The 2014 budget hammered claimants with a second benefit cap as the Tories sought to capitalise on the political 'success' of the first.

When the coalition introduced a £26,000 cap on a family's total benefits many in the UK rose up to congratulate them, reasoning that the 'scroungers' deserved their kicking.

Punished by years of below-inflation pay rises, the suffering working poor have been encouraged by media and government to look at the workless around them not as the biggest victims of the banking-lead recession but as the cause of their misery.

Against this background almost any policy that bashes the workless is popular, and on the surface the second cap is likely to fall into this category.

A limit on the amount individuals can receive was not seen as enough, and the new policy will see the total spending on 'non-structural' welfare limited to £119.5 billion this year.

This category does not include Jobseeker's Allowance and other out of work benefits as they vary with the state of the economy, and also excludes pensions, presumably on the grounds that older people disproportionately vote Conservative.

It does include some elements that unemployed people rely on, like housing benefit, but also tax credits to help the working poor so they can afford to stay in work.

It is this part that contains the potential seeds of the policy's downfall.

The government claims to want to 'make work pay', but reducing support to those in low paid work achieves the exact opposite.

Many do not understand that housing benefit is paid primarily to those in jobs, and a cap on its value will mean fewer and fewer will be able to afford to take entry level work in London and the south-east where rents are higher.

The coalition has encouraged the misunderstanding of benefit issues to try to focus attention on the poor and excluded rather than the real culprits, the banks and financial services companies that contribute to Tory party coffers.

Some are easier to demonise than others; the disabled and pensioners are harder, so George Osborne and Iain Duncan Smith try to make the link between the unemployed and the £200 billion welfare bill to frighten people into compliance with their line.

The reality of course is quite different: half of that money goes to pensioners, a big chunk to the disabled, and JSA only accounts for 2.7%.

Having created this misinformation, their policies have previously targeted the workless directly, with households where someone works excluded from the £26,000 cap.

The second cap spreads the misery to the working, and when they feel the pain of reduced tax credits and housing benefit payments that no longer meet the cost of their homes it must be hoped that they find common cause with their unemployed brothers and sisters who have felt the pain for longer.

At UnemployedNet we have tried to encourage the use of the term 'pre-employed' rather than 'unemployed', to recognise the fact that the majority of workless people do find work with reasonably minor delays.

Many find themselves in a cycle of 'low pay/no pay', finding entry level and temporary work sometimes but spending periods out of work.

There is in reality little difference between the two groups who face the same problems of poverty and a desire for sustainable work that pays the living wage.

Only an understanding by the low paid and workless that they are the only ones who are truly 'in this together' will improve the lot of both.