To think we're deluding ourselves over childcare?

[aliteralAIBUforonce]

I have a child who goes to nursery one day a week. I am very lucky that I can go part time and family have the rest of the time.

He's been doing this since he was 11 months and I hate it. He doesn't dislike it but he doesn't look forward to it either. A couple of times o have dropped him off then had to duck back into the cloak room and I've seen him looking rather lost and alone at the breakfast table. Breaks my heart.

A few times when I've been out and about I've seen staff from nurseries taking groups of kids out. They never, ever engage with the kids. Just each other. Bloody joyless experience by the looks of it. Those are the better ones too.

AIBU to think that we're going to see an epidemic of adolescent mental health problems is the next few years?

This is a shit was to bring up our kids.

Why are people so defensive? I have no idea whether childcare is benefitting or disadvantaging my child. Only hindsight will tell. Maybe he would be better with more or less or none how do I know? I can only try my best to decide. If I have to work and have to use childcare then part of that decision is taken from me.

@mbosnz

Personal and collective responsibility are not mutual exclusive; both are essential for a functioning society.

The logical extreme of the former is anarchy and of the latter, an oppressive form of socialism.

Our children are all our own responsibility but we are members of society and pay taxes to a state which is supposed to make a decent standard of live possible. It is of course up to ourselves to live that life but we need decent infrastructure and services to be available.

I am in a situation where decent services are not. They should be.

I'm a bit involved with local politics and the state of education is something I think I'm going to make myself more involved in.

Pushing the state into ensuring that those services are available, is fulfilling my personal responsibility to my child. The state is not an alien entity from above- it is ours and we can expect it to dam well work.

Actually they have a history of not inspecting previously Outstanding providers. That needs to change if it hasn't already.

Yes this needs to be addressed. My DD’s nursery was last inspected by ofsted in 2013 and because it was rated outstanding they haven’t been back since. A lot can change in 6 years! I didn’t base my decision to send her there on the ofsted report in any way but if other parents are then they could be placing reliance on information that’s woefully out of date.

If you think decent services means a 1:2 ratio, and that this is in any way achievable, then I think you're in for a bit of a disappointment.

I'd also be interested to know whether others in your area are as dissatisfied with what is available, because this is one subjective opinion about how poor the pickings are where you are.

Again - you are talking about a country in which the police, the schools, the infrastructure, the health system, are chronically underfunded, have been for over a decade, and are creaking at the seams. A country in which they're mooting the pension age going up to 76.

Do you think you are just a smidgeon unrealistic about what the state can afford to provide in terms of subsidising ECE for children, as to what you think it should?

If you want a 1:2 ratio - well, you're talking about a nanny per child, effectively - to be state funded? I think that's a level of parental preference that a parent really ought to be prepared to put their hand into their own pocket for.

Mbosnz agree.

If the OP really is ‘a little bit involved’ in local politics (which I doubt, as many of her claims sound implausible) then she’s woefully out of touch with reality.

If the OP is genuine (and I still think she’s probably just a shit stirrer) but IF she is then I think all she’s done is highlight her own specific childcare problem (which largely seems to be that she uses relatives for care and puts her child into nursery once a week, which is not enough for most little people to settle - a week is an awfully long time for a young child between sessions.) She certainly isn’t a spokesperson for all parents however much she wants to be

@mbosnz

All opinions on here are subjective.

I don't think that 1:2 is so absurd. Childcare under two is not subsided by the state. If it were even a bit, this could go along way to achieving this. Maternity leave generally ends at 12 months or less. State subsidy for childcare does not kick in to age three. Why the gap? It's essentially a tax on having children.

A better ratio may also make childcare a more attractive job and therefore reduce staff turnover.

Why do we always give up so easily in this country?

Absolutely, however you have been making rather sweeping and dogmatic generalisations about childcare as a whole, based on your subjective and limited experience and observations of it in your area.

You don't think 1:2 is so absurd? Do you think how underresourced the police are now, and how serious a crime has to be to elicit investigation, let alone prosecution and conviction is absurd?

How about how underfunded the NHS is? How poorly hospitals are maintained, how many drugs and treatments freely available elsewhere, but not available here are? How many patients a GP may have on its roll, how many patients a nurse may be seeing to on a shift, how many hours in a shift a doctor may do?

How about the ratios at school? If you think the ratios at ECE are absurd, how about 1 teacher with 30+ students, how many with special needs, and behavioural issues? About schools not being able to teach specialist subjects because the schools are haemorrhaging these to other countries? Having to cut TA's for SEN pupils, because of chronic underfunding?

How about the mooted pension age rise NOW to 70?

It's not a tax on having children - it's an expectation that parents will have, to some extent to fund their own children and childcare preferences.

Yes, we pay our taxes. Those taxes have to cover an awfully big stretch of the entire populations growing wants and needs.

Raise taxes?

Hmmm. In the current climate, this country is haemorrhaging businesses, as they look to set up elsewhere, where it is cheaper, both in terms of taxes and in labour, and where there is political certainty.

The cost of living is going to go up, not down, certainly in the short term.

They're not going to punitively tax the very wealthy - that's them and their mates. That leaves the people earning the moderately big bucks - some of them we can't afford to lose, but they can go anywhere - those doctors and surgeons for example. Or the middling bucks - that'd be people like the nurses and teachers. Also a shortage, also can very easily go elsewhere. I'm buggered if the people on the very low wage can be bled any further, they can barely make a choice between rent and food as it is.

Sorry for the novel.

Short version.

Yes. Yes, I think your 2:1 ratio is perhaps a touch unrealistic.

How on earth do you conclude that having to pay some childcare costs is ‘a tax on having children* ? And as for ‘why the gap’ ... are you not aware that the free hours from age 3 is a relatively recent thing and that prior to that, we used to pay full fees, often from when the child was a few months old until they started school?

Honestly OP you come across as a mix of naivety and entitlement. It’s like because you've had a child, you think you’re the spokesperson for parents across the U.K. You also seem resentful because the care you have made for your child is unsatisfactory so you have some bizarre idea that you should be given free childcare with a 1:2 ratio.

As for the increase in mental health issues ... as pp have pointed out, these are diagnosed far more frequently now, but that doesn’t mean they didn’t exist in yesteryear.

As an education practitioner, I do actually think there is a genuine increase in some mental health issue among adolescents, but this seems to be related hugely to social media and the pressures and bullying around that. There is also a massive link between mental health issues and drug abuse. Sadly in my work I’ve come across many adolescents who have these issues and there is no pattern with whether they’ve been to nursery. Patterns tend to be far more around family breakdown, lack of positive Male role models. Plus the pressure of social media and also addiction to computer games and other ‘screen’activiites which can sadly replace real life positive interaction.

You forget that regulated childcare has been around a while now... my kids are all adults. You’d be hard pushed to tell which of their peers were in childcare and which weren’t.

It’s clear that your own experience of using childcare is not satisfactory - and tbh if I was using relatives as childminders and nursery once a week I wouldn’t find it satisfactory either. You simply cannot extrapolate from that, that ‘we’re all deluding ourselves’ about childcare. You seem to want to believe that to fit your own agenda

It’s not the responsibility of the state to pay for your DC’s to be provided with good quality childcare. It’s the responsibility of the parents.

As I understand it - the 12 months maternity leave is for the benefit of the child. Then, some ECE has been proven to be beneficial for children from the age of 3 years , and it's a way to even up the playing field for underprivileged children.

It's not about facilitating the parents career or coffee mornings.

@mbosnz

The over threes funding is available to all where I am at least. It is not just given to underprivileged children.

Yes, I am well aware of the strains on the public sector budget. It is horrendous in some areas. However, some things are worth spending money on- both morally and fiscally. There was some evidence that Sure Start for example could actually save the state money in the longer term- through improved educational attainment and better health outcomes. Everything is short-termist now.

As you say, the current climate is harsh and likely to get tougher. That means we must invest in our children even more. This needs to start from day one- it's not my field but doesn't the biggest proportion if not most brain development occur prior to age five? And we have an attainment gap between better and less well off kids at that age before they even start school. That is horrendous.

It's all very well talking about personal responsibility but the pragmatic, utilitarian view requires that the state assist in these matters. Doesn't matter if it's 'right' or not in your view, it's what works and what we need.

What about parents who choose to have more than two children?

Their 2:1 ratio is stuffed at weekends, the mornings, the evenings and during working hours (assuming at least one of the parents works )

Poor children, condemned to poor quality parental care and mental health problems for having more than one sibling

I think you're misunderstanding me.

I agree that the state should subsidise childcare - particularly in the case of children who are in situations of crisis or deprivation.

I also think that the amount that the state can and should subsidise childcare in, is, and should be, balanced up with the competing wants and needs that are making demands on the public purse.

I do not think that childcare ratios of 1:2 are in any way realistic in the current economic climate, given the serious underfunding of other higher priority needs. If a parent wants that, then I suggest they need to fund it themselves. If they can't, then they're going to need to lower their expectations, or adjust to what is being provided, or what can be realistically provided.

That, I would argue, is the pragmatic, utilitarian and may I say, realistic, view.

I'm not misunderstanding you at all- a top up on what parents already pay could make all the difference. Particular if coupled with more and better trained staff.

But no, this country can't think beyond the next few months these days.

Sadly, it's probably only going to get worse as Brexit bites. It's hurting social care recruitment already.

@aliteralAIBUforonce you haven’t actually engaged with any of the valid points which posters have made which question the views you’ve expounded.

Honestly you need to look outside your own little bubble. It’s blatantly obvious that you have your own personal axe to grind. You work part time, you use relatives for childcare except for one day (when presumably the relatives aren’t available) when your child goes to nursery. You clearly resent having to pay for that one day of nursery (you question why there’s a ‘gap’ between the end of maternity leave and age 3) So, you seem to resent spending on care for the most precious part of your life, yet at the same time you want ratios of 2:1 in nursery!

Honestly, you’re not going to get everyone agreeing with your absurd statement that we’re all deluding ourselves because many of us have chosen our childcare very carefully, paid through the nose for it (full fees from 3 months up to school age for many of us) and our children have grown up into happy, resilient and productive adults.

Like a said, you show an astonishing mixture of naivety and entitlement.

Actually the state does subsidise childcare before the age of 2 - via the tax free childcare system! And it's pretty good to be honest, better, in my view, than the childcare vouchers (which were also subsidised by the state but not v fairly as it relied on employer getting the scheme in place in the workplace).

But no, this country can't think beyond the next few months these days.

It can't pay beyond. . .

I'm interested. What do you think should be cut from the budget to fund your dream childcare option?

Cos you can't spend the money twice.

If you are in Local Body Government, I hope like hell it's nothing to do with budgeting!

There's a big fat thing beginning with B for a start...

Okay, and now back in reality land?