to like this UKIP idea of a tax break of £13,000 to help stay at home mums?

[Belladonna666]

I know it probably won't go down well on Mumsnet, but I actually think this is a good idea being suggested by UKIP.

www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/ukip/9949657/Ukip-courts-Tories-with-13000-tax-break-for-stay-home-mothers.html

I know some people think its 'unfair' that dual earners just under the threshold get to keep CB. But personally I don't begrudge dual earners because CB would hardly make a dent in childcare costs, which for many families is as big or bigger than their mortgage payments, and is something SAHP families don't have to worry about.

The only response I've had to that on other threads is 'well some people get free childcare from relatives'. Well- quite, but you cannot base policies on the basis of what families choose to do for eachother. I know people who've been gifted house deposits by their parents.. It doesn't make it unfair for those who don't.

The govt is good at promising things and never doing them. I'll believe in a referendum, when I'm standing in a ballot box!

I'd prefer the tax allowance of the stay at home parent to be temporarily transferable. But UKIP are a bunch of racist disablist toerags.

The only thing I have to say about the article is it has innately sexist language in it. Mrs Perrins talks about Stay at home mums, not stay at home parents or dads, and falls into the age old trap of assuming that childcare is solely mothers responsibility. The headline also assumes that men never take responsibility for being the main carer. Until the press and politicians start talking about "parents" instead of "mothers" society's assumptions will not change. If they wrote articles about people running businesses and spoke solely of "businessmen", "the men calling the shots" and "the chaps at the top" they would be rightly called for gender exclusive language.

Are abused women always SAHM's though? I have access to my own money but I guess if you werent working you wouldnt.

It was something that I brought up on a previous thread really about keeping your independence. With the high divorce rates and rates for couples just living together rising personally I wouldnt have felt comfortable with totally relying on another person forever. Its a very long time.....

But janey, equally it's wrong to assume that they have huge child care costs. Where I live, my dd got free full time nursery in the term where she turned 4. if I was working, that would have saved me lots of money.

And when I was working my mum gave me free childcare.

My friends who are wohp rely on a mixture of nursery and family. For some people childcare is eye wateringly expensive and I don't begrudge them the help with paying for it, but for an awful lot of people, it isn't.

And seriously... UKIP.... Really... Actually laughing out loud! Sorry...

I would imagine totally free state childcare which ties in with working times is pretty rare karma- you were lucky.
I totally understand where you're coming from, but the fact
That some families get a freebie isn't a reason to base policies on. You can't legislate for that. A family member who provides childcare for nothing is effectively gifting their time, just as a parent who pays a house deposit or pays for a holiday for their adult children is gifting something. It doesn't make it unfair that other people don't get it. It has to be seen as a bonus.

maisie when cb was introduced not many women with children worked no, if they did they also didn't get paid even vaguely as much as men.

Making it difficult (making the woman have many children, so childcare becomes too expensive) or outright forbidding victims of dv to work does seem quite common IME, but I'm no expert!

I certainly regularly see posts on MN from sahm whose partners are high earners but financially abuse them.

karma was your daughter's full time place 8am -6pm, 52 weeks per year? You are very lucky having our mum close, but my mother also works FT so that wasn't an option for me. I don't support this either, main,y because I am not married and I don't think that marriage should be a condition of benefits or tax allowances.

By full time, I mean a full school day, so parents would still have had to pay for breakfast/after school club.

Ps those dual income families who use grandma as free childminder could always gift their CB to her as a gesture. It would come under expenses as it would be nowhere near the real cost of childcare but would at least be a gesture...

I agree that marriage shouldn't be a condition of benefits/tax allowances.

I wish I knew these people who get family to help out with child care. The people using our old childminder and nusery didnt have any such options.

There is a 1 year waiting list for our previous nursery and its a growing market.

I sort of do rely on a few people as in if I am stuck at work I ask another parent to do a pick up etc but during the last xx years it was nursery and childcare 100%.

We had our children late in life and of course your parents are so much older. My DH is over 80. DH's parents have a great life, very fit and active and have a fab time (but are living 300 miles away!). We have ocasionally used them them when DH and I wanted a short break on our own but sadly had to also pay the childminder as well to keep the place open! And of course they had to travel 300 miles to come and stay (and raid our drinks cabinet!)

Nah [bugrin]

Seriously, at the time my mum wouldn't take any money from me. I had the opportunity to go back to work and my mum couldn't push me out the door fast enough. I didn't take the piss though and and in our family we all help out when needed.

I had my first child when I was 23, so my mum was young and fit and able to help me. She wouldn't be able to do it now (and I wouldn't ask). I only had one child back then and that's much easier for parents to help out with than the 4 i have now.

All our close family lives 2hrs away (we moved for work) and work full-time...

I don't think that's an unusual situation. People work as late as possible, and the economy is shit.

Unfortunately that means I have to be a SAHP as we can't afford the childcare.

I don't think I should get a tax break because of that though. It would make it even harder to go back to work, because not only would I have to earn enough (+the little bit 'left' from DHs wage) to cover childcare, but also to cover what we lost in tax break for having a SAHP.

I guess what I am saying is please keep some independence. I have a close relation who was a victim of DV.

She was very very silly tbh, she had a full time role but her partner didnt like her doing it, he claimed she wasnt showing him enough attention. So she gave it up and it went from there...She would constantly lie about what was happening.

It only finished because he decided he didnt want a doormat (his words!). She would never had had the confidence to leave....

Perhaps if she had worked in the real world (and not his world!) this would never have happened.

Karma I hope you realise how fortunate you were having a young healthy parent who didn't have her own work commitments and was happy to do what was in effect, give you a massive amount of money (because free childcare is really the equivalent of a relative paying your nursery bill)
It really isn't like that for many people.
Like Maisie says, many peoples parents are old, infirm or dead. If they are younger they are likely to be working. Or they live too far away. Or they just want a life that doesn't revolve around the committment of childcare. And as maisie also points out, the reality of childcare costs isnt just the (huge) daily fee, it's the fact you have to pay 51 weeks a year for nursery (just because you get annual leave doesn't mean the nursery bill is cancelled). And childminders usually charge a retainer for time out (eg maternity leave for baby number 2)

Having in effect been given a huge amount of money by your mother (which was the case as you earned and didn't pay any of it in childcare) it's even harder to see how you begrudge other families CB

I don't begrudge anyone cb - I think it should have remained a universal payment.

I do appreciate my mum, and as I said, when she has needed it, I have helped her out too. She was able to do this for me because at that point in time she was a sahp herself (I have much younger siblings). Her sah status enabled me to return to work (and pay tax) when my baby was too young for me to have considered leaving him in a nursery.

Sorry, I meant my DM is over 80 (not DH!!).

Well I'm glad you don't begrudge it. I too wish it could
Remain universal. We have lost it, but our children are older and just need before/after school and holiday care now so it's a picnic compared with nursery fees.I would obviously prefer to still get it, but given the economic mess I can see cuts need to be made, and tailing it off at the HR tax level is a reasonable way to do it.

It's UKIP. They could promise me a lifetime of wine and kittens for free and I still would never vote for these racist, disabilist twats.

They make my blood boil.

'Well, once upon a time every individual, working or not had a personal allowance they could transfer to their spouse when they weren't working or didn't earn enough to claim the full allowance.'

Exactly Hollyberrybush, I remember this too when I was first married. It was one of the early Thatcher administrations that abolished this and brought in independent taxation.
I think marriage provides stability to kids' lives and society's structure and see no harm in incentivising it (for gay and straight) rather than undermining it, through the tax system.

Child benefit was to give some protection/financial stability to SAHMs whos husbands pissed their wages up the wall on a friday night! that and the ones that just with held the money. The idea was to ensure children were able to be fed.