Please or to access all these features

Add post

Watch this thread

Save thread

Start a new thread

Flip thread

Hide thread

My feed

Active Unanswered threads

Getting started FAQ's

Unanswered threads Acronyms Talk guidelines

Hide shortcut buttons

Talk

AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Flip

1 2 3 4 5

Original poster

To think that if lone parents are switched from income support to jsa

106 replies

Dontgotosleep · 11/08/2014 21:08

when their youngest child is 5, and with the lack of job opportunities, child care isn't cheap and the fear and threat of sanctions then this will just encourage women to go out and keep getting pregnant every few years to remain entitled to income support.
Please believe me this is not a debate about which is best sahm or working mums. I believe it should be a personal choice. My choice was to work. However I really don't think the government have thought this policy through.

OP posts:

DaisyFlowerChain · 12/08/2014 08:22

Just as some people will work any job to provide for themselves and their child there are others who won't as see it as beneath them or believe they should be exempt from working as they have a child/children and why work when you can benefits instead.

It's not just about a safety net once the children reach 18 but work of any kind provides lots more positives. Better outcomes for children being a huge one.

IS to age eighteen is simply laughable. It's quite surprising how many mothers manage to work after having children if people believe that having children renders a person incapable of working.

If capped to 12 months like maternity, everyone is treated equal -those that plan for the child financially and those that don't get the same period to find work once it expires. Given most threads usually have a quote of "I was working until I had the baby" then they would have had maternity pay and a job to return to anyway and should have never needed IS.

ilovesooty · 12/08/2014 08:31

Dead end jobs can be a means to an end but I think anyone lone parents or not should be able to access support and options to move beyond that if that's what they want to do. I don't think you should have fewer options because you're a lone parent but I don't think you should be supported simply to stay at home once your children are at school with no expectations that you move beyond that.

babybarrister · 12/08/2014 08:57

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

dawndonnaagain · 12/08/2014 09:44

Daisy Yet another ill thought out post that precludes help for those with disablilities. If IS is only paid until the age of one, what happens when at the age of two the child is found to be, for example autistic. Parent has to give up work to be with said child. That is why it is paid until five. It used to be longer, but that isn't the case anymore.

Having another child is NOT the easy way out.

Babyroobs · 12/08/2014 10:02

Surely the situations of lone parents is so variable though? Not all lone parents are completely without support and raising children alone. Many 'lone' parents that I know have 50:50 joint residency with the kids dad,many of the kid's dads have them every weekend and many are surrounded by a lot of support from family and friends. Obviously there are going to be some who have no support at all whom working is going to be harder for but certainly not impossible.

Original poster

Dontgotosleep · 12/08/2014 10:48

Exactly.Ramrod it does go on. That's all I meant and I got chewed up and spat out. However I wouldn't call it a disgrace, though. People do what they have to. It's called survival

OP posts:

randallsummer · 12/08/2014 10:52

The issue is childcare and costs of it.

Some government funded nurseries and/or childminders that parents pay for in relation to their wages would stop the benefits trap for many.

Our group of friends are all quite 'leaning to the left' but we do know someone who has had children in the situations the OP describes and it's always a bit of a running joke. So it does happen - not often I am sure, but it does

randallsummer · 12/08/2014 10:53

bauhausfan · 12/08/2014 11:07

I also know someone (who has never actually had a job despite having a master's degree) who deliberately has spaced her kids like this so she could stay on benefits and home educate her children. Rare but the op is not imagining these people - they do exist.

However, most women would like to work outside the home therefore it is not fair to punish the vast majority of women for the sake of a few random pisstakers.

bauhausfan · 12/08/2014 11:09

I'm not a single parent but if I were, I would at least want to work P/T just for the social aspect of it. It must be very lonely being a single parent. I am a SAHM (I do work P/T in the evenings) and some days I can hardly wait for DH to get in so he can take over with the kids and I can get a break.

MorphineDreams · 12/08/2014 12:46

LOL Mark Simmonds has quit because he can't possibly afford to live on 120k. The twonk.

fedupbutfine · 12/08/2014 13:55

Why shouldn't you do a dead end job though? What makes a lone parent so special? There are 000"s of people with or without children in dead end jobs. I prefer to refer to them as a means to an end job. Just make sure you look at the bigger picture and have a plan for the future

because despite what you might read in the Daily Mail, work (dead end job work) often doesn't actually make a lone parent better off...I have three children that need childcare and no regular support. If I worked at minimum wage, I would - on paper- have more coming in that on benefits but (and this is the crucial bit that gets missed by so many), I would also have far greater outgoings. It wouldn't add up. Had I had my children early enough in life, I can see why I might have considered having more to keep filling the gap.

fedupbutfine · 12/08/2014 14:00

lone parents on TC get 79% of childcare paid for

No, they don't. They get up to 70% of childcare paid for. Just as a family with 2 children gets ^up to* 70% of their childcare paid for. There are upper limits (which don't touch the sides when it comes to paying for childcare in London and the South East, nor when it comes to paying for outside of normal working hours childcare).

I know what you meant, but I do think it important to make sure that people don't think that there is some kind of 'single parent benefit' that all single parents, regardless of their circumstances, receive. Single parents are subject to the same means-testing as other families - they are just more likely to qualify for benefits as there can only ever be one full time wage coming into their households.

naty1 · 12/08/2014 15:38

5 seems more than reasonable.
Most mums i know went back to work at 9m.
Hopefully it doesnt encourage people to have more.
It would be great if men had to support the lone parent.
Working is expensive- tax to pay for all the people not working

BlackWings · 12/08/2014 15:46

Here's a better idea. Punish those nrp's who evade supporting their child with imprisonment. Afterall if I as a RP didn't feed my child I would be prosecuted.
If all nrp's paid child support, all rp's would be able to afford to work.

Darkesteyes · 12/08/2014 15:48

The words "up to" in information criteria seem to get missed a lot. People fall foul of this all the time. You could see a job advertised as "up to £9 an hour" apply for it and get it and then find out its minimum wage.

And there should be more effort on the part of the law to ensure the absent parent pays Child Support. Children arent Immaculate Conceptions.

DaisyFlowerChain · 12/08/2014 15:49

"Here's a better idea. Punish those nrp's who evade supporting their child with imprisonment. Afterall if I as a RP didn't feed my child I would be prosecuted."

So if a RP doesn't work and therefore not supporting the child either, would you imprison them too? Unfair if not.

If all nrp's paid child support, all rp's would be able to afford to work.

I doubt they would, many on benefits get child support and still don't work.

OHforDUCKScake · 12/08/2014 16:07

This reply has been deleted

Message deleted by MNHQ. Here's a link to our Talk Guidelines.

BlackWings · 12/08/2014 16:28

The difference is daisy, the rp is doing just that, you know, raising their dc, whilst the nrp might take them to McDonald's once a fortnight if they're lucky.
Nothing wrong with using the safety net of IS when your dc are babies or would you rather dc of LP'S were put into nursery the minute they're born?

DaisyFlowerChain · 12/08/2014 16:45

Blackwings, nobody has suggested nursery from the moment they are born. Just that all mums get the same maternity leave and therefore nobody is special or given extra. Childcare is widely available and even subsided so there is really no excuse to not work.

Darkesteyes · 12/08/2014 16:52

Im bloody glad i chose not to have children going by some of the attitudes on here.

BlackWings · 12/08/2014 17:05

Yes because work always pays, everyone is paid a living wage, rent is reasonable and childcare is affordable. Oh wait, no it's not.

Viviennemary · 12/08/2014 17:13

Everyone who is capable of work and doesn't have private means should get a job. Why should people struggling along on mininimum wage have to support them.

dawndonnaagain · 12/08/2014 17:14

Childcare is widely available and even subsided so there is really no excuse to not work.
And for those of us with children with additional needs?

Thefishewife · 12/08/2014 17:17

My brother in laws sister has just got her first job ever her youngest is 6 but her oldest is 15 I think if the new rules had not have come in she would of never worked

She is not disabled
She is not depressed
Is not uneducated

She has just qualified as a childminder her reason not to work because under the old rules she could choose not to

Flip

1 2 3 4 5

Swipe left for the next trending thread