Beware a mother scorned. George Osborne’s copping some stick on Mumsnet, social
forum for the Latte-drinking classes, and with good reason. ‘Hard-working families’, many of them far from rich, will feel abandoned by the party that ought to be theirs.
IDS, Cameron and Osborne have taken a huge a political gamble, as James noted earlier, and they have also taken an enormous social risk. It is telling that the Centre for Social Justice, IDS’ think tank, are lukewarm about the proposal, describing it as ‘probably appropriate’ but calling for an alternative. Skipping through the comments on Mumsnet and you can see why. Many of those whose combined income is roughly £44,000 – £55,000 are saying they’d be better off divorcing, which totally defeats the object of IDS’ wider welfare reforms – there is no point in transferring family breakdown from the poorest to the next run up.
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