Christmas on the Dole

I know that Christmas is done and over with for another year, thank the gods, but I figured that I would write about how people on JSA manage this festival of conspicuous consumption. As I don't have any children, so don't face the pressure that parents do at this time of year, I asked some of my friends to tell me how they managed over the holidays with little or no money.

For Christmas 2012, I knew that I would not be able to buy presents for anyone other than my husband, and that I would be able to spend no more than about £30 on his present. I also knew that I could not spend more than £5 a week extra on food shopping.

In the lead up to Christmas, I decided that because I had time, but no money, that I would make peoples presents. I made Christmas tree decorations for family and close friends. The materials for these cost me less than £10 and I was able to make gifts for 30 people. If I had spend the usual £5 per person, I would have spend £150 easily. I hope that the gifts I made were appreciated more than if I'd just got something in a random shop.

My husbands gift was fairly easy to sort out, he collects retro games consoles, so I just looked in places like Cash Converters and found him a PS2, some games for it, and an N64. I spend a total of £35, and was able to pay for the consoles weekly over about 6 weeks.

To manage a Christmas dinner for me and my husband, over the two months before Christmas, I spend a little extra each week to buy stuff like ingredients for mince pies, Christmas pudding, and Christmas cake, cheese, crackers, a bottle of wine etc. Instead of buying a whole turkey, I got one of those turkey joints in a foil tray that costs about £5. On Christmas day, we had a Christmas dinner, with starter, some smoked salmon that was on offer, the main course, turkey with roasted potatoes, veg and gravy, but none of the other trimmings, and desert, homemade Christmas pudding, and a couple glasses of wine. There weren't any left overs because I knew when I was preparing the food that I couldn't afford to have any waste. This was actually one of the nicest Christmas dinners I have ever had.

So far it seems that I had a wonderful Christmas, there was food, there were presents, awesome.

But what else is Christmas about?

- visiting family?
- meeting up with friends?
- going out for drinks with work colleagues?
- lights on the tree?
- being warm and safe inside when it's dark and cold outside?

We couldn't afford to visit family, and my family either live too far away or are too old to visit us, and my husbands family were invited over, but decided not to come because we don't have a TV. So neither of us saw any of our family this Christmas.

I budgeted for one night out with friends, and had £20-£30 to spend on that night, not much when you are going for drinks and dinner. So I had to turn down all but one of the invites, which is a horrible feeling. I hope that my friends that I turned down don't think I was snubbing them. I chose which night out to go on based on who asked first. The night out I did have was good fun, but I would loved to have been able to meet up with more of my friends.

Drinks with work colleagues? I wish I had some...

Lights on the tree? The only reason we had a tree this year is because a good friend of mine gave me her spare one. This is my husband and mines first year in our own place, last Christmas we were in a shared house. So we didn't have any of our own Christmas decorations other that the tree ornaments I had collected over my childhood. We decorated the tree with lights and everything, but we didn't dare waste the electricity on switching on the lights, even on Christmas day.

Warm and safe inside? Our house was cold, almost as cold as outside all through the holidays, just like it has been since winter started.

This Christmas has been a total mixture for me, brilliant because it was mine and my husbands first Christmas in our own place, and we did have a wonderful day together. But it has also been the loneliest and most depressing Christmas I have ever had. I missed seeing my friends and family, I missed the social aspects of Christmas, and the parties that usually happen around this time of year.

We managed Christmas without racking up any more debt, not many people manage that, and I think it is nearly impossible if you have children. Here are some of my friends stories....

This family have 3 children, my friend is trying to start her own business as a Doula, she has had next to no help in this from the Job Centre, her partner has severe back problems and suffers from mental health problems that make it hard for him to find a job. 

"They [the DWP] stopped my partners ESA a month before Xmas,  so all we get at the minute £75 a week between us, [two adults, one teenager and two young kids] as I get working tax credit...

Xmas...the kids ALL had second hand stuff that had been passed our way for them and we treated ourselves to a few comedy DVDs. 

We are hoping JSA will back date to end November... and as for my partner finding a job that he can physically do, let alone mentally, or even get to work in first place... 

Thanks ATOS merry fucking Xmas!! I worked 43.5 hrs in 3 days as part of my apprenticeship ... I am going to fight tooth and nail if they say I'm not allowed to be self employed! At least I've been telling them for 4 years what i was going to do and have funded training myself. 

We tried to appeal but had to be in on 28th December ... They are assholes!!!"


Another friend of mine has four children, her and her husband live on a very low income and rely on income support.

"Well, I'm not exactly on the dole, but I am poor with limited support (Low income self-employed with no top-up).

Um, well, I can't afford to buy that much so I make the majority of the presents, and this year a lot of people went without a gift because we just couldn't afford it. We bought for the kids and that's it, no immediate or extended family, no friends. Just the kids.

The dread three weeks to Christmas is the worst. You sit there with your diary, frantically trying to balance out what little available money you have. You finally think you've got it, and then you remember that a turkey alone is over twenty quid. With all the trimmings and treats, you're looking at forty quid for one meal. And, you know, I'd like to say we got a week's worth of food from that meal, but we didn't. We got one lot of bubble & squeak out of it and it was gone.

Our Christmas treats this year consisted of a box of Roses and two tubes of Pringles. That's it. I made a few mince pies but couldn't afford the luxurious, expensive ingredients to make more.

I started my Christmas shopping in October and it was still shit. Toys are so incredibly expensive and twenty quid gets you fuck all these days."

Another friend, has written this account.

"Christmas on the dole as a parent...It means that you attempt to keep Christmas as low key as possible. If you're lucky enough, like we were, to have a grandparent who is a very keen shopper when it comes to shopping, then your child might get what they have asked for from Santa. But if you are not as lucky and are on Income Support, it means that you save little bits of money through the year, maybe even buy bits that are a really good deal in January that you think your child might be in to almost a year later, and hope that November or December might be a three payment month for housing benefit or Income Support or your child is just going to end up with essential clothing because they've grown out of what you were able to get the year before. You buy everything a size larger for them from the cheapest places possible in the hopes that it will last. You only buy for your child, not for any other friends or family, and some of them will think that you're forgetting them on purpose. Christmas dinner, you might splurge on a Value chicken rather than a turkey from somewhere, and it just ends up as a standard roast dinner."


Finally, this friend has survived cancer, but still has major health issues relating to it, she has a young son and is a single parent.

"Christmas with kids on Benefits.

Every parent wants their kids to wake up Christmas morning and have big shiny eyes and see that Santa's been. How on earth do you manage that on benefits, well, to even come close is a military style operation of saving up all year, a few pounds here and there, buying at boot sales for a quid a time, spending hours on eBay waiting for a bargain, watching as time and again things slip out of your price range (max a fiver in most cases) and relying on family.

Next year i think my son will have outgrown Santa, and will know that i cant afford all the flash things he wants. yay for me. not, still want to give him a nice time, as most of the year we cant afford to do much at all, cant afford swimming or lazer quest or flash birthday parties at kidszone or whatever,just not possible, he knows these things are not available to us. Most of the time he's pretty cool about it for an 8 year old,and then I'm so proud and sad all at the same time, but not always, sometimes it hurts and frustrates him, and i get pretty tired of having to say no, no, no, no, I'm sorry, but no. I'm not a materialistic person on the whole, and i try to teach him to think similarly, but he's still just a kid, and he wants things.

I make Christmas the best I can by saving up tiny bits all year. my nan puts any two pound coins she gets through the year in a little pot, and gives them to me in early December so if there is one a bit more expensive present he wants i can still get it for him. I have learnt to become a bargain queen, buy it when its stupidly cheap and hide it and hope he still likes it by Christmas.

I'm hugely thankful for my family, my parents, brother, partner, they all make Christmas magic for him in a way i couldn't do alone. That feels very hard at times, but he's whats important, I'd rather he had things i cant provide than go without cos i feel bad and can't match up. His favourite presents this year all came from other people really, apart from the second hand game boy i found on eBay for 15 quid. shame the charger broke yesterday. Don't i feel like the best mum ever."

Christmas is a hard and lonely time of year for many people, who for various reasons are stuck outside the social norms. I hope that I never have to face another Christmas like this one.