Of my colleagues, I think two have childminders and the other has his wife at home. As I said, that’s their choice. One of the new Labour Councillors brought her daughter to the last full Council meeting and has her in the office.

More importantly, he’s not missing having his mum around while he’s growing up!

I often think the biggest benefit I had in my childhood was that my mum didn’t go back to work until I had been back at school several years, and even then she got a job that meant she was back home in time for me coming home from school. I think anything that can be done to ensure a child is spending as much time with a parent as possible should be encouraged – whether that’s allowing them to take the child to work, or just allowing them to hold off going back to work until the child is school-age. Obviously the second one is tougher as not all couples can survive off one wage, but where possible, it would be good for people to be able to take their children to work.

This would probably be made easier if the housing market (among other things) hadn’t inflated to adjust for two wages being the norm…

~alec

I dont have kids…but well i was one not THAT long ago…

My parents seperated when i was just starting Primary School….with my mother working full time it was my grandparents that did alot of the child care for me and my older brother.

When i say alot i mean most of it during the week, my gran would come to the house in the morning to get us ready for school…we would go to my grans for lunch, and we went home from school to my grans.

Now i think that i dodged allot of the dissadvantages of being from a broken home because i had that near constant presence of my grandparents. But i dont think they should have been, effectivly, paid for by the state to do it.

Thats not to say that they were out of pocket, my mother did cover the costs of looking after us, providing money for the food for our dinners and the like.

So the problem i have with your fifth point in that in the situation i was in, we didnt need extra funds to cover it and i dont like the idea that a family that does need extra support wouldnt get it because a family that doesnt, like mine, was getting something.

It was my personal decision, and it’s certainly not for everyone. I’m the only one in our group who currently brings a wee one in despite three male colleagues having children about the same age, and a female colleague just having had a baby quite recently. That’s their choice. I admit it’s pretty stressful at times and I worry that people see me as being distracted and unprofessional. If it weren’t so unusual, I think I’d be a bit more relaxed about that. Some folk are surprised, some say they quite like it. Only very few have passed comment negatively.

There’s a bit of a guilt thing too – I don’t like handing my son over to people, he’s my responsibility. During the programme last night, one woman said that she dropped her child off at nursery early in the morning, picked her up at night, and only saw her for a few hours a day. A father felt the same thing. That’s pretty sad, and it can’t be good for us. Even being able to see your child during the day, perhaps to have lunch together, would be nice. If the nursery was in the same building as your workplace, it would make that a lot easier.

Alexander goes to nursery two days a week. I think it’s good for him to be around other children, and get stimulation and fun. I take him with me the other three days unless it’s going to be a really busy day – the nursery can sometimes offer an extra day. Even for those two days a week, nursery costs are our biggest household bill.

The proposal the company came up with in in the programme – children up to a year old can stay by the desk, and over that age they get a nursery place on site – is quite good. I take the point about separation of work and home life, but it’s actually really nice to have Alexander around; I don’t feel I’m missing him growing up.

My job’s different every day and I’m out of the office meeting people a lot of the time, so that makes things more interesting for him. I do make a lot of use of the time when Alexander naps! There are plenty of folk for him to say hello to in the office, and he’s not too disruptive most of the time (I hope my colleagues would agree). We have quite a good ‘village’ between my Councillor colleagues and Council staff (and more widely in the SNP, where I’ve taken him campaigning and to conferences!). In an ideal world, some kind of creche would be good, for the times where I’m in a meeting that requires more of my attention than he’ll allow.

I’ve been quite lucky to have circumstances flexible enough to take my son to work – it is do-able, but people need the support of their employer and colleagues to make it happen.

Happy to discuss this in more detail – thanks for the opportunity!

You keep using the word flexible, and that’s the key. Yet your solution seems to be fairly fixed – raise taxes, get more state nursery places. It’s not that simple.

For every parent, or family, the ideal solution is different. Which is why the solutions have to be flexible also.

First, we, like almost every parent I know, sought to minimise the hours our children spent in child care. Don’t get me wrong, the hours spent interacting with other children is good for them. But every day, 9-5 is not ideal. Nor is it practical – on days when you are you are both working, you need that nursery open 8-6. And thats with us both working ‘normal’ hours.
Second, there are far more solutions that state-run nursery, and my experience is that they are often better. After school clubs, child minders, private nurseries all deliver big time.

The solution is flexibility. Here’s simple ways in which we can help, and do more, without the need for any big shift:
First. The biggest single help to anyh parent who can access them are the child care vouchers Gordon Brown brought in (and I’m not Labour). They allow you set aside your salary to buy the child care you need, tax free. It’s capped at £243 a month. Not enough. It should go up. And it should be easier to get. Currently, if you don’t work for a big firm, you can only get this by filling in a annual tax return. In other words, there are barriers prevent it reaching those who need it most.
Second. Not every parent wants to work. Lets make it easier for those that don’t, so that the strain on our over-run nurseries is eased. Recognise not marriage, but family units in the tax system. Allow couples to transfer tax allowances to one another and so avoid tax, if they have children.
Third. Currently you get 2 1/2 hours per day of state provided nursery care, once your child is old enough. Expecting employers to give you an 2 1/2 hour shift is unrealistic, especially when you realise that its only available, where I live anyway, between 9 & 11.30 and 1.00 and 3.30. Make it a weekly allowance rather than a day rate, expand when its available and then you’re getting somewhere.
Four. Do everything we can to encourage flexible working. Because an understanding boss is essential.
Five. Allow those child care vouchers to be used to pay the grans, grandads aunts and uncles who step into the breach up and down the country. Or find a way of rewarding them.

There is no single way of delivering child care that will suit all parents. Child care is personal, you as a parent have to be happy with it, and it has to fit round your work, and lifestyle, be it shifts, 9-5, full time, part time, family, separated or single parent . Its sometimes suggested by economically right wing politicians that the solution to health care or education is simply to give out vouchers and let the market provide. You know what? Child care may be one area where this really is the simplest way.

But one of the things I am quite disappointed in about the SNP Government is that in 2007 they had stuff in their manifesto about doing more to promote flexi working and home working which would provide an environmental benefit as well as making life easier for many working parents – cut down on the commute etc. And as far as I can see they have done diddly squat.

But that is maybe another issue.