"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!

Well I'm trebly fucked then.

Let me see, I have epilepsy, which caused me to lose my job, so I've been on ESA for over a year. I "can" work part-time (though no one will hire me because of aforementioned epilepsy) so I'll be losing that one.

DP has to stay at home with me as my carer, because I cannot look after our two young children alone in case I have a fit. But hey, they're cracking down on DLA, so I'll probably lose that too, which means DP will lose his carer's allowance.

Out of the two of us, only I can work (if DP works, we would need a carer to supervise me with our children, or they would both have to go into day care ), but I'm a woman, so I should be baking cakes at home. The Conservatives might as well pop round with a stick and beat us while we're down already.

Sign me up for the revolution. I'm getting steadily more pissed off with this bunch of arrogant, mysogynistic bastards every passing day.

stealthsquiggle - I am a UK taxpayer, not a French taxpayer

Fair enough, Bonsoir - does that mean you are not allowed to rant about the French state ?

This household pays a hell of a lot of French tax, so I can rant about both!!!

This week, I have gone from horrified through to incandescantly livid with the actions of politicians. Today, my blood pressure has finally gone through the roof at the stupiditity of this woman.

I so hope she comes on for a webchat

I would like to see the private sector being more creative with the patterns of working they allow their employees. Sometimes it will be to their advantage. When I worked for a big company, I could have done my job from anywhere including from home and flexible hours would have worked to their advantage, but I was stuck with a 9-5 and an hour commute each way to an office five days a week. It's so frustrating.

Jill Kirby really is not stupid. She is, however, saying something extremely unpalatable to many people. Not politically correct at all .

I wonder whether he actually means this trollop, or whether the Tories are holding her three sons hostage so she trots out the party line in as many places as possible.

I mean, how could any woman in her position genuinely believe the bollocks she is spouting?

if teh tories are fans of SAHMs, how come WTC only gets paid to those where both aprents work then?

Confusing huh?

carer- stuffed. SAHM- stuffed. DH in army and you move around a lot- feck you missus

Go bake a cake

There is of course a real issue here: if SAHMs are considered to be more productive for the economy as a whole than mothers working in many public sector jobs (because this is the issue), SAHMs deserve financial recognition and protection. Not removal of CB.

Or WTC.

Don't know if this has been said yet - but who is looking after Jill's DCs while she's running about "think-tanking" and spouting wisdom crap?

yes it is this inconsistency that i just don't get.

tell us what they ideally want us to do and how we will be supported, then if we choose to do something else we know it is against the believed "greater good" and we won't expect or ask for any back up.

but atm i am just confused. as a SAHM (last 6 months) i have felt pretty undervalued but now see it is going to be harder than ever to get back into work, but need to as CB has gone, uni fees are going to be astronomical, yet the new message is increasingly to "not have it all, make sacrifices", ie to stay at home.

oh and as for healthcare and pensions, well, i just hope nothing happens to either dh or our relationship

This big society shit surely comes about from lots of wealthy politicians sitting around at dinner parties proclaiming "well, my wife does voluntary work to help poor people, it's done her a world of good. Seriously, more people should try it. She was so bored when she was spending all day shopping and having her hair and nails done".

Because of course, women are no good for anything more than that . Heaven forbid those in the public sector (teachers, nurses, doctors to name a few) might actually be doing anything useful for society.

amidaiwish - the only way this proposed model will work is if private sector jobs are more flexible and women whose children are off to university can somehow pick up a well-paid private sector job after 18+ years of being at home and flexible working in order to pay the university fees.

Which is going to be really tough.

Women's lives were always hard.

You know, when I recruited for HS it was poor people that volunteered.

Well off ones? nah.

Look at the comments after the blog - a lot of women do believe this BS and one of the posters (can only assume they are male) states "Remember alot of them are women who take take take and give birth to child who again take take take fom our schools, hospitals and housing." So clearly we all have children by immaculate conception and they are our sole responsibility! Oh and these children that take never get to put anything back to society to do they .

I did write a complete rant about this but most of it has been said. Suffice to say that women, once more are being asked to take responsibility not only for the fuck-ups of the city men but also apparently sole responsibility for the country's children too (because obviously we all conceived by immaculate conception).

Under Labour, I felt that policy favoured working mums (childcare subsidies). I felt that they wanted all mums to go out and get a job.

Under the Tories, it appears that this policy has been reversed. Oh, but wait a minute: single mums lose their Income Support once their child reaches school age.
So it seems that the Tories want single mums to work. But not partnered mums.

scallopsrgreat - that comment was talking about immigrants. asking them all to get the f*&@ out of our country. nice.

Just popped onto MN intending a little relaxing work break and saw this. Read the article, listened to the link....

RAAAAAAAAAAGE! Lots and lots of RAAAAAGE!

Back in the 1950s my aunt was told 'I don't know why you're going to medical school, it's a waste of time for a woman, you'll only have to give it up when you have babies'. She came top in her year and was a really good doctor - a clever and sympathetic GP and we all know how good those are when you can find one!

Twenty five years later my sister was told not to study medicine by the careers advisor at school, as there was 'no point, you won't be able to fit it around having a family, and that's what women have to do'. She too came top in her year at medical school and has saved goodness knows how many lives over the course of her career (and had a family). She often says she's glad the world has moved on to the point where her daughter will be the first generation not to be told any such nonsense. I'm not sure whether to send her the link to this and ruin her day or not...

What a silly cow, has she seen the cost of housing???!!! Not to mention food..... On an unrelated note I'm pretty sure the employment rights implemented by labour can't be undone? Can they?

really Trubert? do they not want partnered mums to go out to work? are single (male mostly i guess) incomes going to rocket so high to be able to afford mortgages, uni fees etc..? i don't understand.

Has anyone noticed the irony of someone who works for a think tank criticising people for not having real jobs?

i would be GREAT working for a think-tank