So Nick Clegg has confirmed that the Government intends to “encourage shared parenting from the earliest stage of pregnancy”.
A great policy – two thirds of mothers and fathers think parents should share the responsibilities of caring, but only one third of parents report that this actually happens. In other countries where real choice has been delivered, the amount of sharing has changed hugely and immediately.
So what might Government actually do to remove the constraints that currently engineer families into the patterns of the 1950s?
1. Create a level playing field for leave entitlements between mothers and fathers
The previous Government gave fathers 2 weeks and mothers 39 weeks – one of the biggest differences between mothers and fathers in the world. Both the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats have said they want something more equal.
It won’t make much actual difference to start with because the price of taking the leave is far too high especially for main earners – the pay for taking leave is far too low. But a balanced system can be invested in as we get through the recession.
2. Challenge employers who penalise anyone who has temporarily to compromise work for family
Mothers have to disrupt work for pregnancy and childbirth and many are automatically penalised. This means that for many families, when the mother has taken a hit on her career for pregnancy and childbirth, it is not possible for the father to take a second risk for the family.
Fortuitously, blue chip employers led by BT are right now setting up a new association, Employers for Fathers, which can work with Government to tackle workplace cultures that force parents to divide roles – and they are, for the first time, tackling how men work, the nub of the problem.
3. Challenge social attitudes that limit choices for families
It is not the purpose of Government to engineer social attitudes, but it must make sure that the information channels it owns don’t continue to promote the idea that caring responsibilities belong to women only. Government could also find ways to reward private information providers who change and start to introduce new ways of presenting family life.
Take maternity services, which nearly all families use. The entire logic of the medical model of birth is that one person is the client or the patient. The NHS as a whole still does not really know what to do with the families that invariably turn up with the mother – a real pressure on midwives who are eyeball to eyeball with these families every day. And yet if midwives work with the family, the health outcomes for mother and baby are a great deal better. The good news is that midwives are next year addressing this issue – the Royal College of Midwives is organising a conference, Family Matters. Another major partnership waits for Government to take up.
Antenatal education is in crisis within the NHS. It is time to rethink this from scratch. The key function of antenatal groups should be to connect parents into supportive local networks, such as local training colleges, local campaigns, local activities. And these should be inclusive of both mothers and father so that both parents have equal opportunity to receive support.
The NHS guide to pregnancy should be re-written and addressed to families, not to mothers only. Changing this will be a test case of the Government’s resolve: when it tries this most simple of tasks, it will hit all the ice-burgs of resistance.
4. Mainstreaming relationship support
Mainstreaming relationship support for parents is another policy just declared by Government. This needs to engage with both those involved in a relationship, not just one of them. If that happens, it will help shared parenting because it will support both parents and help them towards cooperative patterns.
I believe in Nick Clegg and David Cameron. They are the two most powerful men in the country. They are also parents of young children, confident and competent in caring for their children in their own right. They know shared parenting from the inside out. They moved Cabinet meetings for the sake of the school run. They have just declared they are taking personal charge of family policy. The prospects could hardly be better. But I am pretty sure they will find it more difficult than they think – I have been trying to change things for 10 years and I know all the barriers they will encounter.
