Well of course it will because we are the welfare capital of Great Britain.

It isn't targetting like some will think 'let's target Manchester'. If you need to make savings on welfare and other government spending and a large proportion is in a certain area then it is only common sense that will tell you why that area is affected more than most.

Question is why after 13 years of Labour is this region so heavily reliant on state handouts and why can't we stand alone?

As for Richard Leese stating that we can ride this storm well the storm hit nearly three years ago for everybody else.

Maybe don't spend £170 million on an extension to the Town Hall and that will help. Why wasn't the council cutting back when the recession first hit?

Seeing as these areas have probably the highest number of welfare recipients than anywhere else in the land, isn't this obvious? doh!!

It was only a couple of weeks ago MEN ran the story of the housing estate in Rochadale that had only a single adult actually working for a living!!!

I see the 'people haters' are filled with their usual bile, 'me first' and 'everyone who doesn't work (irrespective of their circumstances) is a scrounger' mentality... so why aren't you working, you dole jockeys?

And if someone is daft enough to employ you - dubious, at least - does the boss know you are wasting his/her time an money cruising(!) the web?

Personally, I'm on holiday until Wednesday.

I'm just awaiting the usual procession of sound bites from the respective MP's for these areas - and then won't put forward any solutions to this whole mess.

"influential Think Tank, Centre for Cities."
its funny how any old think tank has their findings reproduced without any analysis of their methodology.
Think tanks arent independent, they get funding from somewhere and tend to reflect the political bias of its backers and staff

Well, instead of leeching of us taxpayers TRY GETTING A JOB!

There are plenty out there, mainly menial (warehouses, junk food pushers, etc), but they do exist.

There are people who are genuinely needy, and those we need to support as well as we can, but lets be honest - just how many of those do we see in the pub moaning about things during the working day? As opposed to those who did sod all at school and now think the world owes them a living?

There are those who think they're entitled to sit at home watching Jeremy Kyle until it's time to shove their buggyful of benefits to the local for some alcopops, ciggies and crisps, and they need cattle-prodding into usefulness.

Ironically, these are the same people who tend to whinge about immigrants, blissfully unaware that the reason we need them is they won't get off their lazy backsides to do the same jobs themselves. Although to be honest, I think I rather prefer the polite Poles over the surly tattooed landwhale chavs...

People in half decent jobs don't want competition from millions on the scrapheap but I guess they'll always require someone to feel superior to.
This vast underclass is the product of an extraordinarily cruel me me me society which appears to be headed by the meanest most heartless and undeserving.
Don't forget they only gave us the welfare state after two world wars.

A subtle way of reducing SERIAL SPONGERS from overseas methinks. GOOD EFFORT !! At last waking up to it.

Why are people acting so surprised,Manchester and it,s surrounds are the dole and welfare capital of the country.They have been the recipitants of huge amounts of Labour benefits over the years and finally the chickens have come home to roost and long may it continue say I .Three cheers!!!

Labour still at it. Thirteen years of Government & it's still everyone elses fault but theirs.

I used to work for the DSS and astonished the first time I had to deal with a woman who had left school at 15 (pregnant of course) and had another kid every 2 or 3 years (by several different fathers) until she ran out of eggs in her early 40's. She then waltzed into the job centre (she had just got out of bed) and demanded a £28,000 p.a. sales job because the DSS told her she now had to look for work. I had 15 minutes of verbal abuse and treated like dog-t*rd until my supervisor told me to sign her off and let her go on her way.

Vast majority of these lifelong spongers have no intention of working and will try every trick in the book to maintain the 'shameless' status quo of their slovenly lifestyles. The only downside to this is they breed like rabbits to maintain their benefit culture life, and their offspring do exactly the same because they don't know any different.

It's funny how many people have jumped onto the 'I hate benefits' claimants bandwagon, however if any of those had taken the trouble to read the report they would have noticed that by far & away (over 50%) of benefits were down to the unrealistically generous & largely unfunded pensions given to public sector employees.

The baby boomer generation has wrecked this country, from a time when there was almost full employment, they went on strike until most manufacturing was destroyed, they ran up huge defecits as a result so bad the IMF had to bail them out & they passed those debts onto the next generation. Now that we are having problems they say that we should not leave debts for their grandchildren! The cheek of it! My generation had to pay for WWII so why are we being expected to pay for everything? Why can't we leave debts for the next generation like our parents did for us?

If we have to cut anything perhaps we should look to cut the over generous pensions which were never problerly contributed to, no one will starve but the ones who have benefitted most from the countries calamaties will suffer a little along with the rest of us.

After all they caused it!

I agree to all these cuts...because I am sick of working to watch people create more kids and get paid more money than me to chain smoke and drink cans....But dont the libs think there going to far? With all the job cuts there will be no jobs to make the suckers work.....
I think as soon as the next election come we will be back to lazy labour country...and high tax for teenagers to pro create on the expence of me and my daughter!!

the lazy bone idle work shy benefit spongers need a kick up the arse and forced back in to work. why should the working tax payer have to support there life style choice. the main problem being some times they would be better off on benefits rent paid and so on, of which this problem should be addressed. there are jobs out there that the foreign workers seem to be happy to do whilst our own are reluctant to even consider and would rather have the giro. on the last occasion i was made redundant i could not afford to run a car never mind have sky tv and all the rest, so some thing is wrong with the system where it pays you to stay at home comfortably and not look for ways to improve yourself, even voluntary work is better than stewing at home and could open doors to new careers.

We all need a reality check in britain,we need to stop people comming to britain getting free medical help and free legal aid to fight deportation etc then maybe we will save millions each year,And stop east europeans just walking into jobs that british people can do.(force the lazy sods off benefits).

Good. Let's get some of the work shy scum bags out working.

13 years of labour vote buying has lead us to the state we are in.

The scroungers need to be told that the gravy train has come off the rails. I for one say 'Hoorah'

The vast majority of benefit takers I know are winging it. It robbery.

i was run over in 2003 my life never been the same i want to work but some days i cant even dress myself and jobs see me as a risk coz somedays i cant show up for work as i cant move so where does this leave me and i dont want your pitty just i cant afford to live now so where does that leave me

Can anyone explain to me why I should pay taxs towards benefits to someone who has never worked?If you put nothing in you get nothing out.I work hard for just above minimum wage . I dont want to subsidise.
1.Teen mothers
2.People who have never worked since leaving school
3.People who will not work for minimum wage

I'd like to pose a question to the people here having a go a various benefits claimants.

Is it worse to be a single mum with a child or a man running a corner shop with an unrealistically low customer base with a non working wife and 10+ children? Of course he is 'working' but not earning enough to support himself let alone his family, and yet the government pays him even more because prima facie he is working!

There are plenty of people in positions like this although we might not always realise who they are.

The World According to Archie Bald:

And lo! All that Bad was the Tories fault!

And yea, after many years in the Wilderness did Labour come to power, all that they did bad was verily the Tories fault!

And anyone who argueth that Labour were not Glorious and True were most Assuredly Tory for cannot it be there must be but TWO parties? Forsooth, must not one who disagrees with both upon most things be of one body or the other? Those who disagree with The One True Way must be Tory, for what other path can there be?

And yea did the many who had capacity of thought did much rolleth of the eyes, and handled such infantile attitudes with the sarcasm it verily required, such be the wage of grossest and most foolish tribalism!

Chris mancs, surely your compo payments not already spent? That is if you are as bad as you say.From the sound of things your disabillity benifits already been cut.WHY MAKE UP A STORY TO MAKE A POINTLESS POINT? Archie Bald sorry we cant all be born or live in your lovely poor socialist town of Didsbury where most dont work any more because after a few years pretending to work you are now siting back and trying to mock those who are paying for your early retirement and public sector pension.The lady made a statement and as usual your type who think they are better decided to be nasty not witty,cos your a halfwit moron.
To many have benefitted under Labour without contributing and the only reason they did not work was because the public sector did not want to deal with that type so it was decided to just pay them, well we cant pay them anymore and many do not deserve what they get which as the lady halfwit archie bald tried to mock said is more than many working families.

its all ok saying workshy will have to go to work etc,etc.But most unskilled jobs at the moment are taken by foreign workers. i am talking from experience after working since leaving school being made redundant and having to work at these places for agencys on nmw.Even if you put into the pot i.e.ntional ins. and tax ,when youre in need its any excuse to knock you back.Taking from people and forcing them into jobs that arent there will only lead to one thing,even more abhorrent crimes than we see now.

I have always had sympathy for those who want to work and can't because of health reasons and those who want a job and cant find one. But there are too many who have claimed benefits for years with no intention of working and for them I have no sympathy and feel only contempt. Maybe they should now be made to work in the community or risk losing their benefits, for those of you thrown on the scrapheap through no fault of your own I feel for you I have been there myself. As for these young scroats and chav's I say its time to bring back conscription.

Considering Manchester and Wigan councils have the 2 largest populations in Greater Manchester they are therefore more likely to have a higher number of unemployed people compared with smaller areas such Bury not being as effected on the whole. People just have to use their brains and look at the figures to see which areas are getting the most cuts and then logically think why. Higher population - more people claiming welfare = more cuts.