THE welfare state and misconceptions about benefits claimants forced their way to the top of the agenda at a hustings event in Poole yesterday.

Around 50 people, many of them residents with learning difficulties, attended the question and answer session at the Salvation Army Hall, which had been organised by disability charity Mencap.

The panel, made up of parliamentary candidates and local Borough of Poole candidates, was asked a series of questions. One of them was how people with learning difficulties – who needed benefits to survive – could claim without having to feel they were ‘scroungers?’

Vikki Slade, Lib Dem candidate for the Mid Dorset & North Poole parliamentary ward, replied: “Everyone needs to be treated with dignity and respect – people who need benefits need benefits for lots of different reasons, there is only a tiny, tiny number of people claiming benefits that are so-called ‘scroungers.’”

Meanwhile, Green Party parliamentary candidate for the Poole constituency, Adrian John Oliver, said: “I think the government has a key role in setting the culture in our society.

“A good starting point would be compulsory equality and diversity education in our schools.”

Richard Turner, UKIP parliamentary candidate for Mid-Dorset & North Poole, described the welfare state as one of the best things about the United Kingdom.

“We’re all going to need it at some point,” he added. “What is does for a lot of people is it gives them independence. But it is important to make sure those people who use the welfare state do need it.”

Andy Ross, the Conservative candidate hoping to win Borough of Poole’s Poole Town ward seat at the local elections, hailed benefits as a “right in our society.” He added: “Those who need them will get them, should get them. That said, we have to be sure we don’t waste public money.”

Labour Parliamentary candidate Helen Rosser, who is campaigning for the Poole seat, said she personally knows many people who rely on benefits.

“Within the media we have this myth that so many people are benefit scroungers,” she told the crowd. “It is a culture through the media that we look at that very small minority of people who abuse benefits. There is a reason why benefits are in place, they are needed by some of the most vulnerable people in this country and are extremely important."