Could have been a good system, but the way it was decided who should get EMA was ridiculous. I know so many people my age who are in quite well off families but generally have to pay for things themselves anyway. There are also on the other hand kids I know who were on EMA that had jobs on top of EMA and I found that the kids who got EMA were not even spending it on things that they apparently needed. Too many people I heard saying things like “Yay, EMA has arrived, now I can buy that DVD/game/alcohol/other non essential things.” Even the conditions for getting it were soooo often avoided. I knew countless poeple who would forge teachers signatures, or get another teacher to sign it, get a friend to sign it, to prove they were going to lessons even though they clearly were not. Also the whole single parent thing giving you EMA is outrageous as well. The fact that being cared for by a single parent comes under the conditions for EMA just gives off even more negative vibes about single parents not being capable of supporting children. Obviously there are exceptions to all my points and I’ll bet their were a fair few people that needed EMA but nowhere near the majority. In my opinion it could not possibly work because there are just too many things to take into account. Do the persons parents help them out?, do they have a job?, do the majority even spend it properly? (No), Have they really met the conditions? Bad idea, and bad ways to calculate who deserves it. Like many people here have been saying, we do need cuts, but having people stuggling through cuts whilst handing out free money to a majority of kids who spend that money on things that other people can’t bloody afford is just stupid. Glad its gone
