What could the Government do to support families where one parents wants to stay at home?

[puddle]

This has been mentioned on the thread about 'wraparound' school hours. Many posters are saying it's a good idea as long as it is coupled with Government support for families that want to have one person working and the other at home.

What kind of support do people mean and how would it make a difference? What can the Government really do to make being at home a viable option for families?

[Tortington]

whilst i wholeheartedly agree with you caligula - thats not how society is constructed. its constructed to force people to work, its constructed towards consumersim to the detriment of others. the myth that money = good, better, superior. the shiny car, the mortgage, the laura ashley furniture, the designer clothes and the highly expensive seeweed wraps, whole industries around "pampering", forever cheaper supermarkets who force closure of local shops, the 20p teatowel at the expense of some kid in columbia, investments, stocks shares, get more buy more spend more.

if you do not participate in this society as per the above rules - you are already rich enough to do so or poor enough to be in receipt of benefits.

we cannot change a whole society and its capitalist ethos - the govt is not about to say " hold n a minute - i have ust bought some buddha beads and it got me thinking....stay at home and look after yourkids if you want - free josh sticks and sandles all round"

in a capitalist society you must make money - hence whole govt industires to help with childcare after school care,breakfast clubs, sure start clubs. the govt isn't in the business of encouraging people to do otherwise

[Caligula]

Custardo I don't think you can ever sort the wheat from the chaff. There will always be arseholes in society; the reason why we don't have perfect societies, after centuries of philosophical discussion on how to construct a perfect society, is because human beings are imperfect. There will always be bad people around ready to play the system, whatever system you have. But that's no reason we should construct the system (whichever one) around those people.

[TwinSetAndPearls]

I live in an area with a very high teenage mum rate and work in family support so deal with these issues on a daily basis.

As custardo said, teenagers who get pregnant soley to get a council house, or more often a room in a hostel have very low expectations in life. If they keep these expectations they will go on to have more children. By giving them somewhere to live, perhaps out of the environment which led them to think being a teenage mum would be a good life choice, and an education we are raising their life chances and giving them an oppurtunity to succeed in a way other than having sex and babies. This must be a good thing, it may not work in every case, but surely it is worth it for the cases it does work in.

AS for mothers being at home on benefits I work with many women in this situation and see them being approached/pressuerd to going back to work. Many of these women are very vulnerable and are barely coping with the stresses of their life as it is, adding employment into the equation will not help. By being out of work they are able to access services which build their confidence, become better parents and build skills so eventually they can enter the job market. My main concern here is for the children, in many cases they are better of with a parent at home accessing services which will result in an improved home environment which will in turn result in a happy well adjusted adults twenty years down the line. Hopefully then the chain of deprivation will be broken and these young sdults will be contributing to the state purse rather than taking.

[Tortington]

i think if your thinking is that you will have a baby who you will be solely responsible for for the rest of your life so you can get a house and free childcare to got o college - then you have seriously low life standard expectations which is a larger question in itself. thats why the TPU's educate teenagers into having a greater hope and career choice than having a baby.

and anyone wanting a baby who comes from a poorer background will realise that having a child will be more likely to keep you in poverty than not.

i have always told my kids, that if they want money - dont have kids. that doesn't mean you can't raise children on a low income.

however my argument is exactly this.

when is it ok to pay mums to be good little laura ashlyites and colour with their kids - and when are you paying scoungers who can't be arsed getting a job? how does one sort the wheat from the chaff?

[horseshoe]

I agree with you there and I think unforseen situations do arise.

I guess my point is aimed more at the people who do not consider financial situations at all. I know one too many people that worry about what they are going to do on maternity leave for 3 months. To me that shows no financial awareness what so ever.

A friend of mine for example does not work, her DH works when bothered and yet she suprised me in how much she received in benefits such as council tax and rent benefits and tax credits. There is absolutely no desire for her to go out and work and as long as the government keep giving. She will stay at home.

My local council also provide housing and free childcare to mothers under 19 so that they can attend college or school and whilst I do not disagree with young mothers I laughed when the council reported that we have one of the highest teen rate pregnancies in the UK. Of course we do!!

I think the govenrment are very eager to improve mothers incomes so that they have more choice. However, I dont see how they are currently going about it helps. The childcare voucher is automatically the childs at 18! What if my child heavens forbid is experimenting with drugs at that age. Do I really want them to get instant access to cash?? Wouldn't the government of been better off investing it into universities and making places more affordable for youngsters?

[Caligula]

The problem with that, horseshoe, is that people's financial situation can change. And also, they make decisions based on future expectations which may not be fulfilled. Most of us take out mortgages expecting our income to get better over the years. Not many couples take out mortgages anticipating a fall in income (although perhaps they should).

I agree with you on housing though - I really think for most people, housing costs are the single biggest factor in their decision making. (For most people, the mortgage is the single biggest outgoing.)

[horseshoe]

I'll probably get blasted for saying this but IMO people who chose to have kids should be aware of their finacial state before making the decision to have them.

Dont get me wrong...I completely back plans to give extra maternity pay, leave etc but at what cost to women??? Employers especially small businesses will be very choosy about women that they employ and how can a interviewee prove that the reason they were turned down was because they were of child bearing age?

Tax credits to me only seem to benefit people on lower incomes where only one or even both parents do not work and yet many people on reasonable incomes still cannot afford to drop half their incomes.

therefore I think affordable housing is the key as it seems to be the brunt of many issues. Other than if the individual is fairly debt free and housing is affordable than that should help.

[Tortington]

i think that would have a lot to do with the goodwill of the employer - whether you could cut your hours down - and not a lot of people would be able to access it.

[Orinoco]

Message withdrawn

[Caligula]

Quite right Prufrock.

I recently totted up my latest tax credits and worked out that the level of government subsidy I receive for working, has now equalled the amount I would receive if I were on the dole.

In August, when DD will go one extra day to nursery, the tax credit I receive will actually come to more than the dole.

Meaning that it is more expensive for the taxpayer to keep me working and my DD in nursery, than it is to allow me to claim income support and look after my own child. That's pretty effective targetting and a pretty clear message.

[Prufrock]

But zebra - the govt is encouraging parents to go out to work, thereby diminishing the full time childcarer role. They are already targeting quite effectively

[wordsmith]

Zebra!!! Hi!

[zebraZ]

wordsmith (do you feel important, dear? ) pointed out flexitime... right now I work flexitime which is a Godsend to me... If one of my children is ill on my usual workday, I can just work my hours another day. I don't see how Wrap-Around childcare (thru the school) will help -- presumably they won't take ill children. And yes I would send my ill child to childminder if CM and child didn't mind, but then sometimes the childminder or one of her own children is ill, and I have to shift my hours around again.

Honestly, when my current job finishes I don't see how I will get any other work (other than selling things, and I don't do selling) that really fits with childcare.

Otherwise, bizarrely enough, I agreed with Gobblidigook... I don't feel comfortable about the govt. "encouraging" one parent to stay at home particularly (or not). I would prefer not to have such targetted interference.

[Tortington]

lol pru - you're probably right.

blu- by my reckoning at papier mache pheasants having a value of £5 each you could get a packet of ciggies for that - OR we could just pay poor people in ciggies we could introduce the ciggie living allowence (CLA)

[Chuffed]

serenity your last sentence hit the nail on the head!

[serenity]

I like the idea of transferring tax allowances. If we could do that I could give up my evening job, and be a 'proper' SAHM rather than an incredibly knackered SAHM whose too tired to do all the things she wants to do.

I get irritated with the fact that I can claim money so that someone else can look after my children, but I can't just pay it to myself to look after them, if that makes any sense?

[wordsmith]

Personally I think tax allowances should be transferrable when you have children, so if one parent wants to stay at home the family will automatically be about £4.5K better off.

It's just not good enough to say, GDG, that we chose to have children therefore we should not expect any help looking after them. Quite honestly that's only an argument that those on reasonable incomes without crippling mortgages can afford to make. It may be idealistically pure but practically it would mean that fewer people would have children, and in 20 or so years time there would be fewer to pay tax and fund pensions, social services etc for people like us now!

I think the answer to the questions is "I wouldn't start from here!" - it's not just the government but employers and society as a whole which needs to radically change if we are to start seeing parents and families valued. I think the government has done a lot already through the tax credits system. Yes of course more could be done (ie the transferrable tax allowance) and I'm sure we'll get there eventually...

And again, personally speaking, I don't think the ideal should be for one parent to stay at home, but for both parents to be able to work part-time or more flexibly and be treated as a family unit rather than just a breadwinner and a dependent. I think it would provide a more balanced home life, set a healthier example to our children (boys and girls) and stop some people implying that higher education and good careers for girls are a waste of time if "all they're going to do is get married and have children" - a viewpoint commonly expressed by some employers!

[milward]

Give sahm's a sahd's a break from looking after their kids - just like when at work you get a lunch break etc!!! I have no family to support me looking after my kids. My dh does a great job but works long hours so I'm in the frontline most of the time. We couldn't get any places at childminders as I don't work. We had to find the cash to pay for a private school that looks after kids from 18 months as I just needed to have a short break. My dd goes 4 mornings a week & I can see how much she enjoys this.

[Caligula]

Great post TSaP - remind me to go mad!

I think the fact that there are a minority of loonies who parent badly (and possibly dress badly too) is a bit of a red herring. You could make the same argument about child benefit - why not abolish it, because some parents are rubbish at parenting? In fact, you could make it of practically any institution you like. Why not abolish free universal education because some kids won't do their homework? Why not abolish the NHS because some people insist on smoking, eating fatty food and not exercise? Why not abolish income support, because some people will cheat? I don't think you can organise society from the starting point that a minority are always going to abuse things which are laid out for the good of the majority - of society as a whole.

[TwinSetAndPearls]

I don't often agree with Custardo, being one of her pinko guardianista laura ashley ( well more boden actually) paper mache wearing types but she has a point.

As a SAHM I can see the benefits that my daughter has got from me being at home, I am deeply worried by our trend in society to hand our children over to the state from breakfast until tea time - if not later, it is all very Orwellian. WE send our children to school far earlier than most other countries and now we want them to stop their longer, not in the name of education but wealth creation. I think the government should be doing more to enable a parent to stop at home if they wish - but how to do this is so problematic.

I have often thought like flashingnose that we could rework the tax credits system so everyone got a payment and it was up to you if you wanted to spend it on childcare or assisting a parent to stop at home.

But I know lots of parents who quite frankly are just crap and there parenting borders on abuse, I am aware that I have a very rose tinted view of what parenting is and assume that all parents raise their children in a similar way to myself - but they don't and the state paying families to provide a crap childhood is a road nobody wants to go down. I suppose we could go back to the nineteenth century and parenting classes ( another idea new labour has knicked) but then the state is still ruling our homes, telling us how to raise our children which isn't much better than the children's centres being planned at the moment.

I have been fortunate enough to go bonkers a few years ago enabling me to claim sickness benefits that could enable me to stop at home without living in absolute poverty, not everyone is this lucky I was then able to ensnare a man who could support my daughter and myself but we have had to make a lot of sacrifices and the pot is now empty. The word pension sends shovers down my spine. I am now registering as a childminder so I can remain at home for a few more years. Childminding in our local area is presented as a way off benefits for SAHM which although fine and admirable in many cases has also resulted the most unsuitable people becoming childminders just because it suits the government aim of cheap childcare and less people relying on benefits.

Maybe there isn't an answer to this problem maybe SAHMdom is going to remain the privelidge of the mad, poor and wealthy!

[Blu]

Not if she's goping to shoot the bloody papier mache pheasants, we couldn't!

[Prufrock]

No it isn't Blu - but it is on "our" governments agenda - you know the one whereyou are PM, custy is chancellor, I'm DWP. We could have Lav as minister for rural affairs.....

[puddle]

Just come back to this thread! Very funny post custardo. It's been interesting reading.

I started the thread because in all the threads about working vs staying at home this seems to be raised as an issue ie the Government are doing lots to encourage us to get back innto the workplace and they should be balancing it with support for those who choose to stay at home. I have never been able to think of how that might work in practice and, despite the many ideas on this thread, I still can't.

[Blu]

You're right.
Actually, I think patricia hodge's proposal for HV's to dispense opium to children of working mothers (sic) ony means that the opium will end up fuelling the black marhet in papier mache pheasants, or being sold to unemployed youths in hoodies.

Seriously, is this AT ALL on the gvts agenda? I thought that the main purpose behind 'family friendly' working practices was to keep as many parents as possible in the job market, which fuels a strong economy (inc high house prices) etc etc.

[Prufrock]

Custy - yeah of course you'll get some people who keep on having kids so that they have one under five and can claim - but IMHO anyone who is willing to have another toddler to get a few hundred quid a month bloody deserves the money - or sectioning