Troubled families have too many children ?

[BridgetJonesPants]

AIBU to agree with this article written by Louise Casey, the Prime Minister's troubled families tsar?

uk.news.yahoo.com/troubled-families-too-many-children-022219547.html

Although I have no idea how you can get 'these mothers' who have probably had a chaotic upbringing themselves to take responsibility for not having any more children.

Casey and her report is a joke. It's popular anecdote masquerading as research along with some gung-ho soundbites about ticking off 'nightmare' mothers that can't actually be proven.

She based it on interviews with 16 families and from that extrapolated that there are 120,000 'troubled' families costing taxpayers £9bn a year.

How did she reach these conclusions?

Last week Ian Duncan-Smith was warned about the appalling standard of his 'research reports' by the Office of National Statistics.

This will be the same Ian Duncan-Smith whose CV used to say he had a degree from the University of Padua until the BBC forced him to admit he had only a certificate confirming he had attended a 6-week language course there.

Casey's CV doesn't stand up to much scrutiny either.

So Casey's bright idea is to use shame as a form of contraception

I agree with the stick of no benefits beyond the third child but where's the carrot that's going to raise their poverty of expectation?

Fathers are important and absolutely necessary for the health and well being of children, but if anything goes wrong it's the mothers fault. Somebody explain that to me, because I just don't see why fathers yet again get out of taking any responsibility and blame for how their offspring turn out.

It sickens me that to so many people, the solution is to punish these women. Yeah, lets take money off them to make them poorer still because they had the misfortune of partnering with violent and abusive men who often get their girlfriends pregnant as a way of exerting control. Let's threaten them with prison or having their kids taken in to care because they lack the skills and the know-how to parent adequately.

The one bright spot seems that there will be dedicated workers who will work alongside individual families. As long as it's not a social work type arrangement with somebody observing and taking notes and reporting back to some unknown boss, I think this sounds positive.

Sorry to digress but I missed this. What was the warning about Ian Duncan-Smith statistic's about?

I think Louise Casey has a valid point. I think the benefit system doesn't help.

Valid point about what?

The benefits system doesn't help, but the alternative (less money in general, or no additional money for additional children beyond a state-approved number) is either too expensive to administer, or risks putting additional children who didn't ask to be born at all, still less into a troubled family into dangerous, starvation poverty.

Several states in the US have family caps on welfare and afaict there is no evidence to suggest they have had any affect on reducing reproduction rates amongst poor people.

I keep trying to write something coherent but can't because I'm so ragey about this woman blaming other women for all the world's ills I'm chewing my keyboard

sorry STIDW, it's the UK Statistics Authority

And it wasn't last week. Apart from that my research is very sound

The families I've worked with who would meet these criteria a significant cause is men's attitudes to condom use and vasectomy. Lots of women (esp poor women can't use hormonal contraception, eg because of smoking, poor health, obesity, high blood pressure, diabetes, dvt, etc). The nhs won't sterilise women under 30 or even some childless women over 30. That leaves few options. If they say no to sex the men leave and they're back to being stigmatised as single mothers. If they do have sex the men refuse to use condoms or have a vasectomy and the women in these relationships don't have the power to argue. They are blamed and left to pick up the pieces whilst no-one blames the men. It sucks and LC is an ignorant arse.

Rather than rely on media hype the actual report is here;

www.communities.gov.uk/documents/communities/pdf/

The Children's Society response makes interesting reading;

'It is vital that we do not lay blame for this country's issues solely at the doors of parents, but look much more broadly at the huge issues affecting this country's children and their families. While we welcome any additional support to help disadvantaged families, the troubled families unit has a narrow focus. The impact of austerity measures, recession and some other major issues hitting children and their families hard have largely been overlooked.
'Vast numbers of the country?s vulnerable families are being left without any help, trapped in desperate conditions, struggling with unemployment, disability, poor quality housing and in urgent need of support.
'Failure to address the impact of the recession and the government?s austerity measures on children will lead to a marked rise in the numbers forced to live in families blighted by deprivation and hardship.'

www.childrenssociety.org.uk/news-views/press-release/statement-response-louise-caseys-report-?troubled-families

Thanks, limitedperiodonly.

If you define a troubled family as a family that can't adequately bring up children because the parents use drugs/are involved in abuse/don't provide adequate care for children, rather than a family on benefits with a higher than average number of children, is there evidence of a correlation between increase in benefits and increase in troubled families?

It's my impression that throughout history vulnerable/unstable/immoral people have always had sex and this has always resulted in children, whether or not they have any money and whether or not having children would be a good idea. It's a flaw in the reproductive system. There isn't a link between to parent parenting, and ability to procreate.

There are some core families who are troubled. I remember my mother telling us about some she taught in the 1940s, a baby a year, father in and out of prison or not there (although in those days there were more fathers with the family because of social mores), children beaten, parents not in work.

What are the answers? Financially the cupboard is bear and most voters want benefits to these people whom those of us who pay a lot of tax in effect keep. Many many mumsnetters would adore to have a third child but do not because they cannot afford it. They feel very hard doneby that these others are financially rewarded for having babies they cannot afford.

The plan is to offer the core troubled families extra help which seems a good idea. We could cap benefits at 2 children. We could have the women grouped with say one other similar woman who is a neighbour and get them each day to remind each other if they have taken their pill for example if that is what is causing the problem. We could introduce work fare for those with babies. If I can take 2 weeks off work in which to have a baby and then go back full time I don't see why these women cannot.

Seriously though, for all those saying she's mad/mean/whatever...do you really think the kind of families she is talking about don't exist? Because we all no, that in reality, they do. And we know that they are associated with poor outcomes for the children as well as the parents.

So isn't it just a bit irresponsible to sit back and say, well, its up to them/none of our business/they aren't harming anyone? The childrens society report is good and accurate and of course we need to look at all the political, economic and cultural factors that lead to poverty, disadvantaged families, etc. But its also disingenuous to pretend that families with 8, 9 children with different fathers and haven't contributed to their own issues. It's not all someone elses fault, and really, how can you say she's wrong by saying that women in that situation should stop having children? I would have thought that alone was a fairly obvious and unarguable point.

^'Vast numbers of the country?s vulnerable families are being left without any help, trapped in desperate conditions, struggling with unemployment, disability, poor quality housing and in urgent need of support.
'Failure to address the impact of the recession and the government?s austerity measures on children will lead to a marked rise in the numbers forced to live in families blighted by deprivation and hardship.' ^

All very true. But if you are living in bad conditions and your family is blighted by deprivation and hardship, the very worst thing you can do is have more children. Surely we should be thinking of ways to identify those at risk from this and help them somehow? If you are so caught up in the "how dare they blame women like this", aren't you actually just ignoring a problem that people need help to address?

I agree there needs to be more emphasis on fathers as well as mothers - it's not 100% the mother's responsibility or 'fault' after all, though you'd think it to hear some people talk! Though in this case maybe the idea is that 'targeting' women is more likely to have an effect, as they're usually the ones bearing the consequences of having more children than they can manage.

I don't think there's anything wrong with having a large family in itself, but surely it's just common sense that if you're struggling to cope - financially, practically or emotionally - with the children you already have, it isn't sensible to keep having more.

If we forced fathers to have children 50% of the time it would help those men cruelly denied proper contact and would help mothers get back to full time work.

It's not all someone elses fault, and really, how can you say she's wrong by saying that women in that situation should stop having children? I would have thought that alone was a fairly obvious and unarguable point.

Of course people shouldn't have children they can't cope with. I just haven't found the part of the article where Louise Casey suggests a way of solving the problem.

Aren't women effectively going to be charged £3K to track down absent fathers?

Perhaps they should "chip" the fathers before they get into bed with them. Some parent chip children in South America to track them if there is kidnapping.

Ways to solve the problem?

• No extrra money if more than 2 children
• Workfare for all parents on benefits with creches for when they are doing it if it's ot work that can be done with a baby in tow in a sling
• no priority on council house lists if you have a child - you will have to slum it with your parents or wait for sex until you marry someone suitable or use contraception or whatever.
• nurse calls round to make sure the contraception injection is given
• fathers once tracked down made to do lots of child care

Mandatory contraception for the unemployed with two or more kids? just a thought

no out of work benefits for more than two kids?

The mysogyny from some quarters is astounding. Did anyone notice how certain sections of the press tried to find ways to blame the mother of the children who were stabbed to death by their father who then killed himself.
titty by mandatory contraception i hope you were thinking of the snip for men too.
And Louise Casey is obviously as thick as two short planks if she thinks domestic abuse only happens further down the socio economic scale. Domestic abuse can happen to anyone from any walk of life. Stupid cow.

no absolutely not, the snip is too final (and in my mind not equal to female contraception but more like a hysterectomy, and I would be absolutely against forced sterilisation unless person was a perpetrator of child abuse), but if/when a pill comes out for men, then yes, I would make than mandatory too. Although rightly or wrongly a part of me thinks at the end of the day regardless of the fact the it takes two to make a baby, its women who are pregnant, and so at the end of the day it is a woman's responsibility to not become pregnant.

I think your creche idea isn't bad Xenia. The problem is would some of these people actually bother to turn up and work. The trouble with benefits is that it is paid regardless of what the person does. There doesn't seem to be any sanctions.

I think lack of work ethic may cause some of the social problems.

I did listen to radio london and Louise Casey was interviewed on the day that it was breaking news. some of her clients could not cope with getting up in the morning, let alone going anywhere out of the house.

You might want to read it before you call people "stupid cow", since she didn't say anything remotely like only poor people are involved in domestic abuse.

It seems the main priority of this unit is to get children from troubled families to attend school regularly. I don't see what there is to argue with there.