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Just been reading this
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/haveyoursay/2011/01/how_important_is_good_parentin.html
I found some of the comments really good, number 12 for example who believes that good parenting is where a parent is at home when the child returns from school!!!
I know it is focused on the under 3`s but people have ignored that really and made some really good points, do we think they will listen, probably not!!!!!
...probably not. But it just goes to show the strength of feeling out there!
Yes, there are some good points made.
Hi
What do we think of this in light of us all at some point having to go back to work and it might also imapct on the training that someone else was talking about for 30 hours after you have been on job seekers for 18 months
Good heavens, we can't win.
When I first came to live here, the neighbour's daughter who was then 13, babysat for me quite regularly. She was very mature and trustworthy, had a sister the same age as my son and I was very confident everything was Ok and safe. My oldest has also looked after my youngest sometimes, say if he was poorly and I had to nip out and get medicine or food.
The training thing: at least childcare is available for those of age 11 and under, however much we might not want to leave them in it for days on end. I think the worst problem is once they get to secondary school there is no vialbe care and yet many 11-12 year olds are not Ok to be left all day on their own (I know it varies from child to child)
I am not sure there is childcare above the age of 8, certainly not here anyway.
I am very interested to see what happens with this and with this
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-12378565
We definitely cant win 
I was quite shocked listening to this on the bbc this morning.
From what I can see, the majority of actions they're taking will hit those who are vulnerable, whether you're living in poverty or as a lone-parent.
Not sure I'm allowed to swear, but it is bloody disgraceful, seeing these cabinet members who have absolutely no idea what living in the real world is like (and my 16 year old daughter, who's poorly with sinusitis said that!).
Totally agree with your daughter sparklinglime!!!!!!
I am waiting to see if there is some Government response to this issue of age and leaving children and also the possible removal of flexible working/part time etc, yes I do understand the maths from a business point of view but it does throw up allsorts of questions as to single parents and working doesnt it?
Agree with your daughter, too, sparkling lime! It is another world......
Hi, has anyone read this today?
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-12544372
I watched a short video as well
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-12549523
It says n the video that some people are living off "just" £10 per day, not sure if this is after everything is paid ie gas, electric, tv, water, debt, if so then I wish I had £10 per day that would be heaven right now. What does everyone else think?
I am really not sure from where they pluck these figures out of the air!
If you had a family of a single parent with one child aged over twelve months then the "very approximate" weekly amount of £140 is what is left after Housing Benefit and Council Tax is paid, as far as I can see, so that is £20 a day (but of course that is to pay EVERYTHING including power, fares and food) I don't think they make it very clear at all. Bigger families would receive more Child Benefit and Child Tax Credit but then there are more mouths to feed, shoes to buy and clothes to wash!
Yes I agree, it did sound as though that was before gas electric etc was paid but even taking that into account this week I have no where near £10 per day!!!!!!
Just trying to work out what shopping I can got lol
I have to say that this is where I am fortunate, which is a bad choice of words, I'm sure. I have four dependant children, so budgeting is far, far easier for me.
Ah yes, shoes to buy... Ordered more shoes this week for school. And I've had to buy another gym kit as I think I've lost the other one over Christmas hols.
Hi sparklinglime, do agree with you on that, when I had 5 dependant children life was easier, then with 4 its was ok but now with 3 and 2 of whom are teens it is almost impossible to make ends meet, I am absolutely dreading the end of their EMA as it does take a lot of pressure off xxx
Couldnt resist sharing this with everyone!!!!
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-12566965
The idea of them even asking this did I have to say make me laugh, what will they think of next to waste money on!!!!!!!!
Time they made posts such as councilors, MPs - including the PM all voluntary positions. To be fair, those who hold posts in government don't need the wage anyway...
Hey tiredmum - no wonder! Where do you find all the time to read all this!! LOL:)
I like the idea of parenting skills being taught in school.
I don't think there is enough support of single WORKING parents.
and on your last one, I do emphasize with an employer who hires a young woman who 6 months or a year later, gets pregnant and they then have to pay not only the maternity but also the costs of a temperary worker to cover the absent role.
Also, there is the temperary member of staff who is filling the shoes of this mum - I know a lot of people take temperary work in the hope that it will lead to a permanent role - so they know from the outset that they'll definitely be looking for another job.
My mum is very old fashioned in her thinking - she would have loved to be a 50's kept housewife. but that didn't pan out. So maybe that's where my thinking still stems from. I do believe that men and women have different strengths when it comes to child care, and I also believe in a more community spirited, everybody cooks and cleans and looks after their neighbours etc, although that's a hard one to act on. I don't believe in money greed, climbing the ladder for corporate succes, or this currency climate of commercialism. However I did dream of being a barrister because of the salary and the fun of arguing... then thought that a judge'd be better, and I'm currently watching an item on ebay so that S can have such n such toy for his b'day. So... yeah...
I kind of agree with Sugar - state at the outset that you are money hungry success desiring go-getter if you haven't had kids and you don't plan to start a family until you are running your own successful business - say 10 years?
If you have kids, say so, that you have child care in place you will never need to leave your desk early to pick them up or take time off work because they are ill, that having them has made you more organised and you can now focus on your career etc etc.
If you plan to have more kids? erm... coming from the angle where even tho planned, the kids - my first especially totally hit me in the face and the whole breast feeding issue just started a terrible president - no one told me it wasn't my choice to breast feed - I'd swallowed all the propaganda they currently hand out, and not a single person let me know that maybe the baby would cry constantly for 6 weeks if they weren't attatched to you and if you can handle 6 weeks no sleep (on top of the last month of pregnancy lack of sleep) then yeah, sure you'll cope with breast feeding
Anyway I divulge. sorry. got me off on one. I really think parenting courses at school would be good but if they're filled with propaganda like the current pro breast feeding campaign, then maybe not.
And sorry but if you're gonna take almost a year off work and expect a business to fund that as well as keeping your job open and hiring temp staff, job equality suddenly doesn't sound quite equal - although they are now allowing men is 3 months paternity leave?
Hi JaneHope, I read anything and everything lol.
I do agree with everything you have said, I was always going to be a career woman wanted to be a forensic scientist, well doesnt life get in the way of our dreams!!!!!! 5 children later here I am sat reading, still dreaming to an extent about a better life.
I am also vey old fashioned about what I believe is right and wrong, I do think and you may have read a post from me about this when we ladies burned our bras then everything went t**s up in this country, we were brainwashed that we could have it all, you cant, there is an old saying isnt there Jack of all trades and Master of none, very true that and we should have remembered it when going headlong into a fulltime career that didnt fit around out families at all.
I also believe that it has upset the natural balance of things for men and women, back to the cave man here but it was always that the man was the provider and the lady was the homemaker, not that I am knocking sinlge dads at all they do a wonderful job.
Breast feeding well yes been there done that one, have to say I only did it long enough to escape the hospital 24 years ago when breast was best etc, never did it again and all of my children thrived perfectly fine on Cow and Gate plus!!!!!!!!
On the subject of schools education generally, I think that we have gone way too far in teaching sex education, again this is an unpopular view but its mine!!! I can only remember 1 teenager out of everyone I know as a teen being pregnant, now it considered odd if your teens arent pregnant by 16, none of mine are thankfully, but I do think we would do well to go back to a lot of the old fashioned values where sex and alcohol were adult only pastimes and we thought they were yuk!!!!!
I do agree with Alan Sugar 100%
xxx
Sex ed in schools is a tough one - media in the world and access to sexualised images is very different to what it was even 10 years ago. I'm always shocked at films they put on in the daytime now - westerns with guns, and even Greece - I put it on for fun to see if S would take to it and 10 mins later I'm watching these girls have a ciggarette and drink alcohol in a very giggly fashion - not something I really want to show a child who is still learning about the world and doesn't have the vocabulary or understanding to explain it to him...
Then we have all the talent shows and dance contests and singing etc. And what about the length of football shorts? I only mention it as it is a vivid way of measuring how times do change very frequently and things go in and out of fashion - womans' bathing suits. etc etc
So education is a funny one, we go back a couple hundred years, and even less in different cultures, and there is the question of educating a girl AT ALL?
Eg. 'My big fat gypsy wedding' today seem to be practising these 'backward' cultures and I don't know. If you're going to educate boys and girls equally - is that possible??? they are so different - and those that dissagree
***CK!! OMG. I've been watching this thing on ebay and just looked I had 33 secs left to make (my first) bid, and I'd got so distracted with onespace, and I put my bid in (18 secs left) only to find I'd been logged out! Omg. typed password, clicked confirm, and wow. yes. won it.
oh man addrenalin's totally kicked in. I'm gonna say g'night! now! Been great discussing politics, maybe more to say tomo!
Ha Ha thats made me chuckle, glad you won it!!!!!!!! Sleep well, goodnight xxx
Very interesting. For me the most significant thing is that children want to spend quality time with their parents. I do think that children who are in day care are usually there because their parent is working....and is therefore very tired by the time they collect the child and it is hard then to do "quality" things. I speak from experience!
Yes I agree with you on that, years ago when my 2nd child was born I went back to work full time when she was just 6 weeks old, I was very lucky and could afford a nanny and a cleaner but it didnt make me any less tired at the end of the day.
Have to say I really dont agree with the idea of 15 mins of children telling us what to do?????? Where do they get these ideas from?
Yes, I agree the parent should always stay in charge. Howeve, maybe just the "choice of activity" could be up to the child, as in Special Time (as long as the choice is not something dangerous like "let's go and play on the motorway" 
)
Ha Ha thats made me chuckle here, I do agree in children having a choice of lets say an activity but I just cannot agree in anyway at all to the child being in charge even if its just for 15 mins, I am sure the people who think up these ridiculous ideas dont have children themselves but if they do its even more of a worry!!!!!!!
S is always telling me what to do! take my glasses off when we eat dinner - because I usually do, and has started reminding me to put my seat belt on...
Oh dear, thats made me smile xxx
I worked mainly full time until eldest was 12, but as nights were involved, I had to leave the job... It's been lovely being home with the children and being awake to enjoy being with them!
I seem to be doing more and more voluntary work now to fill the day, but am still here for them at 3.30pm (mind you, have evening meetings too with the housing association panels). I have found the older they are getting, the more they seem to need me though. Another thing that sadly goes ignored.
Well what do we think of this one? I cant see how they will implament it when our children have to house share till they are 35, good grief they will never be able to leave home!!!!!!!!!!!!
On one hand it makes sense for people to have homes that fit the size of their family. On the other, this will frighten and upset a lot of people and make them worry they could lose their homes. As someone says in the article, it is not as if attractive alternatives are available. I am sure that if modern, pleasant, accessible flats were built, say on a community basis with gardens and facilities then many older people in family-sized social housing would be delighted to move but why should they give up their homes when there is nothing to look forward to.
Problem is Louise people will not take care of their property as it will no longer be viewed as a home but as temp accomodation, the housing associations will face huge costs when a property becomes void, I can see law suits coming with this one and also the ones who can afford to wil buy their property making the social housing crisis even more accute, it isnt rocket science but these politicians have no common sense at all.
I will be watching this story with interest and really hope they win
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-lancashire-12779806
Yes indeed! My own thoughts are that if they could at least help those students in the £30 a week EMA bracket then things would be eased considerably, Maybe miss out the ones who have been getting £10 a week, whose families are not quite so strapped
Aha tired mum, you beat me to it, I was just looking at that article.
It's certainly better than scrapping the scheme altogether. Students who received EMA 2009-10 will get the same until summer 2012. Students who received £30 a week in the year 2010-11 (your daughter, tired mum?) will at least retain £20 a week for their second year, to summer 2012. New applicants can apply through a discretionary fund, with priority to those leaving care or with severe disabilities.
It means that students from families on the lowest incomes, who got the £30 this year will get some help automatically.
Well not as god as it 1st seemed, I was pondering this today
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-12904837
I actually think it is such an unfair way to give out this money, lets take for example a looked after child and I do have knowledge of this and how much money carers receive so the looked after child is usually not disadvantaged by income, also this takes no account of parental income the looked after child might well be living with millionaires, also a disabled child does receive differing amounts of benefits dependant on their disability so again isnt neccesarily disadvantaged by income. There will be loads of young adults who will not recieve a penny uinder this new scheme particulalry those whos parent/s are just above the threshold for tax credits and therefore free meals.
In my view its a big con and will not prevent students from leaving education, the old system was so much fairer in that it was income based and had a sliding scale according to that income.
....ah but making an announcement which seems to give priority to "disabled and looked after children" will always be popular! I agree that these groups may well not be the ones most in need in terms of income, I guess that they may be seen to have other disadvantages though and so removing their money would be seen as putting yet another obstacle in their way.
You're right that there will always be those who "just" miss out on any scheme. Yet another example of whether those on benefits may be better off than those in work and the threshold of around the £16k mark actually is not that big when you consider that might be for a sizeable family.
This is interesting
not at all well publisized is it??????? had it not been for Anna putting a link up for educational special needs and me looking at that I would never have known about this.
I expect there are loads of these consultations that we do not neccessarily hear about, grrrrrr
YES!! although this debate is focusing on the under threes, I think it is a very important point.