Absent fathers to be made into scape goats

[ivykaty44]

absent fathers

as a single mother who has lived without maintenence for periods of time and at times struggled to make ends meet I still think it is awful to suggest making a group of people stigmatised.

there are good NoneResidentParents and there are useless NRP, it isn't just absent fathers but sometimes absent mothers. What sort of country do we live in thuogh where we would want to stigmatise a whole group of people.

Better to keep the CSA free and make it work rather than the clerical mess it is at the moment.

lunninlife - What do you mean? Either you pay towards the upkeep of children of your children or you don't - that's pretty black and white to me.

I'm going to guess that you are not a lone parent....When it comes to family breakups, rarely are things black & white. As someone put in the similar thread in Politics, I doubt there's a single man who yesterday read that and thought "Shit that's me he's talking about".

Every maintenance-avoiding dad will have justified it somehow to his friends, family & new GF as to why his terrible ex has forced him out of the kids lives and he's the one who really is hard done to.

There will also be situations where men will think "Oh fuck it. I'm paying £x a month, I might as well see them to reduce my liabilities". Is that really the type of father we need in our kids lives?

And there will be many cases out there where the dad has genuinely been shafted.

It's not black & white at all and despite being a Tory supporter, I find the current leadership completely out of tune with the modern family.

I LOVE Cameron, I do, I do, I do!!!! When I heard this on TV yesterday, I nearly choked on my broccolli....... about bloody time, I thought!!

My son (13) and I have struggled beyond belief, living in rented on AST's, barely able to sustain a job (when he's ill or when schools close because of adverse weather) and feeling totally inadequate being on benefits as a post-graduate. In any event it is WE, AS SINGLE MOTHERS who live with stigma - how many of us end up calling ourselves "Mrs" just to stop the raised eyebrows when we say "...actually, I'm a Miss" - I could go on. Damn right they should be stigmatised but that's not enough - men who don't support their children are clearly without morality and conscience therefore being stigmatised will have little or no effect.

My ex has NEVER supported his child and I've been in and out of the CSA with all 3 ill-thought out leglislation changes (i.e. they've not consulted single mothers) which have never helped me one bit. 13 years have passed and my child still gets nothing - imagine the impact on the child's self image, something I have spent my life compensating for.
If Cameron tackles this one then he will go down in history and as an act of gratitude I will become a "t"ory - good job I've swallowed my broccolli.

I can't help thinking that if there was a way to ensure that absent parents paid at source to make a contribution towards the upkeep of all children that they fathered/gave birth to then:-

a) use of condoms would rise substantially

b) DNA testing facilities would be heavily in demand

I'm all for DNA testing of every single mum/dad and baby at birth but it's probably against our human rights.

Mums refusing to name or unable to name the father of their child to the relevant authorities could suffer a lower level of state benefit unless there was a documented reason (rape by person(s) unknown etc). They do not have to bring this upon a defenceless baby/infant/child, they can use contraception (free !) or keep their legs shut.

To ensure absent parents paid at source their payroll codes would be amended to deduct additional tax or their benefits would be reduced. The self-employed would incur a cumulative charge (with interest accruing) to avoid manipulating their profits to be low in the income review period. If their profits miraculously improved once the dc were adults, the other parent/carer would still be owed the back maintenance as the cumulative debt would still be payable. Passports would be withdrawn/not be issued to anyone not up to date with maintenance payments. If you can't afford to support your kids you can't afford a holiday and you also need no-nonsense compulsory parenting classes if you think your wants come before your children's needs.

Ive scared myself re-reading my post as it is all so scarily "state dictated domination" and radical I'd best get my flameproof suit and hardhat on now.

Piss-taking by absent parents calls for drastic measures - no ?

it's a more subtle applicaiton of Tory Ideolology is all.

Tories want society to be more moral and look after their own and not rely on the state, so today it's let's blame absent parents. it's more newsworthy and positive spin to blame absent fathers in this instance because all the counter-headlines so far are about how much worse off women are than men with the budget cuts to welfare and to the CSA. he needs to hand out a verbal bone to his voters.

it simply makes cameron look all shiny and caring. but, as others have pointed out, he won't actually do anything to make it easier for single parents to access the money they are owed via CSA because it is a patriarchial run/led system and they don't want to tax themselves and their donors.

now, if i were being even more cynical, I would suggest that what this is potentially building up to is the horrifying prospect that if a single parent (mostly women) fails to secure a maintenance arrangement with the absent parent, then they will have even less money from the state in tax credits etc. it will probably be spun as incentivising people to get what they're owed etc, etc, but bottom line is Cameron et al will use it as another way to lower the benefits bill even further.

but, maybe Cameron is a soft, cuddly chap that really cares about single mothers and their children living on the poverty line, or sinking below it.

Thank Goodness that someone is talking about the real demon parents, the absent ones and not the true grit that raise children alone with little or no support!

FFS , all you critics - IAMCATTY40 et al, we all need to get things into perspective !

yes, we do need to tell ALL parents who do not own up to their repsonsiblities to their children .

It does NOT include the the parents who are desperately trying to take an active part in their kids lives and contribute both financially and emotionally.

YES, the system needs to be changed but we NEED to send a message out these Fathers and mothers that their behaviour is NOT ACCEPTABLE and must change

If having sex results in a baby, you should expect to bare the brunt of the cost to raise it, whoever you are and however much you earn.

Cameron is absolutely right about this. Men who abandon/could not care less about their children are a cancerous sore on the face of this country. They not only do a huge disservice to the poor children they spawn but to society as a whole. In particular boys want to know who their fathers are. Fathers' (I use that term very loosely for a lot of them) should not only PAY for their children they should bei nvolved in the lives of them.
Women are not blameless in all this, quite a few have children knowing full well the father of the child/children won't be around. These days there is no shame in having children and making the state pay for them. These 'baby fathers'' should be found and made to pay for those children they create. It's not a perfect solution, as of course the children should have fathers'who care about them, apart from paying maintenance.
The impact of not having a father is huge. 80 percent of prisoners do not have a father figure. although most are fathers themselves. 48% of prisoners can't read. ( no bedtime stories from father then!) Only a quarter of women in prison live with the father. This area of social deprivation/fecklessness should have been tackled decades ago.
Children NEED fathers! .
Awaits a Guardian reader to say......... "we all need the 'choice' to be feckless, it's a human right".

i disagree, what about the fathers who have been lied to by women who get pregnant without their knowlede-they shouldnt have to pay for or see kids they dont want too. its awful they can take away the passports of men who dont pay up.

rotten- to get round that surely the mother could just say it was a one night stand with a bloke she never got the name of

I'd like to know what the Tories' 'family friendly' policies are exactly, quoted in this article. Everything i've seen from them so far looks tailor made to make families struggle as much as possible, from tax credit reform to childcare vouchers and child benefit. Family values indeed. What a joke.

Of course absent fathers should take responsibility for their children (i am married to one who is desperate to be more included in his daughters' lives). But i'd have a lot more sympathy with Cameron's words if his policies genuinely were 'family friendly'.

knitted.....What? Really if you don't want to father a child....DON'T have sex without a condom.

Sperm does not fertilise an egg without the help of a penis.

I think that men of a low enough quality to abandon a child wouldn't be affected by stigma anyway.

I think that if men (and the women they impregnate) were traceable and financially responsible for that child until adulthood, no excuses, men would think very carefully about the consequences of having sex with somebody they don't care for or feel any commitment to.

'Every maintenance-avoiding dad will have justified it somehow to his friends, family & new GF as to why his terrible ex has forced him out of the kids lives and he's the one who really is hard done to.'

I really agree with this. I am sure there are some (tiny minority) of mums who are causing the problems, but from my experience of people I know, it often seems the dad doesn't want to pay once they get a new familiy. One even said he had quit work to be a SAHD as he was fed up of 'paying for his exes holidays', he gave £50 a week for 2 kids!! It was Ok for him to take his new gf and kids abroad but he hated the idea of his ex doing it with 'his money'. Alot of the new wives seem annoyed that they have to pay out for the kids too. One even said she wouldn't be upset if something happened to the kids!!! I haven't been friends with her since as i found it shocking.

veritythebrave

I'm looking at covering all angles

First let's consider the feckless male. In todays' society, some men can and sometimes do walk away financially scot free from the child they have fathered, plus they go on to father more by other women. If they do intend to have sex the fact that there will be compulsory paternity testing and compulsory payment for children born as a result might hopefully reduce feckless fathering of multiple children.

Then let's consider the children born into stable relationships that then break down months/years later. These children would be offered a greater degree of financial protection by the fact that their father is documented by the DNA test at the time of their birth and, if absent and not paying agreed maintenance, is still contributing to their upkeep via the tax system taking more in tax from his pay than it does from a single man who has not fathered a child or a man (married or not) who is actively financially supporting his children.

There are a few points here from a male point of view.

1. What about the women who use children as weapons
2. It assumes all women are heroic in bringing up children in a responsible manner, this quite clearly isnt always the case at all.
3. What about the women who lie about who the father is? I know one who claimed over £4000 before she was found out. This is said as a single father whos wife left the kids and never contributed a penny, leaving me to work shifts days and nights, sort out childcare and do everything for mine, more to the point ladies, I know lots of other men in the same boat. Being female/ a mother doesnt automatically make you a saint, walk around any town centre at night to see that. It should have been aimed at "absent parents" As for the CSA, when I contacted them they said its wasnt really for men? All parents have a responsibility regardless of gender, its a sad fact of life we live in an amoral society with little regards for family or others, with "fine, upstanding and honest" politicians like ours its no wonder we are in this mess. Cameron is a fool.

knittedbreast

Why would she say that in the knowledge that her disposable income would be cut if she had a child as a result of a one-night stand ?

Her "privacy" comes at a price, society can't be expected to carry on funding those who simply don't want to pay for their social responsibilites/have no social conscience.

We're all in this together remember, you, me and the feckless.

veritythebrave,
Well said, now what about the feckless women too or are these "Victims" and played no part in said reproduction?, stop making excuses, it takes two, you failed miserably in covering all angles because you have a bigotted view.

Well said, now what about the feckless women too or are these "Victims" and played no part in said reproduction?, stop making excuses, it takes two, you failed miserably in covering all angles because you have a bigotted view.