Benefit cut can't solve problem alone

So said George Bernard Shaw.

And now we're starting to see that in action with council tax benefit.

The benefit was scrapped last year because ministers said the welfare bill had doubled under Labour.

Local authorities were left to their own devices in how to deal with people who had previously been getting their council tax bills paid for them.

They were given the option of either cutting the benefit, scrapping discounts for people with second homes and empty properties or plugging the gap by using their own limited funds.

But they could not cut benefits for pensioners or change the 25 per cent discount for single adult households.

Wolverhampton City Council's plan has been amended this week as it continues to grapple with £123 million of cuts and the prospect of 2,000 job losses.

Around 18,500 households with working-age adults are now set to see their council tax bills soar by 83 per cent.

That sounds enormous, but it's worth bearing in mind they weren't paying that much in the first place.

Since the changes came into effect last year a family on benefits in a Band A house was paying about £120 a year.

That's going to go up to £220.

It might not seem like much for the year, but if you're in a household that needs benefits to get by, £220 is massive.

Even so, it is still a relatively minuscule sum to have to recoup through the courts if people are unable to pay.

And that costs money, if not to the council then to the person who was already struggling in the first place if they get saddled with the legal bill on top.

Cuts on their own might be essential to balancing the books after years of public sector profligacy.

Then again they might be a disproportionate way of making the poorest in society pay for the mistakes of the banking sector.

Either way, this can only be a temporary solution. Even in cold, purely statistical terms, taxpayers will end paying somehow, either for the benefits or through reduced council services.

The best way to cut the benefits bill is to cut the number of people who have to rely on benefits.

That means lots of private sector jobs, paid at a wage people can live off without needing support while also paying tax and filled by a workforce skilled in the trades employers want.

The latest employment figures are encouraging but we still have a very long way to go.

And with Peter and Paul still very much at odds, it's going to take many years to get there.

UKIP's finding its swing but it's votes that count

The UKIP problem for the Tories is not going away.

And despite what UKIP would like to think about its appeal to working class voters, it is the Conservatives it is hitting the hardest to Labour's benefit.

Take the latest polling by Tory peer Lord Ashcroft, who helped bankroll much of the campaigning in marginal seats in 2010.

His survey shows Labour are on course to regain Wolverhampton South West next year.

Yet UKIP is the biggest beneficiary in terms of the swing from other parties, taking 11 per cent more votes than in 2010 from the sample reported.

Labour has increased its support by seven per cent.

But if that result moves from the poll to the ballot box, that's all it's going to need. A win's a win.