Sir Keir Starmer calling for nursery closure!

[Boogie5678]

Sorry I’m not sure how to link this but it’s on BBC news.

It's not easy but many could manage it if they put their minds to it.

How? Playpen or other baby cage? Tie them up?

Or schedule work meetings and teaching for the middle of the night?

@Sexnotgender

How do you work that out? The WFH requirement applies to men and women and if men are leaving the women to do all the child care and work full time then those men need to step up to the plate and do their fair share.

Absolutely. Do let me know how you get on dismantling the patriarchy.

It's not about dismantling a patriarchy if men in their home are not facing up their responsibilities, it's a marriage/partnership issue.

It's the mixed messages which hacks me off.

"Act like you've got the virus?" Right, and while your employer wants you to come into the office you'll need to drop your kids off at school/nursery. They can't have it both ways...

@Backbee

I was a stay at home parent and postgraduate student and managed to do both without using a nursery.

Haha brilliant.

I know, I'm incredibly proud of what I achieved. Thank you.

Some posters on this seem sneery about working mothers and just seem a bit too happy about us having the support we pay for taken away. Has come up previously on MN.

He’s a flimsy noob.

@InterfectoremVulpes

Nobody dares admit they don’t want to work! But that’s a whole other story. It would be unpaid.

Why is that? Surely an employer with vulnerable staff would be understanding of their fears and is prepared to be flexible?

Because you get told you can’t be furloughed. Yet ratios are showing too many staff.

I don't understand why parents (especially of little kids) couldn't be prioritised for furlough - or does this already happen?

Some posters on this seem sneery about working mothers and just seem a bit too happy about us having the support we pay for taken away.

Totally agree. Ironically, what I learned from the last lockdown is that I really really like working and having a fulfilling career as well as children.

Because you get told you can’t be furloughed. Yet ratios are showing too many staff.

So there's no understanding or flexibility on offer for these employees, which is a pattern continued across all sectors.

So what about unpaid leave, is that being denied too?

@rustyhinges you just don't get it - go and have a moan on another thread yeah? This doesnt really have anything to do with you and you clearly cannot relate.

@IloveJKRowling that wouid be a lot of parents wouldn't it .. being on furlough - there isn't just a magic pot of endless furlough you know!!

It is always such a shame, and usually a lost opportunity, when women start attacking other women.

It is entirely possible to disagree strongly without resorting to name calling and personal attacks. When we resort to that, we lose respect and we lose the argument.

I understand that feelings and fears - of the same and differing sorts - are running very high. I know they are for me.

There are few winners in the current situation, mostly losers, including many women and mothers and probably disproportionately so.

I said lost opportunity. I'd like to see some serious sharing of survival tips from those currently WFH with DC of all ages but especially nursery-age DC, and also from those who have been there, done that and got the t-shirt - and possibly the grey hairs - albeit under different circumstances. Let's not throw the baby out with the bath water. There's a lot of experience on this thread alone that could be put to good use. That would be a better use of energy.

It's not about dismantling a patriarchy if men in their home are not facing up their responsibilities, it's a marriage/partnership issue.

Gosh, are you always this one dimensional in your thinking?

It goes far beyond your partnerships into expectations from his workplace/boss to expectations from yours. It involves all cultural and societal reference points you and your husband have been exposed to all of your life.Y

I would like to see the evidence for how many nursery workers have ended up in hospital with covid and how many cases at nurseries. My boy goes to two different ones and how many cases.... zero! Not one. I’d they close nurseries that’s it for me. I can just about cope with working from home and home schooling a 7 year old ( who is expected to do 5 hours per day with all work submitted by 3.30). I can’t add a three year old to the mix. I just can’t.

I'd like to see some serious sharing of survival tips from those currently WFH with DC of all ages but especially nursery-age DC

But there wont be any tips. If you are working from home whilst in sole charge of a toddler then you are either not working effectively or you are unintentionally neglecting your toddler. There is a reason that before the pandemic peope understood that you couldn't work from home and do childcare.

I'd like to see some serious sharing of survival tips from those currently WFH with DC of all ages but especially nursery-age DC

From experience it’s safer for your nursery age dc to be cared for properly if you have to do work such as zoom meetings. It’s possible that they wonder off and hurt themselves. And if you are wfh for the full day like this - you won’t be able to in a way that is ok for them. No matter how many tips.

Well on the plus side, it makes that other thread about what people think of SAHMs academic, as we'll nearly all have no choice but to quit.

But if there's a choice to furlough a parent (with a small child who cannot work independently - i.e. not secondary or even upper primary) rather than a non-parent, surely that makes sense?

I work 3 days a week and have a 4 year old reception child and a 2.5 year old who is normally in nursery on my work days. I'm CV so as soon as schools were closed I decided to pull my 2.5 year old out of nursery too as it's not worth the risk. I am very fortunate that some of my work hours have been furloughed and I can do the others in evenings mainly, but my biggest obstacle to home schooling is having a toddler to simultaneously occupy. I can't be furloughed from being a parent to a toddler, nor 'swap shifts' to entertain him after my 4 year old is in bed. Ultimately though, I do not want to catch COVID nor be part of perpetuating the spread so I'm doing my best. I'm still paying full nursery fees too, but it is what it is and our safety is the priority. Nurseries closing will have the knock on effect of less people going out to work, which is what we need. Genuine keyworkers vital to the COVID response should be able to access childcare places but someone working in a garden centre or non essential retail should be at home with their child. The big problem this time is that it costs employers to furlough and I think that needs to be changed back if there's going to be a significant reduction in the amount of mixing outside the house people are currently doing.

My survival strategies from lockdown #1 (husband works 14 hour days approx 6 days per week, so 6 months of caring for one baby and 3 kids homeschooling alongside a full-time academic job - which I was given permission to do from home) are not necessarily ones I'd recommend to anyone?!

I said lost opportunity. I'd like to see some serious sharing of survival tips from those currently WFH with DC of all ages but especially nursery-age DC, and also from those who have been there, done that and got the t-shirt - and possibly the grey hairs - albeit under different circumstances. Let's not throw the baby out with the bath water. There's a lot of experience on this thread alone that could be put to good use. That would be a better use of energy.

There were some threads like that in the first lockdown - they were helpful to know you weren't alone but to be honest they were bleak reading. Most of the people talking about how hard it is to do this aren't speculating, they've done it once and there's a very good reason why going back again feels such a devastating/impossible prospect. And there were lots of well-meaning (or, in some cases, not so much) posts from people who felt they had done the same under other circumstances, and frankly they were rarely helpful, they just highlighted how different and impossible what was being asked of parents now was compared to studying or doing some very part-time work around toddlers in normal circumstances.

If nurseries are so very important- and clearly they are- why aren't nursery staff priority for vaccines?

I know it will vary but in my workplace all we can do is wash our hands- which realistically we all did regularly anyway. We have very recently been told to wear masks when interacting with parents- but the parents don't have to wear one. No protection at all from other staff or the children.

Nursery staff deserve a safe workplace too. I'm not suggesting full closures, or even key worker only because I know that non key workers still need to work, and working from home with a young child is a nightmare. But having to care for children when they have a parent (sometimes two!) at home and not working is insulting and shouldn't be allowed.

If nurseries are so very important- and clearly they are- why aren't nursery staff priority for vaccines?

Because the key priority is not overrunning the health service and nursery staff are not (in the main) at high risk from hospitalisation or death from Covid.

If they are under 40 and healthy, they are more at risk from flu.

Staff having vaccines won't stop spread between children though