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Welfare state makes people lazy says Mayor aide
Benedict Moore-Bridger24.09.08
A key adviser to Boris Johnson has attacked Britain's welfare system, blaming it for making people selfish and lazy.
Anthony Browne, who is to become the Mayor's policy director next month, said the safety net of the welfare state made people reluctant to get a job or look after children or the elderly.
Mr Browne said there was now "extreme solipsism", which meant people were abandoning their duties and responsibilities.
In an essay for the Joseph Rowntree Foundation, the head of the Policy Exchange think-tank said there was no "magic bullet" for the problems but individuals thinking they had the right, for example, to get drunk on the Tube, was "corrosive to society".
He said: "There have been improvements but also an unprecedented, unsettling decline. Each age has been concerned about moral decline. Ours is no exception - although a lot of what is happening now is exceptional."
One of the Mayor's first acts was to ban drinking alcohol on the Tube.
Mr Browne said there were now 101,300 drug addicts and alcoholics living on incapacity benefit - equivalent in size to the Army.
He said the "decline of individual responsibility" was central. "Perhaps most corrosive of all is the welfare culture, from the benefits system to social housing. It exists to fight destitution but it has unfortunately led to mass dependency, with people expecting the state to look after them, rather than state support being a last resort safety net."
Reader views (8)
This article is debateable in my opinion, the welfare state was set up to help the less fortunate in our society, but some people jump on the band wagon and abuse the system and some could work but choose the easy option. I know of people who have never hardly worked and have claimed benefits for years, and had children from different partners and never supported any of the children so the women and children have had to kept by the state. I think these type of people should be sorted out and benefits should go to the people who need it most through no fault of their own.
- Carole Heath, Wallington Surrey
Selfish and lazy eh?
We are bound to pick up typically Scottish attributes with so many Scots 'ruining' us aren't we?
- Graham, Brighton, England
Try sciving if you live in China - you'd soon be connected to the mains until you acquired the work-ethic. I've worked in China. They do not have an endless pit for benefits=bandits and that's just one of the reasons they out produce us.
The army of benefits-bandits and single parent families drag us down at every turn.
- David, East Grinstead
Many years ago I was told not to just give people money that you felt sypanthy towards because what you actually were dpoing was taking away their pride and reducing them to beggars. that still remains true today.
- Terry Senton, harrow
I agree entirely with Mr. Anthony Browne. The concept of the welfare system, although well-meaning, is fundamentally flawed. I don't deny that there are people in society who have genuinely fallen upon hard times through illness, unemployment or family breakdown, all of whom are deserving of our help.
However, the system teaches dependency and lack of self-worth. It has also allowed (through fraud by some claimants and incompetence by some civil servants) families who have parents and generations who have never worked. What sort of role models does this provide for youngsters growing up in such households? It teaches them that the benefits cheques roll in regardless of individual effort and responsibility.
I recognise the need for a safety net to help those honest folk who genuinely need it. But the system needs a major overhaul to address fraud and waste.
- Tim, Bracknell, Berkshire
Labours Communism at it's best.
- Frank, Home Counties, England.
Don't we also have x amount of billionaire bankers hooked on champers and cocaine from squandered families' earnings? Or is that different?
- Carlos M, London
Why are we focusing on drug addicts and the sick when it is the City bankers and hedge fund monkeys that have brought our markets to the brink of collapse. Laziness seems a far lesser crime.
- Steve, London
