Achieving the Best Start in Life for Children !

We really must not push childcare for very early years so much. 

Families need support to care as well !

Toddler groups and playgroups are an approach that is good.

Mothers (or fathers if they are doing the childcaring) staying with kids at these young ages means that parent child bonding occurs and good communication skills are developed and children have a stable secure start in life. From this they can thrive. If parents need extra help with this then adult helpers at e.g. toddler groups can lead sessions in how to play and have fun with your children.

Toddler Group Christmas party :

This side of the debate needs to be heard - and I am afraid to say they may not be heard from very high achieving career women in media, politics etc - so we need to see a balance where work hours are reduced and not just childcare hours increased.  If necessary families can receive funding to help with the difference in wages or salary due to this. But as childcare is currently subsidised (at great expense to taxpayers including single earner families who are highly taxed...) then why not subside parents doing this childcare ! Especially if it means the children get a better start in life. And who knows everyone might even have some fun along the way ! Its what life is meant to be about after all !!!

Another toddler group party !

Why Every Political Party Should Support "Stay at Home Working" Mothers or Fathers as well as "Working" Mothers and Fathers

If you think a about it, Stay At Home Mothers (or Fathers), certainly of small children aged 0-3, should fit in to each Political Party's idealism, along with Working Mothers, who currently fit into the supposed "economic model family" currently being pushed in society.

Here we go :

Green Party

A Stay at Home Mother (or Father) is a Green alternative. Not adding to the materialistic push to own belongings (usually made of the earth's valuable resources). And taking time to appreciate such things as the local park and to get out and about to appreciate the environment. Not adding to the carbon footprint by driving to a nursery etc.

Conservatives

A Stay at Home Mother (or Father) is taking responsiblity for their own children and their upbringing. Standing on their own two feet. Taking time to educate children about society and values. Mums or Dads often volunteer as part of the "Big Society" taking part running playgroups and toddler groups etc.  And if parents do their own childcare then those young workers who are employed on low wages in childcare could get out and train for a better paid job which would bring in more tax return.  The mums or dads can then return to the workforce rejuvenated once their children are a little older.

Labour

Labour had the Sure Start centres which seemed like a good idea. A place where mothers and fathers could go to find out more about parenting. By looking after your own children, this is often the first real responsibility many people have had to care for another human being. But we need to care for families and those who have family responsibility so that they are supported in this vital role for society. Being a parent of a young child gives you a chance to get out and meet people and mix with others. You can learn new skills and take this chance to learn about parenting etc. Labour should be ensuring that every mother has the option to take a few years out with their children and not just those who have saved beforehand or who have a partner working. And Labour should prioritise a review of family budgeting and finance to find out why so many families are currently visiting Food Banks.

LibDems

The Liberal Democrats are famous for being "Liberal" - what does that mean exactly ? Well the definition in the Oxford dictionary should mean that Stay at Home Mothers are definitely on the agenda !
1   Willing to respect or accept behaviour or opinions different from one's own, open to new ideas
2 (of education) concerned with broadening a person's general knowledge and experience, rather than with technical or professional training.

SNP and UKIP

See above - or are you just here to add some colour to the political party spectrum !!

So overall I would suggest we need a major review of Family Policy as this new Parliament of 2015 starts out.  We need to review taxation and benefits.  Obviously benefits must have limits, there is not enough money to go round to support everything, but we need to think what is it we want from and for families if our society is to improve.  We also need to look at the school years and work out how to improve our education system and set higher standards for our teenagers. And we need to review such things as internet access, pornography etc. and how this is affecting all of our children, whether they are directly viewing these things or being affected indirectly.  And.... as well as young children, we should look at how society is treating our older family members and also how this impacts on wider families as well. There is a big difference between having a grandparent who needs help, whether a small amount or large amount to having either no grandparent around or having a very active and involved grandparent who is lucky enough to have retained all physical abillity. And in fact the age range of grandparents that I know varies from 40 right up to about 80 - now that is going to make a lot of difference in a family.

So let us all call on our Political Representatives to make the case for ALL  WOMEN, MEN and FAMILIES !!

My Manifesto

Here is my election manifesto for 2015

I wish the political parties had a few of these - they all seem to be pledging the same boring things - no ethics or ambition involved !  What one would you add or write your own manifesto for change !

1    Children - children deserve the best start in life. Families deserve time to learn to become a family and to be able to understand their child's needs. Many families need support in learning how to play with their children, how to feed them and how to enjoy being with them. This means families need funding.  Funding should not just be going to pay for other people to care for young children. Our brain pathways are built in those first precious months and years of development. If the early years are stressful out brains in future will react quickly to stress and produce more cortisol, the stress hormone - this is a fact.  So come on politicians, FAMILY FUNDING PLEASE ! And this should take account of total family income, as parents often give and take - it really does take more than one parent or adult to help bring up children.  All family circumstances are different, some have lots of friends or grandparents, some have two parents, some have one parent. Some have a parent who works for long hours or works abroad (very common where I live). For this reason I believe that family funding should be based on total income and should perhaps follow the child themselves.  But whether parents use childcare or do the care themselves BOTH MUST BE RECOGNISED.   And I don't know an awful lot about Sure Start centres, but they might form the basis of a good idea. And toddler groups and playgroups should get the full support of society.

2   Animals - animals also deserve the best. We have lived alongside dogs, cats, cattle, sheep, pigs and horses for millions of years of human development. These animals are mammals and care strongly for their young. So they should be allowed to grow in family groups. We should not overexploit them for their milk. Currently dairy cattle have their calves removed at birth and must produce vast quantities of milk. This cant be comfortable for them. Surely someone somewhere can work out a method where the cattle can filter through the milking barn with their associated calf alongside ?  I mean the calves are still going to drink the same amount of milk overall.  And do you know that pigs are highly intelligent and can play football ?!  Yet in the EU there are still some places where they are kept in small stalls. This should not be allowed.  And even with regards to hens/chickens these need better treatment. Who wants to eat meat from an animal which has had virtually no life. The current breeds of chicken are developed to produce meat as quickly as possible and look quite ridiculous. I wonder how good this really is for us to be eating.  We should also be promoting more vegetarian options in some way, encouraging people to eat the wonderful vegetable produce produced by our farmers.  And finally we need to ensure that slaughter methods, if these have to be used, are the most humane possible. They should probably be killed by the captive bolt method and this should be supervised by CCTV. The animals should not have any fore-warning of what is happening. But as I type that it makes me feel physically sick to think that we would do this to peaceful animals. We should only be caring for them, not eating them.  For the sake of the planet as well, we get more energy from farms if we eat crops directly rather than feeding them to animals. So it makes sense ecologically and economically. And we must not give in to religious pressure to change the way animals are killed. Surely any religion would agree that we must look after the animals.  Simples - as the Meerkats say !

3 Climate Change
This is a big concern and needs sorted - guy on Radio 4 this morning talking about how this should be in election manifestos. (22 April 2015)

4  Nuclear Power
As a scientist I have a fair understanding of nuclear power, but the after effects are shocking. The time that it is going to take the products to decay are unacceptable. We need to find another method of power.  And how stupid is it to build Hinkley B (is that the name of the new one ?) right next to the sea when sea levels are inevitably going to rise ? Doh !!!!

5  Finance
World finance needs sorted out. Banks and accountants have pulled the wool over many people's eyes and completely disrupted the world financial systems so they are in a terrible mess.  Gamblers and crooks should not be in charge !

6 Monsanto
MOnsanto should not be allowed to control the world's seeds. This company needs to be stopped. And rumours are that the weedkiller it produces - RoundUp is carcinogenic.

7 Other big organisations
The same goes for Nestle, Proctor & Gamble, Price Waterhouse Cooper (PWC) - many companies have been caught up in less than ethical practises and need to be stopped. Its not like any of these companies (and others eg Starbucks, Amazon) actually need the money !

8 Ecopackaging - biodegradable materials
Following on from the previous issue, companies should be required to use biodegradable components in for example nappies, pads, packaging, feminine hygiene products, washing powders etc.  Companies should be required to use such things as starch etc which will biodegrade, unless they can provide evidence that the material they have used is the only possible material that can be used.  For example look at how many solid plastic boxes for Persil washing liquitabs are just being thrown away and not used - this is ridiculous - the liquitabs could be in a dispenser at the shops and you could bring your box along to be re-filled. Easy to do and masses of plastic saved. Good for the environment and good for saving valuable and finited natural resources.

9  Online Pressures on Teenagers and Children
Children are living with a very different environment even from 10 years ago and need to learn to live with it but also to be protected from it. They need to be able to discern what is good to watch and what is not good to watch. What is a good way to live ? What do you want out of life and are you going to consider other people too ?   Society has become very materialistic.  Personally I am quite horrified by some people I see, driving gas guzzling cares too fast (bought on credit! or via dodgy business expenses), along with dyed hair/false eyelashes/fake tan.  I'm sorry but how did we come to this ?  Lets get our kids out playing, walking, enjoying life. My kids enjoyed visiting an outdoor centre but were confined to their rooms some of the time due to the experience in previous years where other kids misbehaved. Some just do not have any idea nowadays where the limits of behaviour are. And I have seen this at kids parties too. So we need to get our kids onto a firm foundation again (this follows on from Point 1). Then we might have some hope that they can withstand the onslaught of celebrity trash/porn/self harming sites/social media comments etc. And they will hopefully have some ambition then to improve society themselves as well.

10 Care Homes / Nursery Businesses
These are two areas where functions used to be done by the state and are now increasingly in private hands. A friend pays £1,000 a week for her father to be in a care home. So all that money has come from selling his house. Yet even at that he doesnt seem to get particularly good care. When I looked up the profits of the big Care Home companies, they appear to take 33% profit and many companies are linked to each other. Disgraceful !
The same happens with nursery businesses and nursery chains. Many of these are active on Twitter and Facebook etc, and via all sorts of lobbying organisations and are gradually getting money out of out gullible MPs who believe everything they say.  Organisations backing the family are unfortunately more pre-occupied with actually caring for their own kids and just don't seem to get much airtime/lobbying time etc.
But this is not how it was supposed to be. There seems to be two extremes - wasteful resources and people if its public sector (I have heard many cases from people working there and have done myself although most people work very hard) but the situation is probably even worse when the private sector is involved.

11  Huge retirement funds in public sector - particularly national government and MP, MSP jobs  - Also dealing with Retirement Age - "active" jobs and "slowing down a bit" jobs
Why should MPs retire with a full pension as though they have worked for 40 years ? This should not happen. I dont know how extensive it is but I have heard of it happening. Maybe they can get a small payout if they lose their seat, but many people are now in temporary employment - its pretty normal now.
Secondly if some people have retirement age set at 67 then so should everyone.  National government civil service jobs I suspect are still sitting at age 60. This is not on. And fireman are retiring at 50 = ridiculous ! They should perhaps be assigned a less active role eg a desk job if they are no longer fit for the job. But again why does anyone feel that the employer is responsible for employing them for life ? I mean where did this idea come from ? As a person who always worked in temporary jobs, much as I'd have loved a permanent job, I just do not get this !  If you can't do the job then you are redundant ! End of !!  I am sure many people working in physical occupations need to have a re-think at about age 50 eg foresters, farmers, footballers !! etc  Much better to employ all those under-employed young fit people who seem to have to work at Tesco, in the active roles and let those who want to slow down a bit work at Tesco for a while !!
So really that is two issues to do with retirement,

Not Grandparents Harriet !

Harriet Harman proposes that Grandparents should receive funding for caring for grandchildren. (An exception to my argument that follows is if they are the main carer...where they are currently treated as an exception I believe). BUT ..... we must avoid this slippery slope as if this became the case then the ONLY ! THE ONLY !!!! person who was not entitled to be subsidised / paid to care for a child would be that child's own mother.

This flies in the face of everything.

In the animal kingdom mother animals care for their young.

And many of us still want to care for our young. At least at that very young age when you can show them the world. Why would you want to hand this over to a childcare worker ?

 At age 3, if you know about child psychology, at that point, interactions with other children become more important and at that age a few hours at nursery or playgroup can work well. And then at age 5, maybe with a run in of a few half days to get everyone used to it, then 9-3 school days work well. Now it may be that the next best model once kids are at school is for a parent to work part time, at least one of the parents anyway, and this is the preferred option among about 80% of parents surveyed. So maybe kids can cope with a couple of days of breakfast club or after school. But on the other days its great to be able to come home, bring a friend home some days or go to play at a friend's house, or come home after a hard day at school, switch on Children's TV/Minecraft or whatever your "thing" is, and have a snack and drink and put your feet up. Surely we can afford this for families - it's called "family life" - what happened to it ? It still happens in many families, but that is no longer acknowledged in the political classes....but in other families its been lost .... and for some, they say that working is maybe a necessity and for those families there should be financial support. But... if working is really for "you time" or a BMW, or a holiday in Dubai ... then think about it.

What is important ... 

material things ?    

... or human relationships and your relationship with your kids ?

Because kids grow up .... and even more important is your relationship with your teenagers / young adults - if you can keep communications flowing then its better for everyone - and better for "family" !

The Other Woman !

A very brief explanation as this concept seems to be difficult for people to understand.

Babies and Toddlers do not look after themselves.
They need to be fed and watered and cleaned (the mundane tasks) and at a higher level they need to be interacted with and shown new things in the world, and for their enjoyment of life and building of a firm psychological foundation its great if they can actually have some fun thrown in as well.  And then there are the more technical things such as learning to swim, learning to climb, ride a bike, how to hold a pencil, how to listen to others, build sand castles, paint etc etc. All of these need a little bit of adult help along the way, even if its just to sweep up the sand and to rescue various nearby objects from a toddler with a paintbrush !

So what my post is about is prompted by the supposedly exciting news that a youngish woman in quite a public role has finally reached 38 weeks pregnant and has managed to stagger in to work in the fairly high public role she occupies. (the fact that people have been doing this in all sorts of occupations for many years seems to be overlooked) This seems to be news nowadays !!
And apparently by her taking maternity leave this somehow means that the Glass Ceiling has just been smashed.............

Now my first thought is that there have been numerous women in prominent roles for many years. Certainly in the area of medical physics that I worked and in medicine etc and University sphere there were many distinguished women and many women who just got on with their jobs. They seem to me to have been a different breed from this current type of women who seem to be in the news and who seem to occupy in particular politics and perhaps the media too.

So this working woman is being met with great acclaim and she is going to take maybe a year off to look after her baby and an older child too.  Now once she goes back to work, to great praise and acclaim as this is the new equal opportunities modern world, Ha Ha, the thing that gets forgotten about is ........................................................ THE OTHER WOMAN !!!!

Or should I say the other man / woman / gender neutral person who will be looking after the baby and toddler. Because as I explained earlier, they do actually have to be looked after !!

And funnily enough some women, myself included, actually chose or have chosen to look after their own child.

In either case - there is ONE CHILD CARER  and ONE WORKER !!

But in fact in the first situation we have one person who demands Mega-Respect (Respect with a capital R) and one person (THE OTHER WOMAN) who receives minor respect (small r).  They both get paid for their job so this ensures the respect.

In the second situation, there is one person working (Respect) and one non worker who is looking after their own children (= Hard Work) (=Fun) (= can be good for the child's psychological wellbeing) but this person does not get respect from society. Strange that !!

The first situation pulls in masses of subsidies - two personal allowances within the family and a third for the child carer. The mother in second case does not receive a personal allowance.  There are childcare subsidies in the first case and various councils and organisations promote the business of the childcarer)

But we need to sort out this situation to create a more level playing field because currently in our society in the UK it is becoming very difficult for the second situation to be a possibility, and dare I say it, but the more I see and observe of families who try to care for their youngsters at weekends having been working all week, I have to say I think they could do with a good healthy dose of actually learning how to look after their own children.  And I have to say that there are so many tips etc passed around mothers (and fathers) at things like toddler groups that in fact that is really where you learn to bring up your children. You learn tips such as the fact that young children should only be given grapes sliced, and also you can watch your child interacting with other children and you can direct them to be a more caring, sharing individual or help to smooth over situations before they get out of control etc. You are teaching children how to get on with each other and getting them ready to flourish once they hit the big wide world of school nursery and school itself.  And, you are also very much part of a community with the other families and children.

So please remember children do not look after themselves !
(I wonder if it could be a male agenda that has allowed this downgrading of the recognition that this role exists at all ............ hmm !)

And....on another aspect, surely it would be better for women to think of taking a few years out to take care of their children and then return to work raring to go once the children are older. I certainly know quite a few mothers in my acquaintance who are returning to full time work once their children are more like secondary school age or dare I say it even older. But these people are so much more ready to devote themselves to the workplace rather than being drawn in two directions and doing neither job particularly well.  In addition just as a little extra, so many lucky families I know have grandparents who are fit and healthy and very much involved with the family and the childcare. But if you dont have that for whatever reason then really your family needs some extra help. But the way society is pushing it, again its the lucky ones who are angling for subsidies, the ones who already get help.

Anyway as you may have noticed, if you have even read this far, I have diversified and come way off topic as per usual.

But my main point is that its all very well having your politically correct statements about family friendly policies etc etc but the fact is children do not look after themselves.

A Framework for Parents to Register as Childminders of Own Children

As more funds are directed towards subsidising childcare, what is to happen for parents who wish to bring up their own children at ages 0-3 ?

This is still the choice for many, and many of those parents do so because they believe it is right and make financial sacrifices. Others choose it because they want to enjoy rearing their own children and wish to take a few years out from their career. After all, a working life can be over 40 years so why not take a few years out ?  And others would like to have the chance to do this yet can't afford to take the time off work.

Other parents decide they want to stay in their career and prefer to hand over the care of their young ones at age 0-3 to a qualified childminder or to a nursery.

Now, before everyone thinks what I am about to say is outrageous, lets not forget that children still need a carer. If you go to work, the child is cared for. There is a worker and a carer.  If you stay at home, you are the carer, but the person who might have been paid to care for your child is perhaps free to take up a job in the wider labour market. If you have three young children, it probably balances out about the same effect overall whether you work or care for your own children. It still takes two people to do the job plus the childcare !

So, my argument is, why not have a subsidy for a family with a young child age 0-3 and it can either be used to cover nursery fees or else to subsidise a parent who wishes to do the child rearing themselves.

This could be organised in a informal framework and if parents are to receive a subsidy they should be required to show at least that they are getting involved in the following types of activities, perhaps not in quite as strictly monitored a way as is required for a childminder, but still to make sure that there will be positive outcomes for the children and in fact this should also be beneficial for the parents as I will discuss further on. So the types of activities the parents would be required to get involved in could include :

• taking their children to various activities such as baby and toddler groups, playgroup and swimming classes. (all of which usually cost money, hence the tie-in with funding)
• Taking part in some small amounts of training such as basic First Aid for children (which was provided in my case post-natally and was excellent) and Triple P Parenting classes which show you how to do positive behaviour techniques, so avoiding having to resort to such things as physical punishment etc. (this was provided as training for parents if they wished at our local school nursery).  This already does happen in post-natal support groups and education of parents via some school nurseries but it would be nice to record such training.
• taking short online modules in child psychology, health, nutrition and behaviour lcould be taken or post natal support classes at health centres could run short sessions on these as currently happens, but in this case attendance could be recorded.

Placing the whole thing in a slightly formal framework could actually lead to parents having a basic childcare qualification at the end of the three years of parenting, and this could even lead to enhanced job opportunities at the end of the process.  It could also eventually lead to there being more childminders in the system, which is particularly needed in rural areas and in areas where childcare services are already stretched to the limit.
If the parent takes part in this process and has registered as a childcarer then they would have access to the funding that all children are entitled to for their childcare.

Why Not !!?

I phoned in to a radio phone in to make this very point, and someone else phoned in to reply "why should parents be paid to stay at home ?". Yes you might agree when it is stated like that. But child-rearing should involve much more than "staying at home". It is usually the very opposite to that and involves being very much out in the community and meeting other people, learning new skills and learning how to generally get on with other people. You might have your first experience of running a toddler group or being on a playgroup committee and dealing with accounts etc. Personally I ended up as a representative on a community council for the first time. These are all worthwhile experiences. And you learn how to entertain groups of children - a very useful skill if you do decide to make a career of it afterwards !
But more than that its fun !
And that is what is sad about the current arguments - certainly no-one dares to say that now.

But come on folks, from a purely logical point of view - Why can a Parent not be a Childminder ?

________________________________________________


And an additional question to the SNP in Scotland - Why Not ?
Can you really disagree with anything I have said ? Would this not lead to a better and more secure future for Scotland's children ? And give parents the freedom to have control how they run their families ?  Freedom, Choice, Future - these are all things I would like to see in Scotland and elsewhere.

Child Benefit

A mother (or father) at home is not a burden on the state – far from it – he/she is actually bringing up his/her own children. In fact you could cast her as an entrepreneur or even running a small business !

Whereas a mother and/or etc father who both work are actually more of a burden as they are expecting other people to bring up their children. And even though they are earning two incomes they expect to be subsidised and are very often subsidised via child tax credits, child benefit (which is more available to these couples) and childcare voucher tax breaks/nanny tax. Even when their earnings are in the £100,000s they can claim tax breaks on the money they pay towards childcare. The nurseries and the nursery nurses etc are subsidised often by local councils and very often local councils provide free advertising of their services.

Meanwhile the mother who is looking after her own children – whether by desire or by circumstances, has given up her own salary to look after her children.

However in both cases, children do not look after themselves. We need to get our heads around this. Someone has to care for them. And in both cases there should be money going towards that, if we value those children for our society.
We do need children – demographically the population of the UK is aging and we need workers etc to provide income to support the retired and older members of that society. More to the point, we need educated, well behaved children who can contribute to that society. Families and
society can judge how this can best be achieved. Most families, even when the mother “stays at home”, will take children to become involved in toddler groups, playgroups and at the age of 3 they are entitled to a part time nursery place. This can be good for children and often these places can provide the activities like painting, arts and crafts, outdoor play etc that would be difficult to provide at home every day ! I would suggest as a minimum for society we should ensure that all children are brought to such activities so that mothers are integrated into society and families are not allowed to languish “at home”.

But my current complaint is the lack of subsidies or funding via the benefit system for “stay at home” parents .
And added to that the fact that benefits and tax breaks are actually being given to very well off parents is just madness when finances in society are so tight.

The Conservative/Lib Dem coalition government need to quickly rethink this as we are now talking about a discrepancy of £5,000 a year between a family with one earner on £60,000 as opposed to a family with two earners on £30,000 when you take into account two personal tax allowances for the second family, the first family pays 40% rate of tax and only the first family loses child benefit. That is the difference of a new car every year in tax paid !!!!!!

But even more ridiculous is a family with both on £50,000 can keep child benefit, get two personal allowances and can probably claim back some tax in childcare voucher scheme.
And even richer families I believe can use the childcare voucher scheme.

I can give you an example of a stay at home mother who “stayed at home” for the years her children were young, but is now self employed and working numerous hours a week to earn £5,000 to £10,000 but what is annoying is that her earnings are basically just going straight into what other families get to keep as tax – its very annoying to say the least ! Yet another family with two earners on £30,000 and £40,000 get to keep the tax.

Also you might think I am talking about rich families here, but a family with one earner on £60,000 actually end up with after tax the same as a family with two earners on the minimum wage. So we are not talking about very well off families here, much as the government would like to make it seem like it !!

And here is a graphic of the discrepancies when the total income is £70,000, there is a difference of up to £7,500 in net income after tax etc depending on whether there is one or two earners and how much each earn – this is plainly unfair. Particularly as among my friends the people who have a husband (or wife) on a large salary like £70,000, then its often due to them having to work away or abroad or at least away for a few nights each week. So there are reasons for the big salary and often this makes family life more complicated and necessitates that the other parent is more available for looking after the children.