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Lone parents

Use our Single Parent forum to speak to other parents raising a child alone.

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Original poster

benefit changes??????????

225 replies

mummylou85 · 06/03/2009 23:09

Just wondering if anyone else is worried about changes in income support. I think by 2010 the age will be brought down to 7 if not found job benefits be stopped then if not found job it's job seekers? what do you all think of these changes. i'm happy towork but I have no family to look after my daughter? so in sept i'm goingback to finish my course in child care but what if I don't get job out of there. my daughter only 3 now but it's hard out there to get jobs these days especially to fit around children.

I know on job seekers you have to go on many courses, what if these are not child friendly but you have to go you get no money.

staying on benefits is not long term thing for me, I have worked payed taxes in past. but is anyone worried about future, in past didnt matter on what job i did and hours but now fitting it around my daughter. I really scared about job seekers are they child friendly. I stress about everything i'm sorry, but I think these changes take away your rights on how to parent I really think these changes in benefits wont work and i'm worried. i am stresser though x

OP posts:

Are your children’s vaccines up to date?

Set a reminder

HelpwithNameNeeded · 06/03/2009 23:12

Neither of my neighbours work, they have five children. Hes been on job seekers fo years and hes never been on a course or job interview so I wouldnt wory about it too much

FAQinglovely · 06/03/2009 23:16

I don't see anything wrong with it - there's after school care available (although you may need to get their name down early in some areas) and I don't seee any reason why a single parent can't find a job (or indeed why they shouldn't find a job) once their youngest DC has already been at school for 2yrs.

Stretch · 06/03/2009 23:21

Just out of interest FAQ, what do lone parents do about work in the summer holidays and easter, xmas etc..? Esp if you have no family available to help?

FAQinglovely · 06/03/2009 23:38

holidays clubs and schemes - again some areas (ie my town) you've got to make sure you've got their name down for it well in advance but they do exist,

TwoIfBySea · 06/03/2009 23:53

That was my opinion FAQ, until I became a single mother and discovered the reality is so much more different from the prejudice.

FAQinglovely · 06/03/2009 23:55

the reality is there's no reason for a single parent to still be at home at 7. The after school/before school facilities in this town are SH*T - but I'm certainly not going to use that as an excuse not to work.

HelpwithNameNeeded · 06/03/2009 23:56

Well there are two of us and I dont know how we will cope when DD starts school, we do not have enough leave to cover holidays thats for sure.

God knows how a single parent is expected to manage, esp. with the price of childcare

RockinSockBunnies · 06/03/2009 23:59

There's also the option of getting an au pair. I'm a lone parent, am studying now, but when I was working full-time I shared DD's room and had an au pair for a year (she had my room and en-suite ). If the au pair is registered, then you can claim Tax Credits for them, thus solving problems of paying for childcare and also enabling you to get a job where you don't have to worry about fitting in with the school day.

Failing that, almost all schools now provide Breakfast Clubs, After School Clubs and there's always lots of holiday schemes run by Local Authorities at very favourable rates (and all of the above are covered by Ofsted so can be claimed for by Tax Credits).

I don't see why, when lots of couples both have to work and juggle child-care, that lone parents can somehow exempt themselves with the excuse that they need to be at home by 3.30pm.

HelpwithNameNeeded · 07/03/2009 00:02

Arf at au pair on a minimum wage

skramble · 07/03/2009 00:03

I would love a proper job but, no after school care, no childminders, no spare room for an aupair.

Can't seem to get a job regardless of childcare, this week I have been turned down by the jobcentre and a cafe.

I am studying and waork part time, but can't seem to get a proper job, and if I did the kids would have to be latch key.

FAQinglovely · 07/03/2009 00:04

that's why she's saying get them registered and you can get the childcare element of the Tax Credits.

TwoIfBySea · 07/03/2009 00:05

Well I suppose if it makes people feel better to give a good social kicking to those of us going through difficult circumstances.

Of course I should find it easy to get a job that pays enough to actually live off of considering childcare costs are frightening around here. And I don't own my house so nix the au pair idea. And I don't live near family so again, no luck in the free childcare that I know a lot of couples and other single parents are blessed with.

Just lump us all together. Those of us who have, after paying in to the system for years, fallen down on our luck and those who don't work, have never worked and will never work. Because it makes it easier for you to stick the boot in then doesn't it.

And by the by, while those in well paid jobs were off enjoying a few years at uni I was working, bloody hard too. I'm now doing my degree, and I volunteer but don't let that worry you. Just hold that nasty prejudice that we are all one step away from the Jeremy Kyle show and hopefully it will make you feel better about your own lives.

GypsyMoth · 07/03/2009 00:05

We have no childcare for the over 8's here. Childminders don't take them. And only after school club is in lower sch of neighbouring village......so no chance for me. No breakfast clubs here and first bus outta here after sch drop off,gets into town for 9.45. So what would I do??

FAQinglovely · 07/03/2009 00:06

ermm and who exactly was that little tirade directed at????

skramble · 07/03/2009 00:07

ILoveTIFFANY sounds like me, really.

TwoIfBySea · 07/03/2009 00:08

Anyone who equates single parents with lazy lay-abouts who don't want to work.

Which is an awful lot of people.

Which is a sad reflection of our twisted society.

GypsyMoth · 07/03/2009 00:08

Skramble....... If mine were latch key then one of them would be murdered! No way..... Aged 14,12 and 10 with 2 others with a cm.......nightmare!

hobbgoblin · 07/03/2009 00:08

RockinSockBunnies, that is simply not true regarding wrap around care. It is a target set for 2010, and even then it will not be reached in many instances.

I am back at work because I love it but it is way harder as a lone parent to do the whole thing alone. Once you've dashed to work, done your hours, picked up children from after school club who moan every single night about you not being at the school gates sometimes, and then single handedly prepared dinner, done homework, houseowrk, laundry and made lunches you are half dead. Nobody shares the load. There is no dp to come and give you a break even once a week. Relentless hard work which takes up huge chunks of one's salary so that despite Tax Credits, many of us are working for peanuts.

It is not an easy option.

FAQinglovely · 07/03/2009 00:10

then get on to the schools to get a breakfast club sorted. - there was no breakfast club at the Junir school that DS1 attends until a few years ago when parents asked for one.

It became so popular (not just with chidren of working parents) that they recently started a "morning activity club" (which is just another of their "after school activities" - except it's held in the morning at the same time as breakfast club...and doesn't feed them.

FAQinglovely · 07/03/2009 00:10

and who exactly did that on this thread?? >>

TwoIfBySea · 07/03/2009 00:11

I'll never understand why there aren't more opportunities to work from home, I mean it should be viable for most of us but where are the employers with the initiative?

RockinSockBunnies · 07/03/2009 00:11

Not sure if anyone read my post, but I don't have a spare room either. I slept on a futon for the entire year whilst au pair had my room.

I rent my house, I don't own it. Not sure what difference it makes to having an au pair to stay. And the au pair is paid for by Tax Credits, as is any registered childcare that you use if you're a lone parent that works a minimum of 16 hours per week.

Also not sure who I'm supposed to be giving a 'social kicking' to, since I'm a single parent and have been since I became pregnant at 18. Am now 27, done my undergraduate degree, my MSc, worked and am now doing a law conversion. And I'm still a single parent, but I don't see why that means I shouldn't strive for a career.

HelpwithNameNeeded · 07/03/2009 00:13

Many lone parents want to work IMO but its just not a viable financial option

RockinSockBunnies · 07/03/2009 00:13

HobbGoblin - I'm all too aware that it's not an easy option. I'm a lone parent!!!!

GypsyMoth · 07/03/2009 00:13

All these clubs seem to be aimed at towns.......there is nothing in our village at all. And it's 3 tier system here.... I have kids in upper sch,middle schand lower sch. If I worked then I would need to juggle a minded into that equation.......2eldest have braces,so ortodontists very regularly too..... I'd besacked within a month if I obtained work.

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