NOW CLOSED If parents ruled the world…what would make it into your 'Mummyfesto'? Share your thoughts and win £200 Love2shop voucher

[KatieBMumsnet]

To celebrate the launch of the new book, The Mummyfesto by Linda Green, we'd like to know what issues Mumsnetters would campaign for if parents were in charge.

Here's what the publishers of The Mummyfesto say: "Issues affecting and surrounding parents don't often come to the forefront of the political agenda - a recent survey by 23snaps revealed that 46% of parents don't think family issues get much attention from politicians. This is addressed in The Mummyfesto, a new book by Linda Green, in which three mums who campaign to save their local lollipop lady from redundancy discover that they are rather good at it."

So what would you like to see in world where parents are in charge? This can be anything from free childcare to Mumsnet replacing the House of Lords. We'd love to hear what you think - if parents ruled the world, how would we make it better? It could be something small and local or big and national, silly or deadly serious. Time to get creative!

Everyone who adds a comment to this thread will be entered into a prize draw to win a £200 Love2shop voucher.

Thanks and good luck,

MNHQ

Legal right to paid parental leave for childhood illness. Too many parents are forced to phone in sick themselves because their DCs are ill, or take their annual leave at a time when they need it most.
If a child has a notifiable illness, and cannot attend daycare or school, a parent should not be penalised for needing to be home with them. This goes for mums and dads, but should be recognised in law to protect parents from less, er, generous employers who think DCs are an inconvenience to be endured.

Gosh, yy to safe gritted pavements also their drop bit being parallel and sensibly placed

Mummyfesto.

Really? Gosh, I feel so empowered by that word. Oooo, maybe on my Mummyfesto would be cupcakes for everyone, cars that are really powered by fairy dust, and ensuring that all children are put on the Gifted and Talented register, so no one feels left out, and kittens for everyone. And ironing classes for us little ladies so our luvley hubbies have nice crease free shirts.

Must go and do some cleaning and cooking, wearing my pink apron.

name-vetting by the registrar (making sure names are spelt correctly and not ridiculous)

all students to study literacy and numeracy until they are functionally literate (too many kids are chair-warming their way through years of schools with a reading age that does not allow them to access the curriculum)

household management taught in schools - budgeting, cooking, etc because the students who will need it the moat due to their average earning potential are those least likely to learn it at home.

I would make the Primary school curriculum in the UK start at age 5 or age 6, not at age 4. Some children are advanced at age four - advanced enough to absorb learning to read and addition. But given my own experience with my DSD, and given the number of worried parents posting similar worried questions in the Primary Education forum, this is certainly not the case with every child. So, what is the point of having a curriculum that maybe half of a typical Primary 1/Reception class can absorb? The ones who are not taking it in are probably not all dyslexic, and being the youngest in the class is much bigger setback at age 4 than it is at age 5, 6 or 7. I also believe that a large proportion of four year-old children are not emotionally mature enough to handle a full school day - a lot of them at that age seem to need more one-on-one attention than a typical teacher:pupil ratio is able to provide. It should not be normal for your child to come home from his first year of school so cranky and burned out, that the only thing he wants to do is watch TV and not speak.

In my DSD's case, P1 started when she was 4.5 with no deferring because there were serious financial pressures to get her out of full-time nursery and away from its fees (the discount for her being in pre-school was just peanuts...). This financial pressure could be alleviated with a properly thought-out policy to reduce the costs of childcare for all families. If the UK government actually wants households where both parents work, it should subsidise high-quality childcare to the same degree that it subsidises education or the NHS.

Actually, if I had my way, there also would be some better financial incentives for one parent to stay home or at least seriously reduce their working hours. Having spent most of my adult life here, I've never actually seen for myself whether US-style tax deductions for dependents would make a difference or not, but it might be a start. As much as I agree childcare costs are insane and should be made affordable, it also drives me up a tree that I will have to subcontract the care of my own children to someone else.

Tax deductible childcare - this is totally do-able, done in other countries, and would help SO many people with such a minor change! If "the economy" wants people working, make it affordable to do so. This could be a big part of that. I think Canada does this.

Yes to senior positions being available part time, and a big huge YES to parental leave, with better funding, being sharable between the parents. Canada has this, too, incidentally... Imagine taking 6 months off WITH your DP! Or one, then the other.

No church funded schools, at all. People who want to raise their children to be religious can do so at home. Not CofE, not Muslim, not Catholic, none of them - it is entirely inappropriate, leads to social exclusion, and especially due to the local nature of school allocation, can lead to religion effectively pushed onto families that don't believe in it. All state-funded schools, academies included, to have INCLUSIVE admissions set and allocated by a neutral third party. No having meetings or open days to choose the DC you want. No black holes: expand schools where necessary. Yes, demographics change, but for the overwhelming majority of schools, 37 3.9-year-olds don't move into the same 100m in one month -- we know the demand is coming: plan for it. Fund it.

As for "mummyfesto", yes, it's not a great name, but I think a key point here is that this is not about "parents" - witness Cameron, Obama, etc. It's partly about mothers, who might (??) be more likely to actually put children first -- though not always; we vary, like any other group of people! It's about what might be good for families who make mostly normal wages and have not inherited wealth; what might work for people in families where both people work or where the mother works...

I would make it widely available thing for all new parents to go on a baby first aid course.

Ideals rather than Specific rules as such...

Ways to actively encourage flexible working for parents & non-parents alike... Echoing the presenteeism BS up thread...

Some ways to make life easier for single parent families, esp in terms of childcare.

Food: Improvements in school lunches, ban on advertising junk food before watershed; ban on sneaky marketing (don't know the term) to school children using information packs / resources which appeal to cash strapped schools, etc...

Ability to pay a grandparent for childcare to recognise them for their work; ditto SAHP's

Better access to adequate mental health services esp for those suffering from eating disorders

Anti-grooming & anti-bullying training for parents

Bit if a mixed bag but there you have it...

No idea, but mummyfesto is a nauseating phrase..

To make working from home realistically available to mums.
To teach children and some parents manners and respect.
Cheap child care where the ratios are fair - ( that's if the working from home thing doesn't happen !)

1. Free childcare for working parents
2. Help with mortgage downpayments for parents with children who work and do not have access to benefits
3. Free swimming, school clubs, school dinners for all children in school

A week in hospital, post birth, with expert advice on breastfeeding and settling, and time to rest, recover and get emotional support.

Oh my god Diamonds I hope your policy would be optional - I would have HATED that! Was so desperate to get home and learn how to bf in peace with DH bringing me food and drinks whenever I wanted :)

It's taken me 5 days to click on this because 'mummyfesto' is so enraging.

As others have said

Tax deductable childcare
Living wage
Ban on non food items in food (trans fats/aspartame etc) and a ban on advertising unhealthy additives as healthy.
Help with returning to work after a career break. I took ten years out from a very good job, there is no route back in so I am pushing 40 and my earning potential is half of what is was at 22.
Ban on shops selling mothers day cards where more than 95% of them are sickly pink and more than 99% of them have pictures of cupcakes/shoes/flowers/butterflies or any at all have pictures of teddy bears. They are for fucking adult women. My mother is a university lecturer, not a five year old with unusually poor taste.

all children should have one free sport per week to attend

Can we please create a world where having children is not seen as a problem that has to be dealt with?

This means that we all have to value the creation of a child and a family. It's a cultural issue, I think. How many of us have male partners who dote on their child/ren, yet in their workplace, have to be seen almost not to care? Because it's not appropriate to bring issues about your child/family into the workplace? This is especially the case for men, but also for women.

One of the greatest joys of running my own business is that I have been able to plan my diary around my family as much as I can. No longer did I have to pretend I didn't have children. No longer did I have to agonise about whether or not I dared write 'nativity play' into my diary. No longer did I have the angst and guilt about having to take time off (always me) if one of the children was ill?

Until we accept that the bringing up of children is a responsibility of all of us, and that it is important, then it will remain something that is a problem and laid at the doorstep of women, who - we all know - are less important than men.

Free childcare and better facilities/staff when in labour. Not a get them out asap approach they have.

I would like to see first aid and basic CPR taught in schools. Also basic infant resus taught in antenatal classes and how to deal with choking.

I would also like to make it illegal to put displays of sweets at supermarket checkouts.

Great post BIWI.

Promote NOT having children as a perfectly valid, rewarding life choice, instead of a shameful failure.

As many others have said - parents already do rule the world. Perhaps if fewer young people saw having children as the only option open to them to get identity, respect, esteem, cash, whatever, then the social and economic problems associated with the state having to intervene in the lives of hundreds of thousands of unwanted and unloved children could be addressed.

Just a thought.

Well first off I wouldn't call it a "Mummyfesto" (vomit emoticon).... Dads are involved too.

I would massively increase the amount if support out there for families dealing with disability.
I would ensure children who had SEN had appropriate and good education choices rather than just being slotted in to a straight choice of mainstream or special school.
I would being all hospital cleaning services back "in house" so that the hospitals had a say over the standards of cleanliness.

Gosh I could go in and on....,,

Mummyfesto

But even more than that - the image of three 'mummies' (not women, people, humans' who 'discover' that they are 'quite good' at saving a lollipop woman from redundancy?

Seriously?

Being a mother is an additional thing, something on top of all the usual life stuff we all do, like having interesting careers, being well educated or well travelled, having experienced all sorts of trials and tribulations. Just like men. So I don't think women 'discovering' in a crappy provincial setting that they can participate in the real world despite having spawned another human is very worthy. Bloody condescending.

Anyway. A manifesto which I would set out for the running of a country would have all sorts of stuff in it. But new stuff I'd add since becoming a parent, with the wealth of experience this has given me into navigating a not-very-child-friendly country:

• much more funding for post-natal care. The NHS just stops once the baby is out and safe - the first 3 days or so, particularly after a traumatic birth, are crucial to that little human's start in life.

• parental leave for a year at full pay, taken by either or both.

• sort out the housing price malarkey so that being a SAHP isn't a luxury but a realistic choice. Someone has to care for a small child and I want it to be me. I don't want a nursery setting so stop guilting me into flying back to being an economically active human - this is my new job, my important new role, let me get on with it. In general, stop forcing women back into the workplace. Being at home with a baby/toddler is bloody exhausting and knackering, plenty women don't want to do it which is fine, but support those who do.

• more NHS walk-in services. Really hard when you have an ill child to repeatedly try to get a GP appt, in my area parents usually just head to A and E!

And lots of he excellent ideas linked upthread. But the main point is to stop thinking of 'mummies' when actually, we're just humans who have kids, just exactly the same as the men who do run the country. The difference is that their families have choices, money, staff and freedom most families can only dream of.

Free or at least heavily subsidised wraparound childcare from babyhood (for those who wish to return to work) right through to 16.

Raising of minimum wage to a proper "living wage".

Introduction of a "maximum wage". No human being needs to earn more than £250,000 a year.

Abolition of private schools and healthcare. Or a huge tax on their profits to be put back into state systems.

I would make it illegal for baby food companies to advertise their products as being suitable for 4months+. Especially the ones that contain dairy and gulten, as even if you ignore the 6month weaning guideline, babies shouldn't have dairy or gluten before 6 months! It's very misleading if you don't read the ingredients. I don't know how they get away with it.