gave birth to son T-Jay in February last year.
Just weeks later Jade, then 14, and 16-year-old Natasha - who is in a secret relationship with the baby's 38-year-old Asian father - found they were pregnant.
Natasha had daughter Amani in November and Jade followed with Lita in December.
The two younger sisters are still at school and are the only young mothers in the playground. Jade sits four GCSEs this year and hopes to work in IT. Jemma takes her exams next year.
All four mothers live rent free in their three-bedroom Derby house and receive a combination of income support, tax credits and child benefit.
Double divorcee Mrs Atkins, 38, remains unrepentant about the family's situation, blaming society for their predicament.
She said: "I don't care what people say about me.
"I blame the schools, sex education for young girls should be better.
"They have all ruined their lives because they are far too young to have children."
The sisters feature in the BBC3 series Desperate Midwives: The real truth about childbirth that airs from 9pm tonight.

So the mother has THREE daughters, all of who fall pregnant one at 12, one at 14 and one at 16, and lo and bloody behold she blames "society for their predicament"

Now come on. I am not against the old society is to blame line in its place, but Mrs Sodding Atkins needs to be in jail for aiding and abetting underage sex, surely. How hard is it for her to tell her daughters "This is a penis, don't touch it til you are 16". Is that too much to ask? And what's all this bollocks about a secret relationship with a 38 year old man who is paying nothing? So I, Johnny Taxpayer, have to support this girl and her kid because some dirty old letch doesn't want his wife to know he's been banging a 16 year old, is that it? Where's my state subsidised 16 year old squeeze eh?

In assassin land there would be no bunce for Natasha until she had coughed the name of the 38 year old for a start (and yes I know about the domestic violence argument and IMHO you deal with it by locking the b'stards up, not by allowing them to intimidate women so they won't name the father.) The other two fathers would be off to chokey for underage sex.

I know my membership card of the prgressive circle must be under severe review here, that is if it hasn't already been revoked, but this is just WRONG.

To be honest I'd like to have the knackers off the three of them though I suppose some bleeding heart is going to object to castration as contrary to human rights or something. "Its the only language they understand..." ( this too is a JOKE.)

[The_Doctor]

I agree with you.

It is always society's fault, never yours.

Poor society, it gets blamed for everything.

[Spetulhu]

Haul in mrs Atkins for interrogation. Surely she's got SOME idea about who knocked her daughters up. Two of those are criminal cases!

Society's fault? Of course, it's not like a mother should be watching out for her children.

Kind of like these idiots close to my home who want the city should choke off the streets and lower the speed limits "so the children are safe". WTF? This is an area with small housing, everyone's got a large yard around the house where children can play! And some idiots want to hamper traffic so they can leave the kids without supervision in case they decide to play in the streets!

[Big King Sanctaphrax]

Oh my god...what kind of a name is T-jay?! That's horrific!

[Byzantine Prince]

Oh my god...what kind of a name is T-jay?! That's horrific!

Americans have really bad taste in names. For examples I have known a lot of people(even here in Canada) with the names T.C. or P.J.(no, not Panzer). They usually come from America, damn hippies!

[_Martyr_]

Excellent points AdrianII !

[Adrian II]

I am not against the old society is to blame line in its place, but Mrs Sodding Atkins needs to be in jail for aiding and abetting underage sex, surely.

Rrright, why not arrest the girls too, shove the children off to care homes, and make all seven of them miserable? Do you have to wax so two-dimensional about issues at the drop of the word 'society', EA?

This is exactly what I meant when in the other thread I said our social fabric is eaten away by consumerism, marketisation, by financial valorisation replacing real values. Here's a family suffering from lack of responsibility from various parties, and it starts you off on a rant about your money and they way you would take your anger out on the girls, who are minors.

My idea would be to, um, emphatically commit the various gentlemen involved and ensure they have a vested stake in the financing of their childrens' future and the educational future of the young mothers. That's where the boot should come down. Such a policy should take care of Mrs Atkins' political re-education along your lines as well.

[KukriKhan]

So for how long will this ummm... non-traditional family be subsidized? And is there any connection made between the fathers and reimbursement? In other words, if one or more of the fathers are found/revealed/come forward, will the government take money from them to compensate for the tax money spent?

[Fragony]

@subject

Well if a certain brand of politician keeps blaiming society people will use it.

[English assassin]

This is exactly what I meant when in the other thread I said our social fabric is eaten away by consumerism, marketisation, by financial valorisation replacing real values. Here's a family suffering from lack of responsibility from various parties, and it starts you off on a rant about your money and they way you would take your anger out on the girls, who are minors.

I'm missing the bit where I said the girls should be punished? The mother, yes. She hardly looked after her children did she.

Well if a certain brand of politician keeps blaiming society people will use it.

There we have the two positions. Is it consumerism etc that has caused this or is it the fact that people are forever told don't worry its not your fault we'll sort you out? I can see why Frag might be right AII but I'm not seeing your argument just yet.

So for how long will this ummm... non-traditional family be subsidized? And is there any connection made between the fathers and reimbursement? In other words, if one or more of the fathers are found/revealed/come forward, will the government take money from them to compensate for the tax money spent?

If a father is named, the Child Support Agency will in principle deduct maintenance payments from his excess income to pay to the mother. However it is very easy to avoid this, thus:

(1) Do not be named as the father. You can do this by telling the mother you will "smash her**** face in," as I think the traditional phrase is, if she puts you down on the birth certificate. Or you can knock up some silly under age bint (who I read in another paper had had an abortion and two miscarriages before the baby that went to term, come ON Mrs Atkins, its not the stork banging your daughters up you know) who thinks its romantic that she is having forbidden love. So the violent and the borderline paedophiles get off.

(2) Have no (official) money. Cash in hand jobs are of course OK because no one knows about them.

(3) Just be too difficult. The CSA deals with 100's of thousands of cases. Move house occasionally, don't open your mail, change jobs, and the bureaucracy just never catches up with you. If you are caught, deny paternity, it takes the ages to get an order for a DNA test and by then you are off again...

What you must NOT do of course is have a stable job and home and pay your taxes like a good boy. Do that and they come along and dock 25% of your income.

[Adrian II]

Is it consumerism etc that has caused this or is it the fact that people are forever told don't worry its not your fault we'll sort you out?

Could you or Fragony point out a politician who blames this sort of situation on 'society'?