Could you live on £53 a week?

£53 is what you've got left every week once your housing benefits has been docked to pay for the luxury of the extra bedroom you have in your council property. Never mind that you can't find a smaller place to move to because smaller places don't exist, or that you need the extra bedroom for when your kids come to stay on your access weekends, or is where the carer who helps you with your disabled child or demented elderly relative sleeps.

£53 is about half what I spent on a Tesco shop yesterday. That's a month's worth of kitchen and bathroom stuff, plus tins and packets and frozen stuff. It doesn't include fresh stuff like veg, salads and deli meat which I buy weekly.

£53 is a wee bit more than I pay in car and the house contents insurance for my flat each month. But, of course, building insurance is extra.

£53 is roughly what I pay for broadband, phone and TV, including phone calls.

£53 is half what I pay the shower of robbing b*st*rds who act as factors for my building.

I'm fortunate in having retired with a state and a private pension that cover all of this. My bus pass, fuel allowance, free presciptions and free eye test help too.

But I didn't always live in this haven in leafy suburbia and I try hard not to forget it: it's only the fickle finger of fate - call it luck if you like: I prefer to call it being blessed with good parents and a notion for hard work - that means I'm not still living in a council house in Pollok with only a state pension and an extra bedroom to be penalised for.

The whole point of the Welfare State - set up in the late 1940s when the UK had zilch in the bank and a lot of debts from a world war - was to make sure people didn't have to rely on luck and handouts but could count on having a decent life.

Today the Tory government started closing down the Welfare State. If you care, go to this link and sign the petition. It's time Ian Duncan Smith put his money where his mouth is.

http://www.change.org/petitions/iain-duncan-smith-iain-duncan-smith-to-live-on-53-a-week?utm_campaign=autopublish&utm_medium=facebook&utm_source=share_petition