Benefits Culture

The notion that fellow citizens of the UK who earn decent salaries of £50,000 or £60,000 a year - either need or deserve regular state handouts in the form of child benefit payments - is a symbol of everything that's wrong with the country's welfare system.

Now the average salary in this country is less than £26,000 a year.

So why in the world should the government be asked to use public funds to subsidise the  incomes of people who are relatively well off?

The welfare system was originally intended as a safety net to help people in times of hardship - which was a big and much needed social improvement at the time.

But welfare benefits cannot possibly be regarded as a hand-up to better future and the prospect of a better life - if they simply end up as part of the furniture.

Which is exactly what's happened over the years as the welfare budget has grown - just like Topsy, I suppose.

Yet instead of successive governments taking a step back and asking how much public money is being spent - and for what purpose - the bill has just kept getting bigger and bigger. 
  
So to my mind the coalition government is doing the right thing by trying to reform the welfare system with the 21st century in mind - which the last Labour government promised to do as well, of course.

But somehow Labour didn't find the time to do anything practial during its 13 years in power - when the People's Party commanded an overall majority in the House of Commons. 

Now all we hear from Ed Miliband &Co is their concern for the 'squeezed middle' -  when a more socially progressive party would be arguing for extra financial support to be targeted on the less well-off - paid for by eliminating or reducing such payments to the better-off.

Instead Labour is a simply in favour of presrving the status quo - which favours those already earning in excess of £50,000 and £60,000 a year.

A strange position to hold if you ask me and I imagine that's also the case if you were to ask the Scottish Labour leader - Johann Lamont - as well.

Because in Scotland Labour has been challenging the concept of universal welfare benefits and whether such payments represent the best use of public money - especially in tough economic times.

I find it amazing that Labour in Holyrood and Labour in Westminster can have two such diametrically opposite views on the same subject - maybe it's all comes down to the cynical politics of being in opposition.

I hope all will become clear as the public debate unfolds - in the weeks ahead.