Mothers At Home Matter Conference 2024
Saving the choice to care.
Sally Greenhill reflects on our 2024 Conference, summarising the main points made by each speaker, including questions from the day. Click on a name below to take you to their section of Sally’s report.
Keynote Speaker, David Goodhart
David is a British journalist, commentator on social affairs and author. He has worked for the think-tank Demos, the Policy Exchange and EHRC (the Equality and Human Rights Commission). His latest book, "The Care Dilemma: Caring Enough In The Age of Sex Equality” has been widely publicised, including on the radio 4 programme, ‘Start The Week’. On occasion, he has received criticism for ‘sending women back into the kitchen’, which he robustly denies, but he does acknowledge that he thinks the breakdown of family life has led to a number of social problems, namely:
Tensions between modern hard-won freedoms – for both sexes – and the relentless care demands of the very young and the very old.
Undervaluing the domestic sphere, especially the role of mothers.
The instability of family life, especially among the lower income spectrum, has led to nearly half of all 14-year-olds not living with both their biological parents.
The rise of social media and iPhones leads to greater emotional fragility among the young.
State takeover of care for the young and elderly rather than family care may result in less loving attention.
Crises in the Criminal Justice System, educational under-performance, poor housing and poverty: are all due to the breakdown of family life.
A fall in fertility to below population replacement level (1:4 down from 2:1 children per woman). Many couples report having fewer children than they would ideally like.
Recruitment crisis in care jobs.
However, these problems must also be balanced by many positives, such as the emancipation of women, who benefit from greater financial and emotional independence and can escape unsatisfactory marriages. This is why he calls it a ‘dilemma’. How can society reconcile these freedoms with their consequences?
“When asked ‘What do you do?’. We should say, ‘We are in the business of brain development!’”
David continued to compare the role of women in the UK with the attitudes of feminist American writers such as Amy Wax and Anne-Marie Slaughter, who were raised to consider female success in masculine terms, i.e. by being promoted to high office (crashing through the glass ceiling), but disparaging the – largely invisible – work their mothers did at home.
Men must step up to the plate too, which they largely have done over recent decades, from taking approximately 30% of domestic responsibility 50 years ago to more like 45% now, especially among middle-class professional families. But whereas many women are now taking on formerly male jobs, few men are switching to largely female jobs, such as nursery work or social care. However, David quoted Una Smythe who noted that there are twice as many men employed in social care as in the armed forces (roughly 300,000 as opposed to 150,000 in the armed forces), which must be encouraging.
Goodhart claimed that Jeremy Hunt, when he was Chancellor, said that mothers were wasting their talents at home and that they should be out in the workforce, earning money for the economy.
So what can be done to enable more mothers to care for their infants at home if they choose?
Introduce a more family-friendly work culture with more part-time jobs, job-shares etc.
More generous parental leave.
Recognition of the family in the Tax system.
Abolish the 2-child limit in the benefit system.
Front-end Child Benefit so that parents could opt to take the larger share in the early years.
Allocate the government’s £9bn child-care budget directly to parents and carers to spend how they choose e.g. paying Grandma to provide childcare.
Follow Finland’s example in offering a home care allowance, which has a big take-up.
David estimates that these savings could add around £10,000 to a woman’s income, which might swing her in favour of staying at home with her children.
‘Home’ will feature more highly in an ageing population, as older people tend to stay at home more, as well as the modern trend to work from home and rely on Zoom etc. AI will also reduce low-level jobs, so that we may be working a 4-day week in future.
“Our present society regards children as an ‘obstacle’ or ‘burden’.”
Our present society regards children as an ‘obstacle’ or ‘burden’, which puts a strain on marriage in the early, stressful years, so we must try to alleviate this tendency. If we can save marriages, families will be happier. At present only 20% of mothers of pre-school children stay at home full-time. A Survey by the Dept for Education found that two-thirds of mothers would prefer to work shorter hours and one-third would prefer not to work outside the home at all. A British Social Attitudes Survey found that only around 9% of parents thought that both parents should work full-time, so the government’s policy is only appealing to a tiny proportion of the workforce. There must be a lot of unhappy parents in our country! There is a mismatch between the general population and the politicians, who are only obsessed with GDP and mass employment.
Finally, David encouraged the conference attendees to be proud of rearing the next generation and to stand up for our role when asked ‘What do you do?’. We should say, ‘We are in the business of brain development!’
Ellie Vivian, The Other Half
Ellie Vivian set up ‘The Other Half’, an Early Years Research Centre, in response to the Tory government’s proposal to offer free childcare from nine months of age in 2023. As a mother to a small child herself, she was outraged that she felt her and her child’s needs were not being met, so she organised a Survey among 582 mothers, including 23 face-to-face interviews, to gauge their reaction, which she shared with the Conference. In answer to the question: What do mothers want in the early years, many of the answers have already been covered in David Goodhart’s talk, but they are worth repeating here.
There is no one-size-fits-all, the government should not expect all new mothers to want to return to work immediately after birth and hand their baby over to State childcare. There is a gap between the lives most mums want to lead and the policy support available to them. 69% of the mothers surveyed viewed the new childcare proposals negatively (40% marked it with 0/10) 67% don’t use outsourced childcare as they prefer to look after their children themselves. Many mothers (94%) felt the government wasn’t listening to their needs/demands; only 5% wished to maintain the status quo.
They would prefer to follow Germany’s lead in offering paid parental leave until the child is 3, when employers may not be forced to offer the mother’s previous job back but they would have to offer a job at the same pay grade. Many jobs don’t offer flexible working, which can sometimes be viewed as a lack of commitment, especially in careers like Law. Many mums complained that seeing their child for only a couple of hours in the evening after a ten-hour day in daycare was unacceptable.
Sky-rocketing housing costs and the cost of living demand two salaries so what is the answer? They are demanding better-paid parental leave, tax reform for families, a pension system that does not penalise time off for family duties, and mothering to be valued more highly than as a tax-payer.
More local support from family and the community – ‘it takes a village to raise a child’. There is a vicious cycle of falling demand and need, as more mothers put their little ones into care when they return to work, so playgroups and children’s centres close down due to lack of support. There are fewer volunteers to run the support centres, so fewer places to go for those mums who want to stay at home with their toddlers. Besides, these mums are also facing discrimination from those who believe that NOT sending their child to daycare is bad parenting – even though they may not need it themselves. Many parents have lost confidence in their own powers of parenting and believe the professionals ‘do it better’.
Mothers feel ignored by Westminster – their voice is not heard as they face accusations of being ‘economically inactive’, or facing the ‘motherhood penalty’ or the ‘childcare burden’. As said before, GDP is prioritised over their and their children’s needs. Many mothers feel that raising the next generation is the most important job of their lives – which should be recognised by Parliament. However, Ellie did feel that Bridget Phillipson, the Education Secretary, did acknowledge their complaints, while still resolutely pursuing government policy.
“There is a gap between the lives most mums want to lead and the policy support available to them. ”
There were several questions/comments following Ellie’s talk. One man in the audience said that he wasn’t surprised by the findings as he said the only people to benefit from government policies were usually the very rich. He quoted E.V. Schumacher’s book, ‘Small is Beautiful’ which advocates the possibility of removing oneself from the economic daily grind (how?) This is the nature of capitalism and can’t be helped, that’s the way things are.
Another person asked about the demographic makeup of the Survey and how the respondents were chosen. They were told that they targeted social media groups, including MAHM members themselves. Ellie recommended visiting The Other Half’s website to access statistical data.
Finally, one person said that it wasn’t what the mothers themselves demanded, but what was best for the infants – which received a round of applause.
Neil Leitch, CEO of The Early Years Alliance
Neil started his talk by saying that he had toyed with the idea of showing a slide of a recent headline in the Daily Telegraph: ‘Britain is the Second Most Miserable Country in the World’ (March 2024) - but he decided against it: too depressing.
Instead, he started by telling us how he has come to be the CEO of the Early Years’ Alliance, Britain’s biggest charitable provider of preschool care. The alliance has 14,000 centres under its remit, 40 of which are run directly from its head office in some of the most disadvantaged areas of London. Thus, he understands the pressures some families are under.
After a long career in finance, and with no academic background in child development, he had a sudden Road to Damascus moment and realised that he wanted to help children and families lead the best lives they were capable of. He had hoped that this would be a ‘cushy’ early retirement job, but he found that it was the hardest job he had ever done!
The Alliance was started by one woman, Belle Tutaev, and her friend, both mothers of 3-year-old daughters, who realised that they weren’t the only mothers who felt isolated and marginalised, so they started a chain of playgroups – now 23,000 – whose role was to support, not replace parents (mostly mothers) in the challenging role of raising their preschool children. In 2011, Belle was awarded an OBE for services to children and families in the Queen’s Birthday Honours.
Neil told a personal and deeply moving story of his own background. Born to an Indian mother and British soldier father as one of six siblings, his early family life was plagued by abuse and shocking violence, so much so that the authorities decided to place all the children in care, but Neil protested against this so strongly that he was finally allowed to rejoin his mother – to his great advantage. His three older siblings have all predeceased him from drug and alcohol abuse but his mother’s loving dedication enabled him to survive and thrive, with a loving family of his own later on and two successful careers. He even showed us a video of the family dog, which he was persuaded to adopt and who is now treated as a valued family member!
Neil referred to Aaron Antonowsky, an academic who made a study of what happened to the children of the Holocaust in which 70% - not unnaturally – had emotional issues but 30% emerged intact thanks to their parents’ efforts to give them a structured, predictable and explicable life. His thesis, published in the 1960s, is called ‘A Sense of Coherence’.
Two videos then followed, demonstrating the importance of attachment between a mother and her small daughter who didn’t want to go to bed. The child could barely speak coherent words, but she mirrored her mother’s intonation and expressions, and the two were in perfect harmony. The video didn’t show whether the mother was successful in putting her small daughter to bed, but they certainly communicated well.
The second video showed the impact of aggression on a 15-month-old boy who was being shown some items in a box by a friendly stranger. Then, a loud-voiced, angry third party entered the room, and the little boy lost confidence in the game and didn’t know how to respond to the friendly lady. He looked uncertain and afraid, and all communication was spoiled.
Naomi Eisenstadt, the founder of Sure Start, made headlines with her announcement that it was better for small children to spend most of their time at home with one of their parents. The traditional model was for one parent to go out to work while the other parent provided home care, at least until the last child went to school, but now government policy is to get as many parents (mothers) back to work as soon as possible after giving birth. We do not exist in a utopia so we have to make the best of the current situation. We are where we are.
But many parents are in desperate need of respite. Neil has talked with nearly every Early Years minister and Education minister over the past twenty years but he has never been asked, ’What’s in the best interests of mothers and children?’ Everything is judged in terms of its value to the treasury and the economy in general. When he was invited to talk to a large supermarket chain about how to get women back into the workforce, he found many mothers in tears because they didn’t want to return. They felt guilty about only being able to spend an hour a day – usually over bathtime – with their youngsters at the end of a busy day in childcare.
Neil mentioned the influence that both parents and teachers can have on the young. His mother used to try and economise by sending him to school in pared-down men’s trousers with huge seams to be let out later, but the Science teacher shamed him in front of the class, so he decided to walk out of the classroom that very day. Neil then showed us a video of footballer Ian Wright, who was overcome with emotion when reunited with the one teacher at school who had believed in him and encouraged him. Influential adults in a young person’s life have the power to shape or destroy them forever.
QUESTIONS AND COMMENTS
With the retirement age for women raised to the late 60s/70s, it seems mean to begrudge them a few years to care for their infants in the early years. Are human beings merely pack horses?
Why do some mothers outsource childcare when they don’t have to? Why do they think that the ‘professionals’ do it better than them? Neil replied that he had been asked to define a ‘successful’ child – at the point of entry into full-time school. He replied that he didn’t care about the child’s educational achievements; for him, the defining virtues in any child were compassion, kindness and an ability to make others feel good. With today’s unstable world situation, what is needed for future humanity is the ability to live together in harmony.
Neil recommended longer maternity and paternity leave for all. Children are not obstacles, they are opportunities.
The Treasury currently spends £18bn on remedial action in the teenage years. Wouldn’t it be better to spend the money now, as an investment for the future? But the Treasury can’t see beyond the 5-year electoral cycle.
We need to keep plugging away at the media. Woman’s Hour thinks we are old-fashioned and reactionary, but we mustn’t give up trying to get the message across. Ellie Vivian found it difficult to interest the media in her survey. Maybe we should tap into the adult recollections of the generation brought up in the 1980s by highly feminist mothers? We need their voices.
David Goodhart challenged Neil to reply to his suggestion that the government’s £9bn subsidy should be given directly to families, and he also thought that the number of ‘disadvantaged families’ was exaggerated. It is not beyond the wit of man to devise a system whereby the money would not be given to feckless families, according to David. However, Neil’s experience has taught him that daycare is the best option for some children from dire families – like his own. Both men finally agreed that the majority of families are decent and loving and would use the money wisely, but a system would have to be put in place to ensure that this subsidy should not be abused. There is no blanket policy, the only yardstick is what is best for the children.
Maggie Gordon-Walker, ‘Motherhood and Politics’
Maggie started by explaining how she started ‘Mothers Uncovered’ which is a peer-led support group for new mothers. When she had her first child in 2008, her main reaction was one of shock and she found herself crying frequently.. With no family or friends around to help her, she felt isolated and alone and all the professional attention she received was on the baby, but not on her. Things did not progress so far as her being diagnosed with postnatal depression and in any case, she feared that her baby might be taken away if she revealed too much of her true feelings.
So she set up ‘Mothers Uncovered’ where mums can express themselves freely to each other with no danger of upsetting their families, who may have caused these feelings. She built up a team of paid workers, mostly past participants who can help new mums to build up a record of this sensitive time as an act of mindfulness for future reference. Many new mothers feel invisible at this time and undervalued in what has come to be known as a period of ‘matrescence’. Much has been written about adolescence, but very little has been researched about ‘matrescence’ and so Maggie has tried very hard – with success – through books and podcasts titled ‘The Secret Life of Mothers’ to explore and defend this stage of life. She campaigns and advocates through websites like Support Matrescence at Change.org to demand a basic income to liberate mothers to be able to do what they do best, i.e. to mother. She has also been on Radio 5 and the Maternal Mental Health Alliance report, drawing attention to the shocking fact that suicide is still the leading cause of death among new mothers, revealing the paucity of care in postnatal depression across Britain, with only 46 outlets.
Maggie has been asked to run more of these support ‘hubs’, but they are expensive—approximately £1,500 for a five-week course, roughly the equivalent of a hospital bed for one night—and they need more money. She runs a course called ‘Frazzled’ for parents of SEND children and sessions for young mums in their teens and twenties.
Anne Fennell, MAHM Chair
Anne needs no introduction as Chair of Mothers At Home Matter, but she wanted to outline the three main aims of MAHM:
To promote and understand the development needs of young children
To enhance the confidence and self-esteem of new mothers
To campaign for a more level playing field with regard to family taxation
Anne wants to change the narrative about the way young children are seen in our society. Instead of being ‘obstacles’ or ‘burdens’, she wants us to regard them as our teachers, opening our eyes to the magic around us, such as dew-spangled cobwebs in the Autumn. She reminded us of Jesus’s command: ‘Unless ye become as little children you will not enter the kingdom of Heaven’ [MAHM has no religious or political affiliation]. Anne urged us to slow down and share a child’s wonder at the world around us. We have a unique nurturing and soothing bond with our little ones.
Anne visited the 2024 Labour Party Conference with Outreach Coordinators Anna and Ange, who dressed up in outrageous costumes to attract attention. Although it costs about £1,000 to attend this conference, Anne thought it was money well spent as they did make an impact and network with influential people. She reported a growing distrust of what parents do at home as decision-makers prefer to invest in the safer role of professional carers, as they are easier to monitor.
Anne also attended the Women’s Budget Group and asked them how they were going to sell the free child-care from nine months offer to parents, but she received evasive responses as people scuttled off to find someone else to talk to! Hers was the first question to the group but it was put to the back of the queue and never fully answered as they ran out of time. But she received some supportive comments from people who came and congratulated her after the conference, so there is a groundswell of agreement out there: but how to translate it into government – and fiscal – policy, that is the question? One woman said she felt she failed both in her job and as a mother as she had split loyalties. Both NESTA and the Joseph Rowntree Foundation appear sympathetic to our cause. Gender equality doesn’t mean women competing with men for the same jobs; there must be a different way of measuring equality. Our contribution to society is by way of helping to form the next generation, to build fine citizens for the future.
Anne’s next meeting was with the Financial Secretary to the Treasury, where the Child Benefit injustice was discussed. Unfortunately, Labour is not revoking the Tories’ original policy. Also, families should be taxed as a whole, not individually. Anne was also invited to make a podcast with Elizabeth Willetts, and she had a conversation with Jordan Peterson’s wife, Tammy, whom she met at a book launch. However, Anne urged other members of MAHM to step forward to join our voice and widen the conversation.
Amazingly, Anne finds time to be the President of the European Federation of Parents and Carers at Home, which includes 16 countries. She met Nobel prize-winner James Heckman at a conference in Budapest, who will be the last speaker at our conference today. His programs target disadvantaged families by home-visiting children from the age of 3, but some middle-class mothers have misinterpreted his message and have chosen to put their own youngsters into daycare, which is inevitably not of the same high quality as they would get at home.
Anne talked about the ARC conference in London, set up by Philippa Stroud, where she also talked with Erica Komisar who has already spoken at one of our conferences. She went to a UN conference on the status of women where she put forward the unpopular point of view – i.e. that women’s energies were best served looking after their own babies rather than farming them out to strangers. At a symposium on Nordic countries’ approach to the early years, she asked the Danish Minister for Women’s Equality about the right of mothers to be mothers but got the short shrift: ‘What about the fathers? You are trying to drag women back 100 years, I can’t talk to you.’ Anne was later approached by the Nordic News and gave an interview expressing MAHM’s views.
Madeline Wallin, Nordic Childcare
Madeleine (who is Swedish) was invited to speak at the conference by Anne Fennell as she is the Secretary General of the European Federation of Parents and Caregivers at Home (FEFAF), as well as the International Coordinator and Board Member for HARO, raising awareness of the needs of children and the importance of motherhood. Her talk was entitled: ‘The Nordic Childcare Model: how do mothers and children fare?’
Madeleine first explained her own motherhood journey. As a single mother to her first baby, she had no option but to move back in with her own mother, who supported them while Madeleine worked part-time. Later, she had two children with her husband and followed the ‘party line’ by putting her infants into daycare but by the fourth child – her only daughter – she followed her instincts and insisted on staying at home with her, in spite of society’s protestations to the contrary, and she became a motherhood activist.
Madeleine then showed various slides explaining the different childcare options in each of the Nordic countries: Sweden, Denmark and Finland. Despite Sweden’s generous parental leave policy of 480 days (16 months) of shared leave, Madeleine thought that Finland had the best approach, allowing a home care allowance of around 378 euros per month for three years, with extra for other children in the family under 3. They also threw in a maternity grant and a ‘baby box’ of high-quality, necessary items for the baby's first year (or 170 euros instead). Finland seemed more family-focused than the other countries.
Madeleine was impressed – and saddened – by a trip to Nigeria, where the maternal instinct seemed more developed than in Nordic countries. She feels we in the north have lost the mothering instinct, and her sister – a midwife – confirmed this.
The way forward? We must all be more proactive about writing to our politicians to ask for more ‘heart’ and less ‘head’ policies. We must talk to people to spread the message. We are not weak, but mothers are vulnerable: we must fight!
Professor James Heckman and Alison Baulos, Center of the Economics of Human Development
Professor James Heckman is an American economist and Nobel Prize winner now working in Chicago on the determinants of what makes a successful life. His main thesis is that not enough research has been done into the interaction between a small child and its parents – usually the mother. He says that the Government is eager to fund many outreach programs and academic studies but not enough research has been done on the simple interaction between a child and its family environment, including grandparents and the wider family. Much of this research has taken place in Jamaica, the US, Ireland and China.
He and Alison Baulos have been working on home-visiting programs where experts in child development – including teachers and practitioners – try to work with parents within their own homes. Alison told us there were practical problems with this as union rules forbid employees to work after 5 pm when most parents would be at home after work.
Q: Have you heard of a British study of parents and children at home between 2004 – 2015 which mirrors your work? It followed the socio-emotional and language development of children aged from three to fourteen.
A. Prof. Heckman said that he had heard of it but he was hazy about the details; however, he did mention another study with preschoolers around 60 years ago, including the knock-on effects on the next generation. He referred to Orla Doyle who led a program called ‘Preparing for Life’ in Ireland. In China, where there is a culture of parents working overseas and sending remittances back to grandparents, who are raising the children, they found that no amount of money sent back compensated for the lack of close direct parenting.
Q. What do you think of our government’s current policy of sending children as young as nine months to daycare to enable mothers to return to work?
A. Very bad idea (applause). In Quebec, they tried a similar policy but randomised trials revealed negative consequences, especially among boys. Many daycare centres could not match the benefits of an educated home environment, but in cases of children from disadvantaged backgrounds, an average centre may be better than a poor home life.
Q. Why are parents neglected in public policy?
A. In the US, there are many dysfunctional families. There are many single-parent families, creating huge pockets of poverty. Both single mothers and their children suffer from stress.
Also, many families are fractured and need support. Maybe it is easier to hand over the raising of the young to the professionals and abdicate responsibility? But problems like speech and language development are more easily dealt with at home and caught early.
Q. In the UK, mothers who stay at home are labelled ‘economically inactive’. How do we raise the profile of stay-at-home mothers, as we don’t want to be paid – but we do want to be valued and recognised as useful members of society?
A. Prof Heckman agreed that non-market activity, such as mothering, did not receive wide recognition, either in the US or the UK, from either political party. But a woman’s time can be measured and evaluated and should be granted more respect as she is inculcating the next generation with her values and culture.
Preparing the tote bags for conference delegates
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