a bargain breakfast, page-28

"Never seem to see foreigners living in cars, or on the streets."

Proportionally, that is probably correct -- however your leap "Govt. is quick to provide accommodation, welfare payments etc."

doesn't tell anywhere near the whole story at all.

I have lately been exposed to people who, on the surface are bright (and, they are), pleasant to be around in small groups and very capable in small sectors of life.

However, they completely lack in the ability of normal day to day living and also they completely lack in what we would consider normal social skills - ie. in larger groups and society in general.

This renders people who appear on the surface to be intelligent capable individuals to be ok for looking after themselves--------------- the facts are they cannot.

This is so different to foreigners - generally (generally) a person who can uproot themselves from one country and travel to another country on the other side of the world and set themselves up - with or without govt. assistance - is far more capable than the types of person I am talking about.

Generally - and almost all, I would suspect - foreigners would be well equipt in the survival stakes to work out how to get a bed for the night - a meal and learn fairly quickly to get around the society they have landed in.

Many of course struggle with the language - and many would struggle with adapting to the system - but, in general, on a day to day basis, their survival skills would be better than many in our society who, on the surface are what we would think normal, but who are in fact quite disabled.

What I find is that there are indeed some leaches in our society - however, there is a far greater number of people who are in the situations they are in because of something real ------------- they may be trapped by fear of going off benefits - a true poverty trap now so easy these days because of casualisation of work, they may be in the conditions they are in because life has been cruel, they may be in the state they are in because of bad decisions or they may be in the state they are in because they don't have the skills many of us take for granted as 'common sense' and simple life skills - they just don't have them.

From what I see the vast majority of people want a peaceful life - and they want a better life than they have. However, many just don't know how to get it - many have basically no idea.

And, I am afraid that the older I get, the more I see. There are 10's of thousands of people in our society who either need help or deserve help ------------ and, it is a complete tragedy and a serious black mark against us who can help to injure these people because there are a few in the society who do actively rort the system.

To make decisions that have averse effects on thousands of people because a few do the wrong thing is not only stupid - it is just plain wrong.

Our society needs to grow up.

have a great day all

Pinto