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Is EMA fair?

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*_Em_*
What really annoys me about EMA is that the government assume that parents who earn more have more to spend. More money usually means bigger mortgage and bills etc, you live according to your salary etc. (btw sorry if someone's already said this, i couldnt be bothered t read through however many pages this thread is!)


Exactley! My parents earn literally only one or two hundred pounds over the cut-off ... yet I get nothing! I think it would be a fair system if they gave out say...book vouchers etc because the bottom line of EMA is to pay for school supplies because your parents supposedly can't afford to. I can't afford to buy a £28 revision guide but I still bloody had to!

Y'know what the most annoying thing is....at our school, if you DO get EMA and buy school books you can get your money reimbursed if you show your receipt. However if you DON'T get EMA they won't reimburse you. How backwards is that?! When I asked a teacher why he said it was because "generally people who get EMA have lower income so they can't afford books" ....errr they get EMA you idiot!!!

I have to work 17 hours a week so I can afford to pay everything I'm abliged to, as well as buy my own clothes, toiletries, books and afford to go out etc etc. When I explain this my teacher said...."well I'm sure you could handle not running a car and walking to school" I live a good 40 minute walk away from school....as well as I have to lug a load of folders to school everyday! Plus my parents won't pay for my clothes and toiletries anymore so I have to lol.

I think probably the most annoying thing is the whole "status" thing. My friends dad works for BMW, but just because he lives with his mother, he gets full whack! If I lived with my mother I'd get money because I earn more than she does! Its so stupid how they only look at income and not outgoings. Just because my dad gets say £27,000 a year that doesn't mean he has £27,000 in his bank every year!

Oh and yeah....if £30 a week wasn't enough...here's an idea! We'll give people who STRIVE to be on time and reach their grades a bonus every term! Because they're so deserving.....you come to school off your own back to get your grades you say? Well I'm sorry you get **** all!

Wow....didn't realise how bitter I was til just now :biggrin:

Nicola :cool:
EMA drives me nuts!

I'm biased because I don't get it even though I should because my household income has been waaaayy below the £30 a week threshold for the last year, but they base the assessment on THE PREVIOUS TAX YEAR! There's a chance I might be able to claim now because it's a new tax year but we finish soon and there's not much point.

I know people who get paid EMA who don't even come into college half the time! I even know someone who has vandalised the common room so has been banned from it, but who stll gets £30 a week! Every single person I know who is on EMA has been bought a car by their family. Most of them go on holidays abroad every year (I admit I am this year but for the first time ever with my mum! I've only ever been 3 times otherwise, and not for these long 2 week holidays people seem to have).

I know a few people who actually deserve and need the money, but 80% of them absolutely do not need it.

I would urge other people who agree with me to sign the petition below, which is an offical Downing street website petition.

http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/abolishorimprove/
nterry242
I can't afford to buy a £28 revision guide but I still bloody had to!


You had to? Surely you could have done without it, or borrowed it from a library? £28 is an awful lot of money to be spending on a revision guide!

nterry242
at our school, if you DO get EMA and buy school books you can get your money reimbursed if you show your receipt. However if you DON'T get EMA they won't reimburse you. How backwards is that?!


OK, that is stupid. It should be either you get EMA or you get reimbursed for books, not both.

nterry242
When I explain this my teacher said...."well I'm sure you could handle not running a car and walking to school" I live a good 40 minute walk away from school....as well as I have to lug a load of folders to school everyday! Plus my parents won't pay for my clothes and toiletries anymore so I have to lol.


That's a fair point, in my opinion. If you can afford a car, you really don't need EMA. If it's too far to walk, take a bus or a train like everyone who can't afford a car. And as for the folders, why not just take the bits you need for that day out of each folder and put them in a ringbinder that you can take to school? You can't need everything in all your folders every day.
MissSurfer
I know people who get paid EMA who don't even come into college half the time!


You need to take that up with your college then because attendance is the main requirement for getting EMA, so if your college are giving it out even to people who aren't attending, that's a fault with them and not with the system itself.
nterry242
"generally people who get EMA have lower income so they can't afford books" ....errr they get EMA you idiot!!!

I have to work 17 hours a week so I can afford to pay everything I'm abliged to, as well as buy my own clothes, toiletries, books and afford to go out etc etc. When I explain this my teacher said...."well I'm sure you could handle not running a car and walking to school" I live a good 40 minute walk away from school....as well as I have to lug a load of folders to school everyday! Plus my parents won't pay for my clothes and toiletries anymore so I have to lol.


My heart bleeds. I live an hour and a half away from my college by bus so I cycle, which takes 45 minutes. I lived 40 minutes away from my old school and I walked, with folders, PE kit et al, as there was no bus which went to my school (bar those for which the bus stop was 2 miles away from my house).

Why should your parents pay for your clothes and toiletries if you have a job, as well? You're 17, it was your choice to buy the stupid car, if you can't manage your own funds that's your fault; I don't see a car as something that you're obliged to pay for in any way whatsoever seeing as you don't even need the damn thing.

And yes, generally people who get EMA do have a lower income. EMA is a compensation for this on a personal level; I think it's admirable that your school pays for revision guides and text books for those from low-income backgrounds.
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I'm sorry but I'm just going to be blunty honest with my opinion here.Some of you don't get EMA and therefore you are very bitter about some people who get it and how it isn't fair etc. However I get it 30 pounds a week and I didn't get it for the start of the year because of some rubbish,they were holding it up. They are quite strict about the proof you need to get it and a lot of mine is spent on books and things my mum can't afford for me,if it's not books,it's driving lessons nad I also have a job on the side to keep my finances steady. My mum gets about 4000-5000 pounds a year most to loook after me and my brother and we never visit our Dad. If you can criticise our situation and say I don't deserve EMA, then please feel free.
yeh if the system is abolished then ppl like us will suffer!!

the only problem i have with the system is the age thing. it fits with englands age/school system but not with scotlands.

my sisters 16th bday was in june so she started her ema in 5th yr. mine was in november, so mine didnt start till xmas! so overall she has had an extra bonus payment and 6months extra money than i have had!! and she didnt care bout school or exams, so she didnt try!
Lilian
They are quite strict about the proof you need to get it and a lot of mine is spent on books and things my mum can't afford for me,if it's not books,it's driving lessons nad I also have a job on the side to keep my finances steady. .



I don't deny at all that there are people such as yourself who deserve it, however I'm sorry but you have to agree it's not at all fair - I feel I deserve EMA because other than working my arse off, I pay for everything you've listed myself, without the help of my parents, and without the help of EMA. I'm not at all saying it should be abolished and I know that people such as yourself actually spend it on things that it should be.


It's in no way as strict as it should be...I know a lot of people at my school that get it just because they live with one parent with low income while the other parent makes way over my parents do...plus the fact that if your parents are self-employed then some how it can be changed so that you get it. My friends parents have just bought her a brand new £6K car and she pays for NOTHING herself because her dad is so well off....yet there she is with £30 a week. It's certainly far from a fair situation.

Nicola :cool:
I think it's an issue that they don't take the number of people in the household into account. A family with £29,999 and only one child is a lot better off than a family on £30,100 and say 3 children. I think they should reform the system and make the tiering more precise and less general. I don't like that they get bonuses for turning up and making some improvement when other people don't get anything. I mean, why is it worthy of £100 if someone from a lower income background turns up to school, yet if someone moderately well-off does the same they get nothing. I understand the reasons behind the scheme, encouraging more people from lower income backgrounds to continue with education rather than dropping out and getting a job by giving them a regular income, I just don't think the bonuses are fair.
nterry242
Exactley! My parents earn literally only one or two hundred pounds over the cut-off ...



But the question is: would you criticise the system so much if your parents earned just below the cut-off point? No, you'd happily accept a weekly payment of £10, even though you consider it to be so unfair and wrong.
bruisepristine
But the question is: would you criticise the system so much if your parents earned just below the cut-off point? No, you'd happily accept a weekly payment of £10, even though you consider it to be so unfair and wrong.


I'm always criticising the system, even though I get £10. Just because I get that, doesn't mean I don't think it's fair that other people don't. At the end of the day, if you can't afford to go to college/sixth form, you shouldn't go. The money shouldn't be an incentive whether it's used for books/travel or whatever.

I think everyone should get something like £10/£15 instead of £100 bonuses and £30 a week. And before someone comes along and says the rich people will then be getting £30 a week, don't forget about the people that lie that they live with their grandparents when really they live in a five bedroomed house or some other such *******s.

Just because someone gets EMA, don't assume they won't criticise the system.
I don't agree with abolishing the system. It just needs to be improved.
Unagi
At the end of the day, if you can't afford to go to college/sixth form, you shouldn't go.


Why on earth not? If you're suggesting that people who come from very poor backgrounds shouldn't be educated, you're making a very bold, dated and inconsiderate statement indeed.

Unagi
I think everyone should get something like £10/£15 instead of £100 bonuses and £30 a week.


And how do you suggest that the government funds this? Think of how many A level students there are in the UK, then multiply that by 10 or 15. It's not a practical suggestion.
i think that poster was saying that everyone who currently qualifies should get £10- £15, rather than everyone in the country. It confused me for a while too, but that's the only reasonable conclusion I could reach, since the suggestion that everyone in the country should get that is quite ludicrous.
I had EMA but still think it isnt fair. I mean it should be means tested. Yes my parents are not rich and people who dont it have more money. But i dont know if im speaking for all of you who dont get EMA but majority, hwo many of your parents can afford to give you £30 a week. It just doesnt happen im guessin?
its not all about pocket money though. i know alot of people on EMA will spend it on things they want and not what they need, but iv been buying my own clothes since i turned 12, and i pay all of my own dinner money and food. the suggestions that the money is made purely for books etc is ludecrous.

Alot of people who are above the cut off and dont get ema will have parents who by their shoes for them, who will pay for their dinner money and anything school related. Alright, last yr some of my EMA did go towards buying an ipod!, but iv got alot of outgoing expences which i know many people (not all) whos parents earn £30000+ will not have.

i know alot of people who dont get ema, and complain about it and are bitter . .. but these are the people with parents with good jobs, who live in a decent house and come home to food in the fridge! people who recieve encouragement to go to school and do well!

i know the system is screwed but i dont think, unles you have really been done over by the system (as above with the person just above the cutoff who could do with the money), that people should complain about it so much! some of the threads on this post are obviously just from bitter kids, who dont have it atall bad but would like a few extra cds in their collection!
i do agree, however, that the £30 is too much. but, all the people i know on ema do need it, just not that much.
I don't think it's fair to assume that all of us who have posted in objection are bitter and would only have spent the money on cds. I would really have liked that money to save up to have better living expenses at university, or to spend on traveling to and from university open days. I was far from qualifying for it, and I don't mind that other people do get money. I just think that a) £30 a week is far too much and b) the £100 bonuses are not fair at all. I don't think many parents would give their child £100 for turning up at school for a term, so why should the EMA people get that? If you are going to reward some children who are making progress then you should reward all of them, which of course is economically draining, so it can't happen. In that case nobody should get rewarded like that. The maintenance is ok but should be less, but the bonuses are entirely unfair. That's not bitterness talking- that's just a sense of justice.
I think that it's grossly unfair. A higher income in a family is not necessarily indication of more money to spend. Take, for example, a family, whose income is marginally too high to be eligible for EMA. However, what if that family has, say, 4 children as opposed to 1 in a lower income family? A higher council tax fee? A higher mortgage?

I have no problems with people getting the EMA as long as they are genuine. I knew one girl in my year, however, whose parents were divorced and she lived with her Mum. Her Mum was on average pay, but her Dad was minted. She constanly came into school with YSL bags and Gucci glasses (I kid you not), and yet she was still "eligible" for EMA?!
I will be able to get the £30 per week when i go college because of the fact i live with my mum and she gets less than £20k.

But it is slightly unfair i will probably spend about £20 in town and the rest goes in the bank for if i need to get something for school.
People who are going my college get the grant too but will spend it all each week in town. Which makes them just the same as those who haven't got it!! just with extra cash.

I suggest to make easier money in college if you live near someone who goes same college and you learn to drive before them give them a lift and make them pay £5 each week for a lift so if you take 4 people thats £20 each week just for driving!

My dad used to make quite a lot but never gave me more than my pocket money each week. My Mum pays for everything i need educational and otherwise

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