Grandparents doing childcare

[letitpea]

Please read therest of my post, im really not ecpectingbthem to, bit am in a real mudddle with work. I work for the Local authority. I'm a key worker. Part time. Been off self isolating as myself and both children have had symptoms. Due back next week.

1 childs school is open. Great. Younger childs provision is not (not of a school age) Grandparents usually look after younger child. Not able to, given that they are all 70 plus with numerous health issues. Children's dad, my husband , lives with his parents. We're seperated .

Work have relaxed working hours, so I can go in pretty much any time of the day, including Saturday's. Except I can't, because I have the small child. Ex/In laws will have him if I WFH. But not if I go to the office, as the client group I work with us high risk with several having tested positive, and no PPE being provided. I understand their stance, it's in line with guidelines.

Work are saying that they are looking into WFH but IT is not currently ready. What I think they mean is they haven't bought any laptops. Some staff ARE WFH.

So, use ones of mumsnet, wtf do I do?

Does ex work? If he moved in temporarily would he be able to look after the child maybe so you can go to work

So are you saying that you absolutely cannot work from home and equally have no childcare?

The grandparents should definitely not provide childcare. They need protection from you if you are going to work in an environment where people have already been diagnosed with Covid-19. Please do not expose your parents or your ex in-laws to this virus. Why would you even contemplate it?

Under the circumstances, unless work can provide you with the resources to work from home, (so that you wfh AND keep your children with you) then I would not go to work due to lack of childcare.

I should have said, under no circs can ex move back in. There are many valid reasons for this, relating to his behaviour.

@NotEverythingIsBlackandwhite I don't want to ask them this. I can't go into the office, come home to children, then children go to them/ex. I completely agree with you. As work have saud I can't WFH and be the primary carer for children at home, my solution is that I WFH and ex looks after children at his parents. We have been isolated for 2 weeks and would remain so if I WFH. Work are saying they haven't yet "sorted the IT" to allow me to do this.

I'm just looking for ideas really as I am incredibly dressed about this. They are indicating that if I can't get into the office, I take unpaid leave

Can you volunteer to use your own laptop?

If you're a keyworker you should contact your local authority and they will help you find a childcare placement.

Yes call the council.
And tell work you cannot work until they have sorted out wfh. When there was a sniff of lockdowns, my work immediately planned for worse case scenario of everyone working from home. Public sector. My DH’s work, private sector, did the same and made everyone work from home fir a day to test the systems. Theres no excuse if it is physically possible to have workforce working from home, they should have arranged it.

There seems to be nothing in place for under school age children. I work for the Local authority. they sent me a link to a new provision for this purpose, that caters for ages 5 to 14. So useless to me.

I have volunteered my lap top, they won't allow it.

OP are there no childminders taking children of keyworkers in your area?

@LittleLittleLittle

I haven't been able to find one. I live really rurally, there are none anywhere near. The pre school I use is 10 miles away, the school is 6 miles away, not in the sane direction. I work in the nearest town which has a decent sized hospital, all of the schools and childcare in town require both parents to be key workers as they are so over subscribed (one that a colleague uses has 60% of the children still going!).

Have you asked the childcare team at the LA? Where I am they are in touch with all childminders and nurseries every day to see what children they have in and what capacity they have so they can place any requests.

The two keyworkers thing is for couples, single parents only need to be a keyworker.

OP you are a single parent as the children's father is your ex and not a member of your household, so you count on that list.

I'm not surprised the schools are so full. That keyworker list is huge and there are a lot of non front facing admin staff who aren't being let work from home (like myself. And I work for the government giving out all the 'only travel to work if there's no way you can work from home' too!!!)

If you didn't get anywhere with the council, did you try contacting the older child's school? It's likely they've been asked that query already so may know a solution.

It's not worth sending the younger child to grandparents. Children are perfect and mostly asymptomatic carriers of covid, and with the older child going to school and you going to work it's likely the little one would catch it from either of you and happily carry it over to grandparents who wouldn't cope as well.

It is a dilemma, but there must be a solution somewhere.

Just googled 'childcare for key workers' and some interesting results come up. As stated op, contact the older child's school to ask, and contact you local authority.

If you still get nowhere then dig your heels in and tell work you can't go to work until childcare has been sorted for the younger one. They'll soon find an answer for you and help sort it out, or maybe actually start following government advice and give you the resources to work from home.

I'm in the same boat. Work flatly refusing any requests to work from him even though 60/70 percent of my workforce seems to be off due to being high risk or self isolating due to symptoms in the household. It's causing all kinds of problems for the people our job caters to, but still no change to the old fashioned mindset regarding working at home.

A few of the higher grades are happily working from home on their laptops, but none coming for us main workers.

Thanks all for your suggestions. Unfortunately I have exhausted most of them. The LA sent me the link to the new provision which my youngest is too young for. The school the older one can go to next week had only 4 children today, and 3 staff, but won't take my younger child due to his age.

@CaryStoppins and @LittleLittleLittle, where I live, the 2 key worker rule is being enforced, single parent or not, in the town(due to demand) . Not in the villages, but no younger care in the villages.

@ToCaden I'd only send younger child to GPs if I wasn't going into work. I can't do it if I'm being exposed to potential sufferers of Covid 19 at work. And I wouldn't send older child to school in that case. My idea is that I WFH and both children go to dads/GPs, we have all been self isolating for almost 2 weeks.

Also, it has been suggested that I will just not go to work and accrue a deficit in y hours, which I will have to make up within a certain time scale. This would be ok, if it were for a week or 3. What's the chances though?

Well hopefully if you explain the situation with your work they'll get a move on issuing those laptops. You'd think employers who were part of the government would be the first to follow its advice, but no, they drag their feet about everything (except the occasional 'brilliant' scheme they come up with which turns out to be a disaster).

They can't penalise you for not turning up to work due to not being able to get childcare.

Have you asked specifically about which nurseries and childminders are open for keyworker children?

Good luck finding a solution and hope your work gets its act together helping you work from home.

There are apps around to find childminders in your area, some who might still be taking children. I'd even offer to help myself on my days off, but from how you've described we don't live in the same area.

That might also be another idea. If you work with someone with the same issue who could work opposite shifts from you and they could take your child on her days off and vice versa. But that depends on whether you know anyone who fits that bill, and how repulsed or taken you are with any childminder options you are able to find in your area.

@CaryStoppins yes, the ones in the town where I work don't have enough spaces for children already on their books.

Other members of my team are WFH.

@letitpea Hi I would press your work harder for your first option? Find out if the other people WFH have children. And what their situation is? Stress to your work that you absolutely need to work from home as your youngest is not in education. Can you contact the father of your child to help you out at all? I know a lot of people are having the kids at home and working as well. Good luck!