Welcome to our online discussion with Tory leader David Cameron, his first outing since the birth of his third child, Arthur. Because of the volume of questions received and anticipated, we’ll be moderating the questions so they won’t necessarily appear as you post them but please do keep them coming in over the course of the next hour or so. David promises to get to as many as he can.

Many thanks and enjoy.

Mumsnet HQ

What would you do to help us single mums that are royally screwed over by absent dads and the CSA? Would you reform the CSA or scrap it and do something different?
A lot of women are left to struggle on their own without any help and the CSA is worse than useless.

Spursmum,

The system at the moment is clearly in a mess. Like all MPs I deal with lots of cases in my surgeries – some of them are heartbreaking. A third of a million cases haven’t been processed, and the CSA’s enforcement unit actually costs more to run than it recovers! So I support the Government’s announcement of a review of the whole thing – it’s just a great pity that it’s taken so long for them to get here.
The fundamental principle is this: wherever possible, children should be supported financially by both parents. Whatever now happens, we shouldn’t lose sight of that.

We have made various suggestions. For example parents at the moment deal with a new member of staff each time they contact the Agency, and we think a new system must allow a designated caseworker to establish continuity of contact with both parents. We also think the various functions of the CSA should be looked at separately, to see if some of this work could be carried out better by others.

For the sake of all parents who are dealing with the CSA – those currently receiving payments and those who aren’t – we need to end this period of uncertainty and anxiety as quickly as possible. We are ready to work with the Government if their latest review comes up with a clear, simple and effective system.

David: have your children had the MMR vaccine? Will Arthur have it, or single jabs? And is it still Tory policy to offer single vaccines on the NHS?

mommie,

Yes, my children have had all the jabs necessary. My daughter Nancy and my first son Ivan have both had the MMR jab and Arthur will have it too.

We’ve suggested ways to improve the whole process of approving vaccines, to make it more open and to increase public confidence. Where parents insist that their children won’t have the MMR vaccine, it’s wrong for the Government to rule out completely the possibility of giving them a single vaccine on the NHS - especially if vaccination rates continue to fall.

What plans do you have with regards to bringing home our troops from countries we invaded (wrongly in my opinion, but thats by the by) and putting the money into something more useful such as the nhs / dentists / development of green energy resources (gas and electric going through the roof, wind power is cheaper after the initial investment but hardly used).

Congratulations on your new baby David. But I wonder how much you have thought about what effect becoming prime minister would have on your family, and especially on your wife. After seeing what the media have done to Cherie, how could you inflict it on Samantha?

This is a really difficult one. Obviously Sam and I talked about it a lot before I stood for the leadership. I think that you can combine a high profile career with a family life. In the last fornight I have been able to help out at home, for example.

All the time it means trying to strike the right balance between work and family life and also trying to let people see what you are on about without giving up all your privacy.

Mr. Cameron-

What will you do to give families tax incentives to stay together?

At the moment people who live apart get higher tax free allowances detering families from staying together when they otherwise would.

DEAR KELLEEN

This is an important point. Parts of the tax and benefit system seem to send a message that it is better to live apart than stay together. I have set up a policy review to make sure that the tax and benefit system encourage people to come together and stay together. We will announce our conclusions next year.

Congratulations on the arrival of young Arthur David. Tell us The Truth now: who gets up at night, and if you are doing your share does it mean Tony Blair will have an edge over you at last?

To cheeky monkey.....

I am helping at night, but Sam is being very generous and letting me have lots of sleep if I have a busy day coming up. So far the little one is being pretty good -feeding every three hours and sleeping quite well. Better make sure I have a good night sleep before PM questions.... (Sam might say "sounds like a good excuse..."

David

Message withdrawn

Dear cod.

Haven't really listened to Abba for a while.... Could be Dancing Queen, Fernando or I suppose the Winner takes it all.

David

disposables or reusables?

I am afraid that it is disposables ... we have three children in nappies and so it would be a big move. We have been sent some reusables and so maybe we will give it a try..

David

Life with a child with SN must be hard. In addition, your wife has a high profile job as indeed you do, what childcare arrangements do you have in place and what made you choose the type of childcare you did? How do you juggle all the balls?

A tax break for those of us employing nannies would be nice - a refund of a portion of their national insurance and PAYE would be very helpful

Provision for children with special needs in the UK is patchy at best, appalling at worst. What would the Tories do to improve matters if they were elected?

Dear Soapbox -
Our son Ivan is profoundly disabled and needs round the clock care. Social services provide for some of his care at night – and we employ carers ourselves. It is not nearly as tough for us as it is for some others because we are able to afford extra help – and we have very supportive families as well.

The issue of childcare is a really important one. I see it in my own constituency, where the costs of childcare for working Mums is a vital issue.

We want to support women who want to work - or who must work. That means three things.

First, affordable childcare should be available to all.
As part of that, we are committed to retaining Sure Start. We are not planning to close it down. But we do have concerns about the way SureStart is developing. One of the most attractive feature of the SureStart scheme and the new children’s centres when they began was that both were embedded in the local community, run by those who had campaigned to bring the new project to their area. But as the initial SureStart scheme is being broadened out across the country, and new children’s centres are created, control is increasingly been handed over to local authority bureaucracies and real community involvement is diminishing.

So we support SureStart and children’s centres. But we want them to develop in the spirit in which they began by involving local families closely in the management and operation of their centres. And we do not want the Government rigging the childcare market against those private, voluntary and independent providers operating outside the SureStart umbrella.
Second, as any parent knows, childcare must be flexible. We want to allow and encourage the informal, private and voluntary sectors to play a larger role in raising the life chances of children.

Finally, to address the issue of childcare, we must address a much more broad range of issues - like equal pay, flexible working hours, maternity and paternity leave. So we are today asking our Social Justice Policy Group, as part of its work, to conduct a review of childcare policy.

David

Dear David

Will you do anything to promote part-time working for higher-qualified women? I know so many women who have valuable qualifications and experience - lawyers, PR, medics, businesswomen etc. They do not want to abandon their children to full-time childcare, but can't find part-time work. There seems no easy way of finding out what firms will taken on part-timers (as opposed to firms allowing existing workers to return part-time). The country is missing out on a large resource. The only part-time jobs advertised are for things like cleaners, teaching assistants etc - important jobs but not right for everyone.

Dear Meysey

You are right that businesses are missing out here. If women with high qulaifications choose to give up work altogether because firms don't offer flexibility then it is the companies that miss out as well.

One issue that can be looked at is the right of women to ask for flexibility. In all cases - like this one - we have to balance new rights for employers with the costs for employers, including small businesses

David

Follwing on from Cod's insightful music question - Arctic Monkeys or Coldplay?

Dear Willow

Bought the Artic Mon keys - quite like, but am still a cold play fan.

David

David

Congratulations on the birth of Arthur.
I am a highly qualified, well paid worker in IT, but after deducting the cost of me working, childcare, tax & travel expenses I only take home £30 a day (yes I do know that there are people worse off) and at the moment that £30 is essential. If there were some decent tax breaks on childcare it might feel worthwhile. All my male colleagues (only 1 female colleage also a mother and on a similar take-home) say that they wouldn't bother getting out of bed for my salary.
Alternatively if my husband received a tax break to enable me to stay at home that would be a viable option.
What are your thoughts on this scenario?

Dear Debbie

I compeletly understand your situation. My wife and so many of our friends have this debate with themselves all the time. It does seem unfair that all the child care costs have to be paid out of taxed income. My policy review is looking at this issue very carefully. There are lots of different waYS OF TRYING TO GET THIS RIGHT - TRANSFERABLE TAx allowances, tax relief on childcare or a reform of the tax credit system, which is too complex and bureaucratic.

David