mothers with young children are the most discriminated against at work

[paddingtonbear1]

I haven't actually found this in my company, and it's very small - only 18 employees. But I can imagine if I looked for another job, I might find it hard to get one, being a mother still under 40. I couldn't believe some of the comments in the 'have your say' on the bbc website though - most people seem to think that women who can't afford to stay at home shouldn't have kids at all! That would be me then! I don't think in this day and age, with mortgages and other rising costs, that's practical. I don't take advantage though, fortunately dd isn't sick very often, and dh does his share.
I think most of the people making the comments were men, or people with no kids...

I am in a small company and I got dragged into a conversation about young Mothers, when I say dragged I mean I couldn't listen to anymore of there crap!! They were saying that Mothers should not be at work until their children were old enough to look after themselves, there should ne such thing as part-time work and ALL Mothers of small children were a waste of time and money as they (the full-time no kids brigade) worked and paid tax to pay for the tax credits and child benefit for the people that decided to have kids. Completely contradicting themselves!! I jumped in and said at least by working I was contributing by paying tax. I was told that if I wanted kids then I should only have them if I could afford them and not expect my company to employ me apart-time and get any form for tax credit of child benefit.

I am not a person that can sit and keep quiet but I was completely stunned that they were saying all this not only in fromt of me but in front of several other Mums as well.

BTW one was a woman (with two grown-up kids and a grandson) and the other was a man with two small step-children!!

FB x

not surprised at all. My org have been quite good but some ofthe worst discrim I've faced has been from women with older kids who feel (rightly probably) that I'm relatively lucky to be having kids now - better rights/mat pay etc- so they feel I haven't quite earned the badge of honour of clinging onto job f/t for grim death starting back 3 mths after the birth etc etc. Familiar to anyone else? There's often not a lot of sisterly support out there, shame!

I can't afford not to work, unless we moved to somewhere cheaper - but then dh would have to change his job and he's happy there, plus the schools are great in our area and dd is happy. I work with mostly men but none of them have said anything like your colleagues FB - at least not to my face! Maybe they wouldn't dare!
My mum did work when I was small, as a teacher - she was asked to go back as there was a shortage!

The worst boss that I have had is a woman who was a mother too. Another woman started an official bullying and harrassment complaint against her and the senior managers manage to persuade her to drop the complaint by moving her to another post. She is real nasty piece of work.

The guys I work with are very supportive (I work 3 days a week) and most of them do not have children. My immediate male line manager has 3 children and his wife is a teacher so he is very accommodating. I guess I'm lucky.

Sisterly support? Women tend to be their worst enemy by the way they treat each other. Sad really.

I also heard this with interest since I am now in the most discriminated against minority in the country!

What really bugs me is that in the arguments made against discriminating against women with children (or actually against discriminating against any minority) no-one ever seems to make the point that it prevents the skills and talents of those women from being put to good use by society.

It bugs me particularly because I had my baby in the middle of doing my PhD and my university has been doing lots of teeth sucking about part time or flexible working. Before I had my child they thought I was worth investing in to the tune of tens of thousands of pounds, yet now I have a baby they seem to have forgotten that and only see the negatives I bring.

Wake up country - by discrimating against women in this way we are actively missing out on what they have to offer and we are all worse off for that.

Ok, jump off soap box!!!

Where I work, quite a few men are going part-time. I think the tide is turning, albeit slowly.

Yesterday, there was a news report about the fact that there will be 1.7 million people with dementia in the UK by 2051. Who is going to pay the taxes to alleviate this burden if women do not have children or enough children, especially as many of the indigenous population are hostile to immigrant/migrants?

The employers in this country need to wake up, face reality and stop squandering the female resource in this country.

Couldn't agree more.

I also think we have a very bizarrely negative attitude towards having children in this country. We don't see children as a contribution to society, or as something which the whole of society has an interest in and a responsibility towards. We see them as a possession which parents should only have if they can pay for them.

I do believe this is a large part of our wider problem with a lack of social inclusion and the terrible experience many children have in our country.

Action to combat discrimination against women with children would have a big impact on wider social problems.

It's crap isn't it. I was lying awake at five this morning thinking about how very very useful it would be if I could earn more money for the family. However having spent this morning looking at websites for part time work with a view to fitting round school hours all I can find are cleaning jobs.

The money would barely cover the childcare costs I would have to pay for my two dds in the meantime. No offence to cleaners but I would really rather find something that makes my degree worthwhile. TBH I'm really hacked off. I left my well-paid, highly respectable career to stay at home with my children during their early years and now the door as well and truly slammed shut behind me.

I'd be a rubbish cleaner anyway.

LadyMacbeth - commiserations. No-one benefits from your situation. Certainly not you but also clearly not society which has now squandered your qualifications and experience.
Don't want to be a man-hater but oh how different the world would be if women had more power and control.

ScoobyC, I actually think in someways it might be worse because some women, like my old boss, can't stand to see other women progress, especially if they are more able than them. They are too insecure in themselves to accommodate competition.

Who heard our very own Justine from MNHQ talking about this very subject on 5 Live this morning?
There were a couple of women on that phone-in who were against the whole idea that women should work and be allowed to bring up children...surprisingly. Still, the debate made the time pass more quickly as I sat in an awful queue on the M4 trying to get to the office!

I work in a highly male-dominated industry, but on the plus side I work for a very large American company and women are treated very well with regard to flexible working etc.

I see it as the problems of the "ME" society.
Don't these workers without children realise that we the "mothers" used to be childless and most of us have contributed to society by paying our taxes for X amount of years before having children.
Children should be seen as part of society and not as a burden.
And i agree with Lady MacBeth, there are hardly any P/T jobs out there except as cleaners.
Oh, yes of course these full-time childless workers could in fact employ us to clean their homes as they are obviously much more important than us because they make money!
The way things are there should be a law against discrimination against workers with famillies as they are the ones MOST in need of a job/career as they have a familly to care for.
And the tabloids are always harking on about getting single mothers into work, blah, blah, blah.
But NO-ONE will give you a job!
This all sucks big time. Sorry had to get that off my chest.
AB

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I'm finding increasingly, that 'childfree' actually means 'childhater'.

People wouldn't have these attitudes if we just had neutral rights and benefits - all adults allowed say 6 weeks on 90% pay (maternity and paternity pay rates) say 3 times in your career so if you don't have children you can spend it doing something else.

Some employers also allow unpaid time off and workers can use that for childcare or their cruise round the Med or whatever which is fair.

I must say I never faced discrimination. I was even hired in my last place when 5 months pregnant and with 2 children under 3. So must depend on your sector etc. Now men shortly can take 6 months paternity leave I wonder if they will also be discriminated against in the same ways - up to the wives to make sure by the way they equally take it to try to rid this country of its sexism.

Just 6 weeks? I would say we need 12 months maternity/paternity leave on full pay. I worked and paid tax for 14 years before having DTS and so 12 months at home with them on full pay would have been very welcomed and I would have been more relaxed on returning to work than I was when they were 7 months.

i havent read the full thread, but i think mgrs and workers should all try to chill out and give eachother a bit of leeway. All of us are pressured at work whether we have children or not, employers expect so much of their employees these days, is a bit of give and take to much to ask from eachother? What may seem important to one person may not be important to another. If we tried to be decent at work perhaps it wouldnt matter so much that the legal side of things can be a bit pants

Excellent post, ScoobyC 12:22:42!

I didn't realise Justine was on the radio! DH listens to 5 Live so might have had it on this morning, but I was rushing to get ready.
It seems some of us can't win - the gvt try and push mothers back into work, but when we do want to/need to, unless we're lucky we can't find a decent job which would cover the childcare costs. My employer has been great, which is partly why I'm still in this job - but I already had the job when I became pregnant. I doubt I'd have had the same benefits (homeworking, part time) as a new employee - my boss would have employed someone else instead, which in some ways I can understand as my firm is so small.

I think it's interesting that women with kids suffer the most discrimination, followed by Asian women. I have an impression that public debate/govt policy on discrimination sees racism as the top priority and sexism has been sidelined. Maybe time for a rethink?

Having worked for several large companies, and two different ones since having kids, I have to say that the thing I found most distasteful was the sort of hidden/ unspoken discrimination that went on. So, for example:

• meetings/ 'social' events/ conferences which were arranged at short notice (VERY difficult for working parents)
• the exepectation that people could/would work through to 10pm if necessary
• even some of the deep-seated discrimation by male managers who ought to have known better. In one of my previous jobs I was offered redundancy, and my boss's comment to me was "I thought you'd be pleased - after all, you said you wanted to spend more time with the kids... (I'd previously applied for more flexible working)

Most of the time working mothers are feeling knackered, have had their confidence battered, and they won't always realise the discrimination is happening around them. There is also a culture of 'you should be grateful you've got a job at all'.

A (female) friend of mine is under threat of redundancy at the moment. One of the criteria that will be applied to decide who gets made redundant will be absence levels. She has never been off sick, but has had to take some time off with her daughter, so she is worried that this will affect her position.

But the reason some women have a poor employment record is because they don't arrange their personal lives properly AND they let sexism exist at home and let their husbands ride rough shod over them and let themselves always put their career second. If you have two people at work whatever the sex and one has an appalling work record and the other doesn't surely i t's perfectly reasonable to prefer the one who turns up on time, male or female, because they have a good nanny at home, are prepared to pay for that and excell at their work. If you're the best in the office they never sack you, believe you me. Excellence wins out.

i dont undestand employers who give a shit whether your 10mins late - as long as you work your hours.

flexble employment is the answer - no matter how well prepared one is - when your kids arn't at boarding school, you dont have a nanny, a cleaner and an aupair and your daughter needs the dentist becuase of an abcess you have to take her. if then you son has stomach pains so intense he needs to go to hospital becuase of the stomach lining - then that too has to be solved, if then your grandmother who raised you is dying and you are told it's the last time to see her before she goes. and you have to travel to do so then it must be done.

the fact that this happens all in two weeks and each thing is ongoing is rather out of my control.

all i can do is stay in my fucking shitty job becuase my boss isn't overly arsey. becuase no matter how organised or not i am. somethings always happens

Xenia, I just want a feckin' job that involves having a brain. I do not wish to work full time because (sigh) I enjoy being with my children. I could not afford a great nanny even on my last salary (exasperated sigh). I do not consider the fact that I have chosen to stay at home with my beautiful children to be sexism on my dh's behalf.

I would also argue that I am more employable than a childless 31 year old who's about to go off and have children in the next few years. Because I may wish to work around school hours but I would also be a valuable asset to a company because I have experience, intelligence, and possibly just possibly I have a greater sense of responsibity than your average childless Joe (I haven't had a sick day in bed for three years now!).

I'd be cheaper too as my hours would be shorter. Not all jobs take 40 hours up every week, at least 10 is spent pissing about on the Internet!