"It may be better news for women... to look after their own children and fit jobs into the child's day"

[SleepWhenImDead]

So says Jill Kirby, director of the Conservative think tank, the Centre for Policy Studies in this BBC article.

Seriously, what planet is this lady on? She makes out like it's a NEW idea for women to either not to work or to work hours to limit the amount of childcare that's needed. Well done Jill, we'd never thought of that before you suggested it!

I'm going to be hard hit from these cuts to public sector, I'm currently on maternity leave but due to be made redundant anyway. The public sector is the place I'd need to get a job, and get child-friendly hours. DOes this Jill think we get to CHOOSE these things, like a job is something you do for fun to avoid looking after your own children?! Think I might as well give up even hoping for a job and soon we'll lose our child benefit as well. I'm attacked on all directions!

because they're at work and don't have childcare maybe?

I see this thread has spiralled into a SAHM bashing thread.

Well while you lot are slapping yourselves on the back about your fucking fantastic jobs, what great feminists you are and other tedious nonsense, I'm going to be hitting the streets in protest at what the coalition are doing.

They are seriously affecting my daughters' life chances, from education to medical care. This affects ALL women whether working or caring and I,for one, want to voice my anger that women are taking the brunt of the cuts - facing unemployment, rising childcare costs, reduced benefits.

Sheesh.

The trouble really was that the club was too small. What was preventing expansion?

And well said CommanderGhoul.

commander,you're not only aggrieved parent in world.except some of us are working and are up against it,seeing the cuts in action.good for you going on rally.i like many others (surprisingly) cant get day off work

We were not allowed to book our own rooms for use at the school, plus there were problems recruiting playworkers.

it isn't about attacking each other and defending only one group. that's what this govt is relying on as it creates greater social inequalities and hits all women but smokescreens with things that create in squabbling.

I think we will all see the cuts in action soon SM.

We need demonstrations in favour of the cuts actually because the cuts will hugely benefit women and their daughters and put the country's finances on a sound footing such that we can all benefit. I don't think they go far enough but it's a reasonable start.

Am I the only one who is [hconfused] at the fact that bankers' bonuses this year will be the biggest ever.

Aren't we in this mess because of what they did?

Isn't it odd that the government cutbacks affect mainly those who can least afford it?

weird that there is no Halloween .

No, not the fault of most of them and they've done very well this year. Go forth and be a banker if you have what it takes. It's a free country.

Not true the cutbacks affect those who cannot afford it most. The rich have been taxed a lot more.

The Governor of the Bank of England on why it is indeed the fault of the banks

Xenia you clearly know better than all the economists across the world who would strongly disagree with you, and many of whom strongly disagree with the spending review.

The conservative government are blindly following an ideology not backed by sound economic strategy.

I have read many of your posts on mumsnet and have ignored them up to now in the believe that you are either a troll or just live in a completely different world to most of us, but your comments on this thread just had to be challenged.

'so these women giving up career choices they are stupid aren't they?'

'we need to stamp these women right out surely......They have no place in modern britain'

Xenia it is you who is stupid making comments such as these. How exactly do you intend to 'stamp them out' as you so delicately put it?

Your choice to work full time and from when your babies were very young. Your choice to employ childcare. Great that you earn good money etc

My choice to be the one who nurses my children when they are ill and not a nanny. My choice to be there because as a child who came from an abusive and pretty poor childhood, I think there is nothing more important than having a mother who puts you first.

wishiwas - don't get too riled. Xenia's online persona is essentially a slogan on a sandwich board. There isn't really any opportunity for meaningful discussion there.

We have always had economic cycles. It's how markets work. It's a bit like the seasons and the moon. now there may be steps that could have been taken like poor people in the US not taking out loans they should not have done (arguably it is as much the fault of the American poor in taking on the debt as the banks who leant it but no we don't like making people responsible nowadays do we - we want to blame others) but markets go up and down. It's how it works. It will happen again in my lifetime. I've read my grandfather's and uncle's letters from the late 20s and 30s. It was pretty bad then too.

The cuts are needed and good not just to balance the books but to remove if we can (and this Government has hardly started) the dependency culture which we have. The pound was doing pretty well after the cuts were announced. We also had the biggest improvement since WWII I think in terms of up turn so we might find the cuts are going to correct all the faults caused by labour and they will save the nation. Well done Cameron.

Xenia is one of those people who comes from a well off background, and then finds a nifty employment niche by being in the right place at the right time, and then genuienly wonders why everyone else doesn't See The Light and do this.

She can't help it.

Yes Xenia, Thanks for "stamping me out". I was planning to return to full-time high rate tax-paying work in a couple of years time (because I have that choice) but you obviously believe I have given up entirely.

We make decisions based on what it is best for our own family at the time - we should all be fighting to allow every woman the right to choose. It is not a concrete decision - I am a SAHM now but I will not be doing this forever. I don't want a school hours only job, I want my job with realistic childcare available to allow me to do it.

No, not every woman. There's that dreadful sexism again. We shoudl as women be fighting to ensure men have those choices too if indeed we think it's a good choice to be economically inactive. Why aren't you fighting for the rights of all the husbands of women posting on here to be at home? It is as much the right if it be a right at all of man as woman.

well they have as much 'right' to be at home with their children as a woman does

Come on Xenia you can do better than that

Xenia you are terribly ill-informed. There is plenty of evidence that those "poor people" in the states were systematically mis-sold mortgages by those who knew that the debt could be repackaged and sold on, thereby becoming someone else's problem when the inevitable defaults happened.

Xenia, some people have no choice but to be "economically" in active - eg if caring for sick/disabled children or parents. Espeically as (which you clearly approve of) there will be even less state provision for such people.

Did Bonsoir ever tell us which public sector jobs are nice to have but we can do without - apart from the Real Nappy Lady?

"arguably it is as much the fault of the American poor in taking on the debt as the banks who leant(sic) it but no we don't like making people responsible nowadays do we - we want to blame others"

I think it is important to remember that the people selling the loans were on commission to do so, as were their superiors and their superior's superiors, etc. etc.

It was nobody's responsibility to think of the banks they were working for (never mind the economy), just themselves. They knew that they would be ok.

I think it's hilarious that the economy collapsing is the fault of people with no money who were offered a house and said "yes".

The word 'responsibility' is far reaching Xenia, and the banks should be asking what sort of culture their own employees were working in whereby their own economic wellbeing, not the bank's was their only concern.

WRT Women staying at home- why is bringing up children not financially rewarded on a par with WOHM? To accept that raising children is less financially worthy an occupation than WOH is perpetuating the status quo.