School closures: Thousands of women have just had their double shift doubled

Totally agree. I'm a single mum of 3 and was made redundant after the last round - they based it on recent performance so it was meant to be unbiased but of course what that really meant was that those of us with small children all.lost out, even if our performance had been stellar last year. However because caring responsibilities aren't a protected characteristic, there was no official discrimination, as there were plenty of child-free women who we stayed.

I think a big part of this is making caring responsibilities a protected characteristic, and acknowledging that women as a group are going to need more support, and single mums (who are disproportionately from disadvantaged groups already) in particular.

It will be a net benefit to society too, to keep women in work or help them return - increases productivity, increases tax take and reduces benefits and numbers of children growing up in poverty.

Also I just want to clarify that I don’t want schools to be open. Ours have been horrendous in covid 19 numbers, really frightening. Neither do I wish to pay to put them in another corona petri dish in the form of paid childcare by way of an alternative.

Absolutely a massive feminist issue.

I’m in the civil service - no furlough, but we had an offer of special paid leave. I took two weeks off, when it was that or have a breakdown, because working with a 2.5 year old was literally impossible. I also had oversight of my unit of 100ish people and their leave applications - we were vastly weighted towards women taking the leave. In fact I can only think of two men who did - one to take care of a sick parent, and one who had recently taken six months shared parental leave (so not reaching any men for whom flexibly looking after their kids would be a new thing).

I’m now on mat leave, I went on it a month early (back in July) because I just couldn’t cope. My DH is good, but I have the lower paid, part time, more flexible career. Whilst there is an element of choice there, the fact that I have this career and he has the higher paid, full time, inflexible career is of course partly sex-based, it would be ridiculous to suggest otherwise.

Unfortunately I can’t see an answer which is not generational - raising today’s kids and teenagers to believe that raising children is genuinely something to be shared by both parents.

A pp said that women love their children more. I’m not sure I would agree - but on the whole women are expected to (and subsequently do) sacrifice themselves for their children, in a way which is very rarely seen in men.

I am for universal homeschooling allowance , per child.

It’s also the assumption that working from home means you’re on a laptop answering calls and zooming. Lots of us have to produce stuff. We use heavy machinery and technical often hazardous materials, or we rely on being on site, or working with clients etc etc. Many self employed have already had to move/ downsize premises etc, and now the assumption is that we should do work from our kitchen while watching the kids.

So many great posts on this thread. Sad ones too - that all resonate with me and my experience. @TooExtraImmatureCheddar you summed so much of it up - the crazy juggle and the guilt no matter what you do.

So what can we do? I like the idea of a women’s strike, but don’t know if we can pull that off. How about a petition on the parliament website for starters? At least try and get this debated by MPs? We could draft the text on here. Ask something along the lines of:

1. parents be paid a home schooling allowance when their child’s school is either closed or bubble shut down - leave it open to debate as to whether that’s universal or related to income (ie so it’s targetted more at lower income families)

1. Gov sets out now what catch up provision will be available in the summer
2. Gov issues statutory guidance to employers on flexible working for parents, including a requirement to undertake an impact assessment this time next year to assess the impact corona virus has had on the sex and gender inequalities in their work place, including progression, access to career development and pay

Or indeed their tail

[quote MessAllOver]@MarshaBradyo. Completely agree. Outsource if you can. Try neighbour's teenagers, university students still at home, online babysitting and childcare sites. I've always managed to find help when I've asked around. Better than leaving young children unattended.[/quote]
I think it's important to note that indecision on the part of the government has left women with very little time to arrange additional support. It was clear prior to Christmas that rates were rising and the pressure on hospitals increasing. They missed an opportunity to make this announcement on Monday, insisting that schools would remain open. I also think the point a lot of women are making is that they're working extra hours around the kids needs. Bookending the day with work. This delaying the inevitable has happened repeatedly throughout the crisis. It's then harder to develop effective contingency plans and leaves everyone chasing their tale.

That’s ok but many , many people are self employed. Lots fell through the net of support last time, and continued to work through and juggle childcare , despite reduced earning capacity due to cancelled contracts etc. This time it won’t be contracts we’ll be losing , it’ll be our careers.

One thing I find interesting about the idea of WFH with children is how many people now think it is totally possible if you just put the effort in, but probably wouldn’t have thought that before. It’s not that they don’t realise. They do realise, but drop that realisation under pressure.

If you asked on here in pre-pandemic times “AIBU to take my kids out of school(/nursery) and homeschool because I’m WFH now? I’m sure I can still carry out a full day’s work on my laptop while I’m teaching them phonics, so my employer shouldn’t mind” you’d have been snowed under with “YABVVVU of course you can’t do that!” replies. There’s a reason that most employers didn’t allow WFH without childcare, and it’s not because they deeply cared about preserving work-life balances.

But now, even on here, it’s sneery comments about how childcare is your responsibility, or it’ll make kids less coddled and more resilient if they develop independent learning skills, or employers thinking that “it’s okay, you don’t need to work all your hours between 9 and 5” will make it doable.

Some people don’t know or care what caring for and educating children involves. But so many others do know, and yet will forget when other options become hard too. It’s as if acknowledging this work is like swimming upstream - even many of those who do it sometimes will give up on it once the currents pushing you against it get stronger.

This has to be a government led push to ensure all businesses are expected to support families who need to be at home.
Children cannot be left alone, I've been put in the position of leaving one of mine by my headteacher, awful choice - SP so job or child safety.

Furlough for childcare reasons needs to be much more publicised and expected, men included.
Flexibility, leave, weekend working. I know impossible in some cases but not all.
Women also need to expect that their employer and their partner step up.

A universal basic income would be a good starting point.

So many of the employers who have been less flexible will be men too. This pandemic has seen the same industries, such as hospitality, take the hit over and over. It is also women who will have done much of the hard, still out of the home, work too, rather than being at home.

@MarshaBradyo. Completely agree. Outsource if you can. Try neighbour's teenagers, university students still at home, online babysitting and childcare sites. I've always managed to find help when I've asked around. Better than leaving young children unattended.

If any one can put £ towards it try for temporary help. It’s too much to take on

Bunting and all the other women struggling .

I definitely experienced burnout during the first lockdown, trying to do it all. OH has loads on and was in a precarious situation, but also tended to default to sending the kids to me if there were any issues. This caused lots of rows. My youngest is a ball of energetic who won't sit in front of telly for any length of time and eldest is at a key stage and needed substantial and consistent support with her education. She was also very emotional and upset about suddenly being cut off from friends. Like many PPs I would get up early and stay up late to get work done and tried to meet their needs in between. There were many work video calls with children demanding attention or smallest crying in the background, while I tried to hold it together and focus. I found it harder and harder to concentrate as I became more tired. I don't want to do it again and I'm genuinely considering quitting.

And it’s so maddening and sad how much of the public discussion around this (when it even exists!) treats caring for and educating children as things we just make happen that don’t require any actual time, and that we should stop whinging about not being able to outsource.

The importance and cost of caring, all caring, for children, disabled friends and relatives, elderly relatives and neighbours, has been totally overlooked in this pandemic.

Parents are expected to work from home whilst homeschooling kids because caring for kids (never mind also educating them!) is not seen as work.

People were cut off from essential childcare support networks for ages because no-one in government appreciated the massive economic burden of childcare provided by informal family relations.

Bubbles to support the elderly or disabled weren't considered for ages because they don't realise how much invisible work gets done by the millions of friends, neighbours and relatives looking out for each other. Even now, a support bubble is supposed to be one person per vulnerable adult when, in my experience, families have usually coped by spreading the load across multiple people.

Don't get me started on how children and adults in residential settings have been abandoned because they're not allowed visitors, with that being seen as an "acceptable mitigant".

This invisible work has never been acknowledged for the essential role it plays in keeping society going. It mostly isn't paid work and its mostly done by women, and frequently older women at that, so it clearly can be forgotten.

I think it needs financial support and not necessarily furlough. Self employed parents (and particularly self employed who fall through the cracks of support , of which there are MANY) are going to suffer immensely due to school closures.
I feel I need some sort of not quite universal basic income to do this again. Parental basic income or something. Not joking

Another issue is, if women with children have paid time off work then who is going to pick up the slack at work? You can bet your bottom dollar it will be the other women in the office! The men will be too important to busy themselves with womens work.

I worked myself to the bone last lockdown and I've already told my manager that I'm not doing it again.

I’m feeling physically sick about it.
I keep trying to write it out but the logistics are making me feel so stressed, it’s worse seeing the impossibility of it written down in black and white.
Self employed.

Also to all women affected by this, what a shit year it's been for so many.

Another small note to make - the need for older women - grandmothers - to distance/isolate, must also be having an impact, as so much of childcare burden is borne by them. This is a conveniently invisible sector, those who will care for their family for no recompense support the economy to a shocking degree (remember the grandparents' strike in Spain?). Still lots of older women doing the school pick up where we are, endangering their own health in the process.

I’ve emailed my MSP.