I am a pensioner. Mrs. May proposed the dementia tax and stopping the triple lock. Having, presumably realised that she might lose the pensioner vote she has cancelled the dementia tax and says she will cancel the triple lock in 2020 but not immediately. She has already shown her hand though.
Forgetting any big picture and just being a selfish pensioner I feel it would be like a turkey voting for Christmas if I voted Conservative.
My problem now is choosing from what's left.
I abhor the use of "dementia tax" - these so called spin doctors need removing. It's just as bad in Scotland with the other parties going on constantly about the Conservative "rape clause". Of course being honest about it doesn't suit the spin doctors.
So fact, there is no "dementia tax" - there was a proposal to make changes to paying for social care costs by increasing how much could be kept for inheritance to £100,000 and treating care home/home care the same by bringing the value of the privately owned home into the equation. Her error was not putting an absolute cap on the amount that would go to social care costs but at least they guaranteed the property would not have to be sold during their lifetime. Here if you go into care it does have to be sold if assets including the house are over £25k ish.
The daft thing is the Labour proposals in their manifesto and costings would cost any pensioner concerned about the Conservative social care proposal a darn sight more but it is not being pointed out to you with a fancy tag - but it is there. First is the Land Value Tax to replace council tax but is a lot higher so that's an annual cost. Next is they are reversing the increases to the Inheritance Tax thresholds (along with other reversals). So if your property was of a value to be worried by the Conservative plans then Labour's will take you for even more both during and after your lifetime. The 'triple lock' was only relevant when inflation is very low. They are retaining the double lock of the higher of earnings or prices. Dropping the 2.5% from 2020 is an irrelevance with rising inflation.
There's no "rape clause" either. This resulted from the decision to limit child tax credits to 2 children. You do not have to be working to get child tax credits. This was announced in 2015 but it was only coming into effect from 6 April 2017 so plenty of notice. The logic behind this was there had to be an absolute limit on the number of children the state would support. No one was limiting the number of children a family could have but the decision had to be on whether you could afford to support the children yourself. In consultation , it came out that there were situations where the number of children could exceed 2 through no fault of the parents so they brought in an "exceptional circumstances clause" of which there are many....multiple births, adoption, non parental care and non consensual conception (hence the spin). So what's the facts here ? Any children born before 6 April 2017 there's no limit on the number of children that the CTC can be claimed for. From 6 April 2017 you can only claim for a child born after that date if the child comes under one of the many "exceptional circumstances" then they can claim CTC. So the crys to remove this clause would result in no exceptions and a straightforward limit of 2 children? It is also a lie that the mother has to disclose in depth details. She has to complete her name, NI Number, Address , child"s name and sign a declaration. The other bit is a declaration by some kind of professional to confirm the right to claim.
In case you are wondering I am not a member of any party and I am not an activist. I just had a very analytical job that required taking apart Government legislation and looking for the flaws then explaining it in understandable terms to anyone it was relevant to. I have voted for different parties depending on the circumstances and I voted to remain but I respect the result to leave the EU.
Thankfully we still live in a democracy and we can vote for whoever we like but I wish everyone was voting based on fact not spin. Never a truer phrase that the devil is in the detail.
Lecture over and it's nothing personal - I just hate the media and politicians misleading the electorate.