It’s not often that government legislation kick starts a revolution. Yet our Children and Families Act, which has just received Royal Assent, does just that. It takes us another important step closer to ensuring the more family-friendly Britain that Mumsnet and Mumsnetters have been campaigning for for years.
This is a watershed moment. Every dot and comma of the Bill puts into law measures that will transform outdated attitudes and systems in Britain. We want to give families like yours more freedom and flexibility to make the choices you want and ensure every child gets the best possible start in life.
So now, thanks to these changes, our parental leave system will no longer be built on the 1950s assumption that when a child is born, mum stays home while dad goes out to work. We want to ensure that fewer women feel like they have to choose between their family and career and that more men can spend the extra time they want with their kids.
And, now, if you’re a parent who wants to give your children the best care and opportunities, you’ll have improved access to good, affordable childcare and greater support through extended flexible working. You’ll also have the guarantee of a free healthy meal for your child during those important first years at school.
This is about more than changing laws. It’s about changing a culture that for too long has dictated rather than supported families’ choices.
Take the coalition government’s introduction of shared parental leave for new parents. In the old system, after a child was born, fathers got two weeks for paternity leave and mothers could take up to a year.
But what about the many parents who want to share these traditional roles between them, so they can better meet the needs of their family?
From April 2015, this flagship Liberal Democrat policy will make it possible for new parents to carve up the leave they’re entitled to, with much greater flexibility.
So if you want to return to work before your year’s leave is up or go back to work for a particular project, you can do so without losing out. We want to ensure that all career options remain open to women after pregnancy. Your partner can stay at home and use the rest of the leave and pay, if that’s what they want.
If you choose, you can even take off chunks of time together. Once you return to work, you’ll also be able to benefit from the support of family and friends who want to help out and will have the same right to request flexible working arrangements as you do.
These measures have been pored over by analysts, businesses and the people they impact to ensure they’re easy to understand, implement and use.
We don’t want to create an unnecessary burden, particularly for small businesses. So we've listened and responded to the concerns of business and their feedback has been overwhelmingly positive. Businesses recognise the more diverse, productive and skilled workforce shared parental leave and flexible working can bring. I have seen some excellent examples of family friendly businesses through the Mumsnet Awards. I’d like to see many more in the future.
Above all else, we want a system that works for everyone, and one of the policies that will benefit almost every family with young children is our plan to provide free school meals to pupils in reception classes, year one and year two of primary school from September. Experts have been looking at this policy for years and universal free school meal pilots have shown the genuine difference this can make.
At a time when many are still struggling to make ends meet, it will save families hundreds of pounds per child every year. It’s also been shown to help children do better in English and Maths. On average, pupils in the pilot areas were two months ahead of their peers, with children from poorer backgrounds showing the biggest improvements. Children in the pilot areas were also shown to be more likely to eat vegetables and fewer snacks.
We know this approach helps. That’s why we’re working closely with schools and teachers across the country to meet our September launch.
Building a Britain fit for modern families has been one of my biggest ambitions, and that of the Liberal Democrats, in government. Today takes us another step closer to making that ambition a reality, laying the foundations for our family-friendly revolution.
Together, we’re building a modern Britain we can all be proud of, with a stronger economy and fairer society. So every British family, no matter what their circumstances, can prosper, and every child, whatever their background, can rise as high as their talents and hard work will take them.