That is crazy, and just demonstrates how far out of hand public spending has got.

True. You can also not discount the thousands of murderers we currently have sat in our overcrowded prison system. By the way, in addition to the annual cost of keeping a prisoner, there is also the £100k+ average cost of creating a new place in the prison system.

I would personally rather see the billions that are currently being spent on keeping murderers, pedophiles and rapists warm, safe and well kept, being spent on more worthy causes.

I would prefer a “work house mentality” to an expectation that these people/parasites are entitled to live off the rest of us.

Everyone is flawed in some way. Are you suggesting otherwise?

If you don’t agree, what is your explanation for the failure of Socialism in the United Kingdom? Or are you claiming it’s been successful?

I am a benefit scrounger if you go by those criteria. I have a number of significant health problems which render me largely unemployable. On top of that I am carer for my 86 year old Father who has small vessels disease, a form of progressive dementia. The only benefit I receive is ESA. My Father is in receipt of the benefits he is entitled to by virtue of paying into the system his entire working life. By being my Father’s sole carer, I receive no other benefit for doing a job that is virtually 24 hours a day and seven days a week. But by doing this I am saving the Government the cost of placing my Father into a care home. Because of my particular circumstances I have lost my pride, my dignity and much of my self respect, not to mention the isolation which comes with the role of carer.

I never had a day out of work in my life Jim until the day I became ill. Long term, chronic conditions such as mine mean that I have no real future and no real hope. Yet every day I do something, no matter how small or insignificant, to try and make the lives of my Father and I just that bit more bearable. No two people’s situations are the same but that doesn’t matter does it? Far easier to tar all with the same brush. Everyone on Benefit Street, everyone (bar one) on your mythical housing estate, all lazy, idle, feckless scroungers.

I’m really sorry to hear of your troubles. 🙁

You are the sort of person that most people want to see receive state funding. The ‘scroungers’ that are repeatedly mentioned here are not people with genuine physical or mental disabilities, but able bodied people who are capable of working, but choose not to. They are a burden on society and contribute nothing.

You should feel proud of yourself, you contributed to society, and paid your way while you were able to. There is no disgrace in becoming ill.

I lice across the road from a bakery, and I suspect this happens a lot there, as I regularly see cars and vans going round the back out of hours.

While I do think that nearly out of date food could be put to much better use, we should be doing all we can to discourage foraging in bins. In the long run, it will end up costing the NHS, and therefore, us.

I suspect Mr Salmond has always been aware that there could never be a currency union, he merely wants to make voters resent Westminster for publicly stating it. He has made it all too clear in the past that the Euro is his choice of currency.

I do find the position of the President of the European commission odd though, why wouldn’t they accept Scotland, when they’ve admitted nations with much lower living standards from Eastern Europe?

IMO, this whole thing is being handled terribly, by all parties involved. Nothing is being made clear at all – except for the incompetence of politicians.