Evolving Politics, or Growing Up?

“If you're not a liberal at twenty you have no heart, if you're not a conservative at forty you have no brain.”

- Winston Churchill

I grew up in a household where my mother had no discernible politics at all, and my father was a passionate supporter of the Labour party who liked to put his point across in a well-reasoned argument which was very persuasive to a teenager. I also grew up in the Thatcher years in Britain which saw a great deal of injustice and protest across the country. By the time I was first able to vote in a General Election, in 1992, I was very hopeful that Neil Kinnock would be the new Prime Minister in the morning. Of course, it didn't work out that way. I was full of youthful enthusiasm for equality, and liberal idealism. Fast forward to 1997 and I was only too anxious to vote for Tony Blair, and delighted when they won. At last, I thought, finally we'll have a Government interested in making life better for everyone. I was full of optimism.

By 2005, I realised that such optimism was naive and unrealistic. Politics and adult life didn't have the black and white that I had imagined as a child. I still was strongly opposed to the Conservative Party, but beginning to wonder whether or not that was objective, or the result of my conditioning.

By the election of 2010, I had evolved as far as to be fairly neutral between the two major parties. I no longer clung to the optimism that Labour was the answer to all our ills, nor was I petrified or disgusted by the thought of a return to a Conservative Government.

This is the year that I will turn 40. I work full time and always have done. I fully realise that I've been fortunate never to have been unemployed, however if I were to lose my job, I would rather do almost anything than sit at home claiming benefits.

I'll be completely honest; I have absolutely no idea how many families are currently receiving more than £26000 in benefits. I know that there are some, but how big a problem is it really? Is the Government about to solve a real problem for the country in imposing this cap on benefits, or is this effectively a popularity stunt? Again, in the spirit of honesty, I don't really care. As a matter of principle, it can't be right that a family can receive more money in benefits than a lot of families that work full time.

It is true that £26000 in benefits is equivalent to a pre-tax income of around £35000. I know several families who work full time and their income is a great deal less than that. They manage, and so must those who receive benefits. Yes, there may well be some exclusions. Iain Duncan Smith spoke on BBC Radio 4's Today programme this morning about safeguards and discretionary measures. Not to mix metaphors, but the devil is in the detail of course, and the proof of the pudding.....well you know what I mean. We'll see about these safeguards in due course.

As I started to write this, there was a gentleman on the Jeremy Vine show who is a single father and full time carer to his mother. His sole income is from benefits, and he depends upon them. His situation may well be a deserving exception. I don't know. But should he really be paid effectively £35000 by the state for looking after an elderly relative? This country is in a dire economic situation at present, and to my mind we simply can't afford this on any sort of scale. Having said that, imagine for a moment that the economic crisis did not exist, and Britain could afford this. Surely it's still wrong that benefit claimants can receive more than a great deal of working families?

So as I near 40, with Winston Churchill's quotation in the back of my mind, are my politics evolving with the times, or am I just growing up?