Stay at home mums on benefits

[Jenny2998]

I am 21,single, and am currently bringing up my 2 children ( 8months, and 3 years) on benefits.

I made the decision to be at home with my kids because i feel it is incredibly important during the first years of their lives.

i don't like being on benefit, but currently cannot find any way around it - i have been trying unsuccessfully to find work at home for the past 3 years. i am keen to become a childminder so that i can support my family, but in the flat we live in at the moment that is just not possble.

so, until the situation changes one way or another i will remain on benefits. The most important thing to me is my children, and i am all too aware that if i did choose to go out to work and miss out on their childhoods, that i would never get this time back.

so, am i to be condemned as a scrounger just because i want the best for my kids? what are your thoughts?

Jenny2998, it sounds as if you are trying to do the best you can for your children, and I doubt you would find many people on Mumsnet who would condemn you for that. People end up on benefits for all sorts of reasons, it's not always a choice. Benefits are supposed to provide a safety net to support people when they need help.
Good luck with your plans.

As long as you have been looking for work you haven't done anything wrong. But if you aren't then that's something else altogether.

Jenny you do not sound very scrounger like to me! Your children are very young and it sounds as though you are doing what is best for them .
Are you coping okay with the demands of looking after two young children on your own? You will find mumsnet an excellent source of emotional support as wall as a good place to get things off your chest!
Do you have much practical support? Do your mum or dad or any friends help you with the children?What about the childrens father?
Are you enjoying being a mum?
I hope you dod not mind me asking, but do you find it easy to make ends meet on benefits?
Very best wishes to you and your children.In no time at all they will be at school and that puts a whole new complexion on things.

Jenny, in my book you're Superwoman! Bringing up kids with the bare minimum of dosh can be really hard, especially if you haven't got much support either. I can't think of a better reason to pay taxes than to help families out when they need it.
I hate the way people on benefits are stigmatised sometimes. YOU ARE NOT A SCROUNGER. Unless you can get fairly well-paid employment it's just not financially viable to work when you've got 2 young children to pay childcare fees for.
If you're really keen to run with the childminding idea you might be surprised at the flats that get through the inspection process. I've been registered as a childminder for 6 months or so and was convinced that our small flat would not make the grade. However, apart from shaming me up big time by ordering me to clean the fridge(!), the inspector was fine about it and seemed much more interested in my experiences with kids.

In my book single mums who make the decision to survive on benefits in order to spend time with their children deserve a medal, not the stigmatisation they sometimes undeservedly get. Best of luck!

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Jenny, I agree with so much that has been said here. Being a single parent surviving on benefits is a very hard position to be in. Easier said than done (I know I nearly threw my radio out of the window on several occasions as politicians made sweeping statements about single parents ) but try not to take personally the generalised comments that can be banded about.

Jbr, why should any single parent with young children have to look for work? Your comment IMHO is very naive. Parenting two small children is a hard job whatever ones circumstances and feeling that one has to look for a job is no help whatsoever. Seeking paid work or not as a mother is a matter of personal choice but it is so far from cut and dried, without a support system, a network of people who could care for ones children in times of illness or holidays... one has little choice in this situation!!

Jenny, as a one time single mother my advice to you would be enjoy your children, make the most of the time - maybe do a part time course at your local college (there will be a creche, it will give you a break and it will help you look to the future and also help you meet people). Children are small for such a small amount of time. Before you know it they will both be at school and your perspective may have changed and you may want an added dimension to your life. My child was three (and of starting school age where we lived) and I went off to university which was the best thing I ever did for the future of both of us.

Like Robinw, I would add don't assume any parent - working or not - is not doing the best they can for their children because it is different from your personal choice. Being non judgemental works both ways.It works both ways.

However, good luck and best wishes, Winnie

I agree Jbr - Jenny's youngest is only 8 months old, and Jenny is doing what she considers to be the best thing for her children. I'm married and my dh works full-time but I stay at home with my 16 month old daughter, does this mean that I am scrounging off him? We also receive Working Families Tax Credit which we wouldn't get if I was working. But like Jenny, I want to be at home with my daughter until she is at least two, then I may consider getting a p/t job whilst she is at nursery.

I never thought you'd be the one to make a judgement about somebody Jbr.

Sorry, that should read I agree with Winnie, not with Jbr!

Jenny2998,

I am a single working mother of 4 and I deeply regret having so little time with my children, they grow so fast.

Enjoy the time you have with your children and don't let anyone make you feel like a scrounger, you're not because you are doing the best you can for your children.

You're young, your life may have changed completely within the next 6 months! (I'm still hoping that mine will...)

Good Luck.

It depends what benefits you are on. If we are talking JSA then you have to actively seeking work to claim it legitimately. And being a "mum" isn't the issue, I would say a dad should be looking as well - where viable.

Plus what's wrong with going to Uni at 18?

Jbr, Jenny will be on income support which is not given out with the premise that you are looking for work like JSA is. She will get help from the job centre if she wants to look for work and details on training for work if she wants to but will not be forced into it. I know this because I am in the same situation as Jenny (my only child being nearly 2). When considering the option of returning to work I had to make some quick calculations in my head, this is how it stood for me: I was working a 40-48 hr week and taking home approx £140-160 a week. During the breakdown of my relationship with dd's father I had to move back to my parent's home (it was his house we lived in). So at 7 months pg I was travelling a round trip of 120 miles to work every day (at the cost of around 50-60 pounds per week)and taking an hour each way. When my maternity leave was up (dd was 10 weeks old) it didn't take me long to figure out that returning to work wasn't only uneconomical but down right stupid. Who would put themselves through that to get virtually the exact same of money by claiming benefits with a 11 week old baby? (Literally I'd have been a tenner better off!)

Like Jenny I'm not proud to be on benefits and I don't like the fact that I'm a statistic, but there comes a point when common sense takes over and you realise that you are just doing the best you can by your child. Ok, some people (jbr) could argue that by now with my child age nearly two I could've got myself some form of work and you are probably right. I get to keep just £15 of those wages while claiming income support and to qualify for working families tax credit I need to be working over 16 hours a week, something I didn't want to do at the start because as my daughter only sees one of her parents I wanted to make the most of my time with her. More recently, however, this is something that I have thought about doing but instead I have decided to go back to university and get my degree with a view to going on to teacher training. I want to accomplish this for two reasons 1, with dd's father having no contact with us (and having no luck with the CSA making him pay anything towards his daughter) I am going to be the main wage earner in her life so I would like to have a decent, graduate wage in order to do this. 2, I want my daughter to have a good role model in her life and I can only hope that she will see this in me when I tell her about our start in life. I do not think for one minute that she will look down upon me for claiming benefits for her first 3 yrs of life. Therefore I am currently studying hard on an access course to get into uni next Oct and for my own personal reasons I work voluntarily in comprehensive schools for 1 hour a week with the NSPCC.

Sorry, I don't know who this little monologue was aimed at, partly at Jenny because I know how you're feeling and it annoys that people very quickly pigeon hole you for being a single SAHM on benefits. Partly at Jbr for suggesting that Jenny must be actively looking for work, although if you genuinely only thought you could claim benefits if that were the case and you were just mistaken then fair enough. All I'm suggesting is that you need to look further than what a person looks like on paper, how much they earn and what their intentions for the future of their family are...

Right rant over, I suddenly feel very empowered!

Just to second Winnie's suggestion about finding a study course at a uni or college with a creche facility. My husband did this for a year (I work full time) enrolling in a vocational course. Our son was aged about two-and-a-half when he started going to college with his father, and he really enjoyed himself at the excellent, and highly subsidised, college creche. A good friend of mine with a one year-old is now going down the same route. She is doing a degree and her university allowed her to do one year full time, and the other years part time to fit in with her child care wishes.

What I'm saying is there seems to be lots of flexiblity out there, with creche places available for all sort of long and short courses, vocational or not. However, both my husband and my friend found places are very limited, so you need to plan well in advance - ie now for next September. If the creche is full, it's definitely worth going on the waiting list. In our case we were on the waiting list for a few months, then as different people failed to start their courses, a creche place become available before the start of my husband's course.

PS, Jenny, I definitely wouldn't say you were a scrounger. I can imagine how hard you work at your job of bringing up two young children on a tight budget.In suggesting college, I'm thinking of your age. At 21 years you've got such a lot of future ahead of you. Unfortunately, and not your fault at all, I think your benefit situation is most likely to change for the better if you set the ball rolling.

I too admire anyone trying to bring up their kids on benefits. I stay at home partly because I enjoy being with my daughter and partly because childcare in London (with no family anywhere near) is so expensive that it hardly makes sense to go back for the moment. I'm bloody lucky that I have a choice. My partner has a good job which means I can take my daughter to classes, swimming, etc, and the cost certainly adds up. I know there are numerous things that you can do for free too but it's quite nice to go to a regular class and see familiar faces and then make friends etc.
What I do wonder sometimes, until I stop myself and think a bit, is why people who are already struggling financially then going on and having more children and this is whether on benefits or struggling on a wage. BUT I know life is not black and white, does not go to plan, we have feelings, people have numerous reasons such as wanting their children to be a similar age, wanting them close together so they can then get back to work sooner, thinking you are with a terrific person and then it turns out you're not, that it wasn't planned but then being very much wanted. I think people sometimes just don't want to see anymore than black and white and we all need to look a bit deeper sometimes, myself included.
I hope I don't sound patronising or offensive and I do wish you luck with whatever you do in the future.

Like Janus, I was lucky enough to be able to stay home while my kids were small because my dh earned enough for us to manage - just. Though as they got older and more expensive I did need to go out to work; for most of the last 12 months I was on longterm sick leave with no pay and we are quite deeply in debt because of it, so I understand a bit about that kind of choice.
I work for a supermarket and quite a few of the mothers there are on their own and getting various kinds of state support; most of their kids are school-age, so they don't need full-time parenting, but their mothers' hours are limited because of the benefit restrictions - for instance one of them (youngest child 10) has just been promoted but a)doesn't want extra hours because her time with her kids is restricted as it is and b) wouldn't get any more money anyway because her benefits would shrink as her wage increased AND she feels her family would suffer from her absence.
Your children are very small and if you can manage financially on the benefits you get - which aren't generous, I bet - then what you are doing is the best gift you can ever give them. It can't be easy fot you, being the only parent - I know I couldn't do it. I think you are very brave and I hope that when they're older you'll be able to find a job that pays well and fits in with what you want to do. You are doing a fantastic job. Good for you!

Janh the example you gave is one I've seen a number of times, where the mother has children of school age and yet still doesn't work full time or even at all. The excuse is they will lose their benefits and this really annoys me. I don't want state benefits going to people that COULD work, only they've got used to not, and can use the excuse that they want to be home for their children. This also means they're at home all day doing sod all when they don't have to be.

Its shocking that parents can get benefits until their children are 16, without having to lift a finger to find work. That money could go to those with younger children who really have no choices. I think the problem is that while there are real scroungers like that who take advantage of the taxpayer, mothers like Jenny who are in genuine need, get tarred with the same brush and get all the flack!!!

..grrr

Lil thank you, that is so true. I feel tarred, I really hate the way I look on paper and the way some people react when I ask for a concessionary ticket to wherever. At first they act fine, and assume they see me as a well-presented young mother (mmm, pushing it with the 'young' bit at 26 I know, but let me dream...!)The very mark of surface respectability, but as soon as they find out I qualify for a reduced rate I get an altogether frostier approach in some circumstances. To be honest I don't care too much what they think of me, but its the way they make me feel that is the problem.

Funnily enough when I have to get in touch with the benefits agency for any reason I get treated like a queen! I suppose that sometimes they have to deal with a few less than savoury characters, and they get a real shock at my politeness and understanding!
Its a funny old world

Just to follow on from the ideas about childcare at college. I am over the moon at the facilities provided by my University of choice, and when enquiring about charges they informed me that with me having a low income I will only have to pay 20% of the costs. Its really well worth a look into...

This is really difficult. I agree with both Janh and Lil. IMO, while goverment support of mothers with young children is one thing, it's madness that mothers of older children can't work longer hours because the reduction in benefits means they will be no better off. I thought the government had been addressing the latter issue, making it economically viable for a single parent of older children to return to full time work. How naive of me. Sigh!

This is quite an interesting discussion because it basically boils down to "do we have the right not to work?" I'm not really sure where I stand on this. It seems to me that society is happy for people not to be in paid employment as long as someone is footing the bill for them. It would also seem that a set of criteria has been roughly set for when we deem that circumstances outside of someone's control prevent this situation from occurring and then the state foots the bill.
Hmmm, I'm not really sure where my rambling is going. Typing while I think really. What do others think? Do we have the right not to work (be in paid employment)?

Surely everyone has to earn their own living, IF THEY ARE ABLE. So I would have thought that you cetainly have the right not to work, if you are not a burden to those of us that are working.

However, if you're unfortunate enough to find yourself redundant society has a duty to support you and you have a duty to find a job ASAP. The issue of benefit mums is similar. if circumstances lead to you being a single mother with no means of support and in need of help, then society should help, as long as the mother tries to help herself as soon as she is sensibly able?

If all people were socially minded this wouldn't be an issue would it? But there's plenty of selfish people around who expect to be given a free ride. I think that intentionally having a child when you know you can't support it, is surely as bad as intentionally packing your job in with the idea of not working for a few years!!

When you think of all the mums on mumsnet who agonise about having their second/third child in case they can't afford it, it is more than irritating to watch single mothers go on to have more children whilst on benefits. Surely the right to reproduce does NOT come before the rights of the tax-paying mums !!

(I hope this doesn't sound too daily-mailish - its not meant to!)

Bugsy, I'm not sure where I stand on this either. I think if you are a jobless single parent for whatever reason, you should be entitled to benefits that give you and your children at least a minimum standard of living. Otherwise it's not fair for parents who happen to live in areas where jobs are scarce, or in very remote places without good public transport to get them to work.

However, I definitely think that single parents who choose to work should ALWAYS end up better off for their labours. Now where's that ticket to Utopia?

All children have "full time parenting". It doesn't even stop when the kids leave home!

Surely everyone has to earn their own living, IF THEY ARE ABLE.

Precisely!

Lil, the example I gave was of mothers who do work, while their children are at school, but who would prefer not to have to be at work outside school hours, or at least not every day. Most of them work 20-24 hours a week. There are a couple with pre-school children, one of whom lives alone and relies on her mother for minding; the other lives with her mother, her brother and her partner and they manage between them.

I think there are 2 big issues here. One is that however good and competent and kind a childminder may be, she's never going to care about someone else's child the way its mother will, and if children grow up feeling secure and loved they are less likely to behave badly when they're older - so surely it's worth it to society to help mothers financially to stay with their children as long as they can.

The other point is - if you're going to come over all draconian and say girls shouldn't be encouraged financially to have and keep their babies (as opposed to the other kind of single mothers who started out in a relationship) then what you're really saying is that they should have an abortion or give the baby up for adoption or make their parents support them.

Suppose this hypothetical feckless pregnant child is your own daughter at 15, 16, 17 - what do you do then?