School closures: Thousands of women have just had their double shift doubled

[Carefulvulvadriver]

What should the feminist response to the above be? Yes yes, of course fathers should do their share of the home school and childcare, but we know many dont and wont, and that still leaves a problem for single mothers like me.
This afternoon the government has announced that 100s of primary schools across the country will not reopen as planned in January. I suspect many more will be added to the list over the next week or so.
We know that will leave 1000s of women once again having to juggle work, childcare and home school. They will feel the stress and hit to their mental health of trying to do that. They will miss out on promotions, pay rises and opportunities as a result. They will have to cancel study plans. Many will work until 3am each morning as the only chance they will have to work will be after the kids have gone to bed. And as ever, it will be the poorest women who will be the worst hit, as will their kids. Some men will suffer from this too, but it will disproportionately hit women.

How should feminists respond? Surely this IS a feminist issue - it's about how social policy and our economic way of life has not been designed with women in mind. The woman stuff - the looking after children and educating them - is somehow to be tagged on as an after thought; the work and time to be magic-ed out of thin air, as it's only the man stuff that counts or is important.

In my view we should be demanding paid parenting leave, funded by the government. I think we should also be putting pressure on the government to confirm it will run "catch up" schools in the summer holidays for the kids who have missed out on education (there will be a problem getting the staffing, although I wonder if TAs might be available as I know that in some cases they are on zero hour contracts and so not paid in the holidays).

What else? Any one got any ideas? And what if we dont get it? Will we just do what so many of us did back in spring (me included) and just suck it up? I love my job, I'm lucky that it's really fulfilling, but isnt it time we refused to do the impossible?

Thanks for the links. Useful evidence. Now unsure whether its better to make a pitch for work when I may not be able to deliver, or to abandon all work plans until further notice.

Ok, so I want to do the petition thing. I've not done one before so dont really know if I have phrased this right (the guidance is here: petition.parliament.uk/help)

10k signatures and the gov has to respond. 100k signatures and Parliament almost always debates it (or incorporates it into another debate already scheduled).

Here is my draft:

"While school closures may be absolutely necessary to slow the spread of corona virus, experience during the first lock down tells us the impact of closures will be felt most by women and children, and particularly single parents and households on low or insecure incomes.
We are calling for Parliament to debate measures to recognise and recompense the physical and emotional cost of home schooling on parents and children through:

1. The introduction of a home schooling allowance paid by government to affected parents;
2. The commitment of extra central government resources now for catch up schools and educational provision to be available during the summer holiday, targeted at children who have been most disadvantaged;
3. The development of statutory guidance to employers on flexible working for parents, including a requirement for large employers to undertake and publish an impact assessment this time next year to assess the impact corona virus has had on the sex and gender inequalities in their work place, including progression, access to career development and pay."

Probably a bad idea to try and get anything finely drafted here by committee, but does anyone have thoughts on refining this? Have I accidentally put something awful or misleading in there? The standards say you need to specifically ask Parliament or Gov to do something, so my "something" here is to debate it - I thought that best as it means multiple solutions can be put forward (because I'm not sure any solutions arent without a downside somewhere or other - as discussed here).

To get it going I need to put my actual real life name to it, which is why this a burner username. I need 5 co-signatures (not sure they need to be public). If anyone wants to private message me maybe we can work out how that happens, although I should know at least 5 like minded women I can call on for that. Also, if there is anyone on here who would actually like to put the petition in their own name, then please let me know as it's not something I relish.

It is hard to do that after your dc born

Academic publication article:

www.google.co.uk/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/education/2020/may/12/womens-research-plummets-during-lockdown-but-articles-from-men-increase

www.thelancet.com/journals/laninf/article/PIIS1473-3099(20)30568-5/fulltext
One of many articles on women around the world bearing the brunt globally.

www.un.org/sexualviolenceinconflict/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/report/policy-brief-the-impact-of-covid-19-on-women/policy-brief-the-impact-of-covid-19-on-women-en-1.pdf

Some sensible UN suggestions for making better policy in this area- including the (apparently quite challenging for some) idea, that women should be involved in policy decision making around Covid19 ...

women should be involved in policy decision making around Covid19

It’s almost as though our COVID policy and decision making team are all male, which would be ludicrous!

Oh.... hang on

@JollyYellaHumberElla

women should be involved in policy decision making around Covid19

It’s almost as though our COVID policy and decision making team are all male, which would be ludicrous!

Oh.... hang on

Then again Scotland isn’t doing too well for working mothers

Making it hugely difficult - private nurseries shut, ridiculously hard to get childcare

I've said all along that policies are being made by people who have never had to worry about childcare.

Women WITH CHILDREN need to be involved in policy making.

I commented recently on another thread about how the chat at mum groups and at the school gate is all studiously avoidant of “politics”. I think we need to be careful about this. Lots of women are self excluding from politics / policy by their attitudes... the looks one gets introducing anything beyond the everyday as a topic of conversation at baby groups or in “mum” circles....what is the answer? Is politics now just a niche interest?

I’m sure lots of working mums are just too busy to give it headspace ... but this kind of thing shows that we need to.

For people assuming that it’s easy to split in, lots of my female friends’ DP/DH are much more likely to do jobs where wfh is impossible - building etc. So even more likely to fall on the woman. It’s so shit.

I must investigate local political parties’ meetings - previously I couldn’t attend as evening meets - but now perhaps with zoom... as long as not at bedtime.

I spent thousands training in semi- permanent cosmetic tattooing and qualified just before the lockdowns started with a license paid for, room rented with a contract signed, insurance paid for and my first few clients booked in. I was very excited and relieved to take control of my life and start earning some good money.

Then came COVID-19. Everything got cancelled. The insurance, license, rent etc non refundable.

Now, after months, I'm so out of practise that I won't be able to work on clients until I've taken another course...or two. I've had to go onto UC which just barely covers food and bills.

Leaving my previous job and training in SPMU was a very sound plan for me. I had saved, planned and waited. Covid came it and ruined it.

4,578 hairdressers and salons have closed for good since the start of the pandemic.

I've even briefly entertained the idea of making an Only-Fans account but I'm too fat and don't have a social media following. These are shit times.

@grellbrunt the looks one gets introducing anything beyond the everyday as a topic of conversation at baby groups or in “mum” circles
Yes that's exactly my experience too - especially in the wider groups. I think maybe it's everyone desperately trying to cling onto the sense of solidarity-for-mutual-survival we have with each other, which is based on having kids in the same school. No one wants to risk breaking that solidarity by being "political".

I think a Parliamentary petition would be great. It's one way of getting this debated and talked about more

It’s worrying how many mothers are resorting to only fans and sex work to keep the roof over their head 🙁 in fact it’s truly disturbing. But what’s the alternative? There isn’t one.

@Candiscophonous

It’s worrying how many mothers are resorting to only fans and sex work to keep the roof over their head 🙁 in fact it’s truly disturbing. But what’s the alternative? There isn’t one.

One alternative is decent child support from the children’s father - but my understanding is that the obligation to pay child maintenance is not easily enforced either by way of state-sanctioned or private legal remedies. That’s an area that could be looked into.

It's really about applying a sex-lens to everything - Engender have done some great work on this in Scotland but I don't know how it's actually landed with Scot Gov.

Some on here will dismiss Engender because of their view on trans rights, but I think recently I've started to be concerned that the focus on trans issues, important though it is, has meant we're taking our eye off the ball in other ways.

website here

I just did a quick google on shared parental leave and it's still at a woeful uptake level - something like 4% for last year. Shocking.

I am usually wary of citing Scandi models as the solution for everything, but their 'use it or lose it' quota model for parental leave seems to really work. If dads aren't involved from the very early days, the gaps start to become too big to overcome.

I’m not referring just to single mothers though @Grellbunt

There are many mothers who are absolutely stifled WITHIN a relationship during this pandemic, and any slush fund (running away fund) they had saved for dark days (and these are the darkest of days) has been obliterated due to living off savings.

@Femin1st

Re the petition, does there need to be something in the guidance to business to include the expectation of considering flexible working...similar to the guidance used to request part time working (acas). This would give all employees (male and female) a right to make a formal request.
Also businesses to make furlough for either male or female employees for childcare reasons, high profile. Many businesses are not allowing this.

This would begin to balance the impact on women and the expectation on schools, both the backstop to adapting to COVID.

ah thanks @ByersRd. I've actually just finished doing it - just need the 5 signatures now. There are various irritating character limits so I had to cut quite a bit out. On the employer stuff, I went for the idea of requiring publication of a sex impact assessment as that kind of implies the other stuff too (if an employer is rubbish at allowing flex working, it's going to see a fall in its sex equality). I'm also very conscious that for many people "flexible" working just means giving mothers permission to work 9pm til 2am, which doesnt really solve the problem here! I will post the link as soon as it's live.

[quote ByersRd]@Femin1st

Re the petition, does there need to be something in the guidance to business to include the expectation of considering flexible working...similar to the guidance used to request part time working (acas). This would give all employees (male and female) a right to make a formal request.
Also businesses to make furlough for either male or female employees for childcare reasons, high profile. Many businesses are not allowing this.

This would begin to balance the impact on women and the expectation on schools, both the backstop to adapting to COVID. [/quote]
The problem as I see it though that even when employers do have genuine flexible working policies it tends to be women who take advantage of them rather than men, furthering the gap between women's presence and men's and reinforcing the idea that women are lesser employees.

Most 'women friendly' policies such as longer maternity leave, increased maternity rights generally, flexible working, parental leave etc have actually caused women to fall further behind in the workplace and be more likely to be discriminated against.

Women's rights in the workplace harms women just as much as it protects them.

At least in the past when women were essentially forced out of the workplace and off the career ladder after having children it was overt, acknowledged and their role as the homemaker still held some value in society. We weren't expected to both compete with the men at work and still keep a perfect house and 2.4 children alive.

Now we are expected to be all things and it's exhausting.

@Femin1st

ah thanks *@ByersRd*. I've actually just finished doing it - just need the 5 signatures now. There are various irritating character limits so I had to cut quite a bit out. On the employer stuff, I went for the idea of requiring publication of a sex impact assessment as that kind of implies the other stuff too (if an employer is rubbish at allowing flex working, it's going to see a fall in its sex equality). I'm also very conscious that for many people "flexible" working just means giving mothers permission to work 9pm til 2am, which doesnt really solve the problem here! I will post the link as soon as it's live.

Will sign when it's up.

Remember (rules of MN) to put the actual link in a thread on the petitions section, then put a link to that thread on here. If you link directly to the petition from here you could get deleted on a technicality.