"Secret" government plans to "win back women"...

[HelenMumsnet]

Hello.

Apparently, the Coalition has "secret plans to win back women" by, among other things, cutting school summer holidays, overhauling child benefit and banning advertising to under-16s.

What do you think?

Would plans like this win you back - if, indeed, you ever went away?

[Peachy]

No, it was like when your friend at school gets asmile from the popular girls, disapprars for a week untilt hey get bored then wonders why you tell her to sod off.

Exactly that.

[ouryve]

OK, just seen this article and I have only one comment:

[notenoughsocks]

Have just read the article. Am .

Among other things, doesn't "Changing plans for the new universal credit to give it to women automatically, instead of allowing the applicant to nominate a household member" = "Women are the ones who are and should be at home doing houseworky and childcare thingys?" How does that sit with their proposed plans for more flexible hours to support shared parenting? Or has all of that gone out of the window?
I don't want to 'shop around' for maternity services like I do for babygrows. Call me naive but I would just like good maternity services.

It all sounds like a lot of cheap and nasty ideas to try and cover up (or help us forget which should be easy because our minds are so tiny) the real losses that women have suffered as a result of the coalition's policies. And, to make it worse, they are proposals more than a little bit tinged with ideas about 'women's place' and the free market.

Rant over. To be fair, I would fully support the ban on advertising. But it wouldn't win be back as they never had me.

[ouryve]

Maria Miller answers letters.

her letter (via my MP) said that famillies with disabled children would be fine coping with big income drops as we had time to get used to it.

OK peachy that requires more than a biscuit. Yep, the prospect of losing £200 a month in tax credits (is that for each child? We'd have nothing left) really does get so much easier knowing about it in advance. [need a dripping sarcasm emoticon]

[Peachy]

The thing about giving it to the female is to shut up people upset about child benefit having ahd the intention of giving a woman some safety and now being stopped I suspect.

And YY to not wanting to shop around for maternity: I ahd ds4 as a hoimenbirth for all sorts of reason including the simple one of a history of birts shorter than the call out time (I was right too; 35 was all it took! MW just mde it from the village- not a ward one, we have the community ones on all)

A day or so after the local amternity unit was closed due to deaths of women there and a safety scandal.

Fiddly soundbites be damned, I just want safe births.

[MakesCakesWhenStressed]

If they wanted to win me back then they'd have to make it financially viable for me to be a SAHM if that's what I wanted (sharing tax allowance with DH perhaps?) and improve the NHS, especially maternity services. These are my two biggest bugbears with current govt, but there are many many things I'd change if I ruled the world.

[notenoughsocks]

Peachy, have sad feeling you are right about the child benefit thing. I was devastated when it stopped being a universal benefit (and that has nothing to do with the fact I lost it as I am a million miles away from the threshold).

Actually - sorry for veering off topic - the universal credit scares me. I can see it becoming an increasingly arbiatary figure which will become disconnected from individual's and families' needs and one that will, inevitabley, get squeezed.

[notenoughsocks]

PS - to be clear - I didn't lose child benefit. I am a million miles below the threshold.

[MakesCakesWhenStressed]

It would be useful if the area you lived in could be taken into effect. DH and I moved down here so he could get work as this is the only place in the country where his job really exists, but although his salary increased by 6k, our rent doubled, so did our other living costs, so we're actually worse off. Now we just have to keep our fingers crossed the risk and sacrifices will pay off and he'll advance quickly enough that he can actually support us and our grwoing family, as my work does not bring in much at all.

[Peachy]

Universal credit is NOT a universal credit- not in the true sense, as advocated by the Greens (I am not a Green BTW, considered but lcoally- nah not for me)

Uniersal just means all benefits in one: that's not true either as they are keeping DLA separate, and nobody really knows about carers: in fact the Governments last line on carers was: we don't really know.

It will amalgamate JSA, IS, Tax Credits, CB, HB, CTC.

In [principle aspects amke sense- eg it should be easier to get adjusted if you are on a zero hours contract (work of the devil) and get a short week.

In practise not so much; we already know that middle rate DLA claimants (children) will qualify for tens of oounds less a week.

And that gumph about protecting the disabled- ha! HB is exempt and ATOS a nightmare (please read the link here; ATOS is nightmarish, the new assessments effectively bar people with non physical disability from claiming) .

Accessible housing, in the private sector is often costly but the councils have nowhere near enough. the new HB levels will force people out of that, and as there is no protection for carers they will forced away from those they care for- which is a nonsense given care by SSD easily costs £2k per week. Not to mention the human element.

DS1 is 11 and in a SN placement: we know full well that at 16 (ATOS age) he will be refused help even though he has marked emotional and oehr ASD needs. DS3 I am not sure; he is severe but verbal and so we will be asked to leave the assessment and he would tell them grey is blue and he can fly seventy miles a night alone if he thought they wanted to ehar it, even though he is unlikely to go to the shop alone or not need care.

However ATOS came from Labour and there is no party aginst them, plus they have been secured long term on a contract so nowt anyone can do.

(Issues? moi? well been supporting an old soldier with his claim, he was shot and has PTSD but a malicious caller lied and they are trying to say he doesn;t need DLA even though he uses a chair and has full sets of reports: ATOS you see assess on a thirty minute appoitnment and will not read medical records)



Sorry, I know. I go on.

[MakesCakesWhenStressed]

Don't apologise. This is a complex minefield and only passion like yours can work through it. I swear to god that claiming benefits can cause depression.

[Peachy]

Thank you. Although I find that even small protests such as this make me feel I am trying and LESS likely to be down if that makes sense?

I feel so much for anyone having to cope with benefits on their own, or with a new diagnosis, after a death, painful divorce or whatever. I really do.

Actually i think the single biggest thing the Government can do to improve the lives of lower income/ unemployed (and let's face it that implies nowt with the stats as they are) or carer famillies is to sort out social housing. Although radio 4 had a series on and claimed that even council houses will be unaffordable in certain palces on the new HB rates.

The idea behind my little enterprise is a specific nbran d of supprt (will not detail, nota dvertising LOL)_ I have a strong feeling welfare advice will be a significant part, whether intended or not.

[LikeACandleButNotQuite]

I find it bizarre that we are encouraged to EBF until 6months, and this is supported, and encouragd by the NHS and wider government yet there is NO financial support to encourage it. I would LOVE for Maternity/Paternity pay to be more supportive in this, say, pay new mothers Minimum Wage for their usual contracted hours of work, rather than a shoddy 128 a week for the first 6 months. The extra would certainly make me re-think the time off I can take.

Base benefits on a combined household income.

[NonnoMum]

I'd like to give a little heads up to the coalition...

DO NOT CUT SUMMER HOLIDAYS

Think of all those lovely ladies who teach the sweet little children in all your state schools...

Those votes would disappear in the blink of an eye...

[MumblingRagDoll]

I would like to add


NO CUTTING SCHOOL HOLIDAYS!!! NO!

[JLK2]

Are they talking about having less school holidays or just having them spread out differently and having less than 6 weeks for the summer?

[Peachy]

Usually it's same but different isn;t it, for teaching contarct reasons?

Interesting that: another excuse for agencies not to bother providing holiday respite as the summer will be too short- along with the rest. kerching.

Note that it will apply no doubt to state schools. How many Tories use these I wonder?

[LemonDifficult]

On Newsnight now.

[JLK2]

How many Tories use these I wonder?
Plenty.

[Peachy]

Sorry, my fault: I did mean Tory MPs.

[dreamingofsun]

you have screwed us over tuition fees, please do not also make my summer holidays more expensive by decreasing the length of the school hols.

[TeddyBare]

I really resent that a lot of the things they have done to win back women are actually for parents, and therefore men who have dc benefit just as much as women who have dc, and childless women are unaffected. How is that supposed to make it up to women, who were systematically and intentionally fucked over by this government?

A better way to make it up to women would be to repeal the sexist changes they bought in, scrap the "big society" (women work for free) and introduce some laws which protect women from the discrimination that still exists. I think some better training for police and facilities for rape / dv, some teeth in the equal pay and anti-discrimination laws and a promise to never prioritise men over women in politics again would be better. You can't "make it up" to 50% of the population, many of whom are now in a position where that can't work and don't have access to facilities they used to rely on, by making some women mayors.

I also think that their intention to make things up to women is wrong in its foundation. They never should have had to have made things up to women, because they never should have decided to sacrifice them to start with. This is an action which admits that they did consider women's rights a reasonable cost to pay to fix the economy, and they never ever should have decided that to start with. This should be unnecessary.

[nancerama]

DH and I work for the same company. We were hoping that we could both go part time at the end of my maternity leave, so that we could spend equal amounts of time with DS, both pay into our own pensions and both maintain our careers, whilst spending a minimal amount on childcare. Our company is very family friendly, so this kind of arrangement could have been negotiated.

Unfortunately though this government has made thus financially impossible by removing the cap on ticket price increases and allowing the rail companies to adjust fares to an unaffordable level. It's not possible to share a season ticket, so we would be forced into buying day tickets, or 2 separate season tickets and costing us around £5000 a year more. It's therefore an unaffordable option for us.

[SardineQueen]

Sorry not read the whole thread, always a mistake but still.

In the article this jumped out at me:

"Setting up a website to allow women to anonymously disclose and compare their salaries with others in their industry."

That's not going to be much bleeding use is it - it's men's salaries women need to know about.