Can someone please explain to me free childcare?

[QueenOfAllBiscuitsandMuffins]

At FEM 11 on Sunday and right now on twitter (if you are following #feministlaw or @thefworkuk) free childcare has been mentioned. Now I really struggle with the concept of why free childcare being provided.
I am not against the gov't helping with childcare costs those who need help but I just don't understand why it should be free. I personally think childcare is cheap at £5ph it's because it comes out of our wages we class it as expensive.
What is the feminist thinking behind free childcare please?

ok just read that back and the construction is appalling, sorry about that. Hopefully you understand what I need explaining.

Because once upon a time children were viewed as a social good for the whole of society rather than a lifestyle choice for the people that have them.

I don't get why that means childcare should be free.

I guess it means socialised childcare rather than free - ie all taxpayers would contribute so the cost would be shared across society just as healthcare and education is now.

Yes, that would be my understanding as well. We regard services of the NHS free, but that is only because these are free at the point of delivery, regardless of ability to pay. The costs are met through taxation so that the benefits of the service can be enjoyed by all. Not 100% sure, but I would think this would be the same line of thinking for "free" childcare.

This might be coming, in part, from what could be seen as the expectation in society that it is a woman's responsibility to pay for childcare if she is in work - rather than recognising that costs for childcare should be borne by both parents either equally or proportionately depending on their resources.

The step further would be a "socialised childcare" like the NHS, where not just mothers, but all tax paying people contribute to funds that support the care of children - recognising that the care of children should be a responsibility of society as a whole.

For single parents if the childcare wasn't free then it wouldn't be worth many parents (mainly mothers as those are most likely to STAH and have residence) to go to work. Many parents who work for minimum wage and perhaps have travel costs etc wouldn't actually be making any money to take home. However the amount the government pay for this chaildcare is actually more then that parent would get if they stayed at home on benefits anyway so doesn't work out well for the government. However, I suppose it empowers the new worker and gives them a sense of contributing to both society and their family.

Having children as such does not really damage women's careers. Staying home with them for years and years because childcare is not affordable does and so-called free childcare would certaionly help here.

I think childcare free at the point of access (good point about the NHS, that comparison works IMO) would be great. We do all lose out, as a society, when women get taken out of paid employment because they can't afford not to stay home. And it is disproportionately women who stay home and who're expected to stay home, so it must be a feminist issue. I have no children and I very much notice (and miss) the women further up in my career choice, who've been pushed out because they had children and the system is not geared up for them. It is damaging that they've been replaced (effectively) by men who are not always as well qualified really.

LRDthe FemDragon, were they pushed, or did they jump ? And if they did jump would they tell you, or make some excuse as being a stay at home mother isn't cool when you have all that career ahead of you ?

I was really talking about a big absence (can you have a big absence?!), not just a few mates who've recently become SAHMs.

In my area, there are very few women at the top level, and the career as a whole is a pyramid shape for women - masses of women start out; very few get to the top. So I've no idea what motivated all of them to get out, but I have a fair sense of some of the general pressures. The reason I commented about men who're not always as well qualified is that when you compare what men at the higher levels have achieved, you can see that some of them were in the second or third 'rank' of the career back when they were starting out, but have made it through. Of course, maybe that would have happened even if their competition hadn't dropped out, but I suspect not.

I don't personally think being a SAHM 'isn't cool' and I'm sure anyone I knew personally would know that, so it's unlikely they'd make anything up.

Sorry yes I did mean free at point of access like the NHS rather than childcare workers giving their services for free!

"This might be coming, in part, from what could be seen as the expectation in society that it is a woman's responsibility to pay for childcare if she is in work - rather than recognising that costs for childcare should be borne by both parents either equally or proportionately depending on their resources. "

This is what I think should be fought for, the recognition that childcare is a cost for both parents. That childcare is the responsibility of both parents.
Of course life is not that black and white for single parents hence I think the need for gov't assistance especially whilst the CSA ask such ridiculously small payments on the non-resident parent.

Daisy you say it doesn't work out well for the government, but is that in the short-term whilst paying for the childcare or the long term when the parent is able to continue work?

"We do all lose out, as a society, when women get taken out of paid employment because they can't afford not to stay home"

But I hear so much that women have decided to stay home because after childcare costs they don't earn anything, but even after the point by KRITIQ that childcare shouldn't be a cost on just the woman should it not be that the short-term pain of only breaking even is worth the long term goal of being able to have a career after the childcare costs have receded?

Well, for one thing, I think a lot of people don't have the option of 'only' breaking even.

I also think it shouldn't be childbearing women who have to choose whether to go for short-term 'pain' or long term loss of career - why should all the burden be on the woman? I know that in practical terms lots of women do have those choices to make and do consider it worthwhile. But I don't really think it's fair to say childbearing women have the choice between two dud options, just because they had children. Basically it comes down to whether or not you believe women who have children are doing so as a 'lifestyle choice', or whether you think parents need to have children or no-one will be around to look after the whole of society as its members age.

Sorry, the italics on parents came across as if I'm being snooty - not trying to!

"...should it not be that the short-term pain of only breaking even is worth the long term goal of being able to have a career after the childcare costs have receded?"

For many of us, there is no long term career, just a succession of NMW jobs.

"Well, for one thing, I think a lot of people don't have the option of 'only' breaking even."
Is this true? A lot? I would have thought child tax credits helped (unless you live in a very high cost childcare area)

"I also think it shouldn't be childbearing women who have to choose whether to go for short-term 'pain' or long term loss of career - why should all the burden be on the woman? "

Whilst I agree shouldn't again the discussion be moving childcare responsibility to the father and the mother?

I think nowadays children are seen as a lifestyle choice AND to help sustain the population!

Sorry I don't know what NMW means.

because we don't yet have a situation where 2 part-time careers are equal to one whole one.
You risk ending up with 2 parents in insecure jobs with less prospect of promotion.

NMW=National Minimum Wage

By putting more energy into campaigning for a vast rise in the minimum wage and providing cheaper housing, lower income familes would have more choices. Taking a job for £6.08/hr and coming home with a pittance is sacrifice indeed when it comes to missing out on your children growing up.

I suppose I wasn't looking at it from the angle of 2 part-time jobs more where the females career is as dominant as the males.

Surely a rise in the minimum wage would just mean either an increase in the price of products/services or the products/services being moved out of the UK?

School is useful comparison. It's good for everyone that children get a high quality free education. We're used to that idea.

Hazlenutt- i think the 30000 women who are sacked every year for getting pregnant would disagree with you.

Childcare doesnt just benefit that child's parents, it benefits all of society. Choldren's potential is often fixed/ limited by age 3, it is the under 3s who should be the focus of the education/ welfare system, it will have lifelong benefits.

Alsoit was one of the 7 demands of WLM in 1970, and has been the one most ignored.

I work in a care home and receive minimum wage (£6.08). If I did not receive 70% of childcare costs paid by the goverment via tax credits, I could not work. Simple as that. No-one can live on £1.08 an hour! And what happens if you have 2 children in childcare? You would end up owing money and earning nothing! (only 1 of mine goes to childcare, the other goes to his grandparents).

I think the first focus should be on free breakfast clubs and afterschool care. So those with children of school age are covered from 8am-6pm.

queen - I do think some people struggle to break even, when you think about transport and so on too. I think it depends where you are in your career - a few years ago most of my mates where in jobs that made them really very little, but they needed to do the time to get further up the career. If you add childcare to that it can be just too much.

I think as well, the current system tempts women away from certain kinds of jobs, where there's more of a linear progression - if your career is set up so you have to do x years of low-paid work/training before your name gets known or you can make money, having to factor in childcare during those early stages is a total bugger. In my very biased, outside-looking-in opinion, obviously.

I think free childcare (or 'free 24 hour nurseries' as it was put in the original 7 demands I think..) is a bit of a red herring.

I agree with you QueenofallBiscuits the ideal should be something like 'mothers and fathers to take an equal role in childcare' ... or something along those lines.

LRD - i don't think women are kept out of the top of the career ladder by lack of free childcare. At the that level it is not the cost that matters, it is the practicality (and choices involved) in bringing up children in a household with two high flyers pursuing uncompromising careers. And as you say the system is not geared to parents. Free childcare wouldn't solve it

Which is not to say there shouldn't be subsidised childcare for families on low incomes, but again its not a panacea. It doesn't challenge the idea that childcare is the mothers job, or really get at what traps women in low paid family friendly jobs.

Himalaya - I think quite a few are knocked off at a lower rung, actually, and hence never make it to the top.

Yes, that's what I was getting at elderberry.

But I agree with himalaya that we need to challenge the idea that childcare is a woman's responsibility. IMO free childcare (set up like the NHS) would do this - it would suggest it is society's responsibility.

I wasn't really thinking of hoursholds with 'two high flyers' - what would be nice to see would be women feeling they didn't have to be high flyers to justify working outside the home, which IMO seems to be something a lot of women do feel they have to do. There are jobs at all levels of prestigiousness and pay and so on, where women tend to get replaced by less well-qualified men when those women have children. At the moment, that is seen as a simple issue, that these women just choose to have children and leave. And lots of women are really happy to do that and to be SAHMs. I'm not saying there is anything bad about that. But you shouldn't have to say 'my job is really important/better paid than my DH's' in order to justify keeping it, and I think a lot of people still do feel they have to do that.