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Mothers’
Election Manifesto
UK
general election 7 June 2001
Carers’
right to payment.
Children’s right to care.
While
all parties claim to put families first during this election, women who
are the heart of the family and of the economy – as mothers, wives,
partners, grandmothers, nurses, teachers, cleaners and millions of other
workers – always come last, along with children. No political party has prioritised supporting mothers and
other caregivers.
One
result is that, since most women, mothers or not, do caring work, what
women spend much or most of their lives doing is ignored and hidden.
Another result is that two million of the children that women in
Britain care for live below the poverty line, one of the worst levels of
child poverty in the industrialised world.
How
can we forget that the first thing New Labour did after winning in 1997
was to call single mothers ‘workless’ and cut one parent benefit?
The public outcry led by single mothers was so loud that child
benefit was increased, but this didn’t make up for what single mothers
lost. It was also the
beginning of Labour’s attack on women-led families. There are now hints that Labour will make child benefit
taxable after the election.
Mothers
are either exhausted by working the double day to make ends meet, or we
suffer deprivation and stigma if we care for our own children at home.
Some mothers and children are forced to steal to rise above dire
poverty.
Every
mother is a working mother.
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Mothers
and other caregivers must receive “generous financial support” as
recommended by the Child Care Commission this year.
Family groups are calling for at least £150 a week for the
first years of a child’s life. Grandmothers also are entitled to
payment for their caring work. As the Commission pointed out, “the free childcare
provided by the previous generation of women can no longer be taken
for granted.”
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This
money must be called a wage in recognition that caring is work and
that raising children is a vital contribution to society as a whole.
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Women
in waged work must not be denied the right to be with children for the
first five years of their lives, or to have the money to pay someone
of our choice to share the care.
And women on benefits must not be denied the money we need to
care for them – children and their carers can’t count for less
just because the father is absent.
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We
must have time to breastfeed, and to develop and maintain
relationships with our children.
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We
must have time to breastfeed, and to develop and maintain
relationships with our children.
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Mothers
receiving income support and other benefits should still be entitled
to passported benefits such as housing benefit and council tax rebate
on top of the £150 a week.
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Higher
wages for all childcare workers, so we don't have to leave our
children with other exploited and overworked women.
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Free,
publicly accountable, high quality, accessible childcare for every
mother whether in waged work or unwaged work: after school care,
school holiday play schemes, weekend activities.
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Mothers
with disabilities are also working mothers.
We must not be charged for adequate social services which
enable us to look after our own children: home helps and home
adaptations, as well as childcare, nursery and school escorting.
Nurseries must be fully accessible to children with
disabilities.
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Mothers
and children must be protected from domestic violence.
The £20 weekly penalty imposed by the Child Support Act on
single mothers’ benefit must be abolished.
We are penalised for trying to protect our families from
violent and uncaring fathers.
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New
Deal plans to compel single mothers, and mothers with disabilities
married or not, into low-waged work regardless of the impact on our
families, must be scrapped.
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Trade
unions must recognise mothers and other unwaged caregivers as workers
and support our demand for wages.
As long as unwaged carers are considered ‘workless’ all
caring work will be devalued – paid carers will continue to get the
lowest wages.
The
money is there
As
Barbara Castle said when demanding decent pensions, “The country can
afford it!” Why is Blair so
worried to ‘reward people at the top’? Isn’t being at the top reward
enough? And why has the
military budget increased under Labour from £21 billion annually to £24
billion?
Women
at home have always nurtured the community.
As more women go out to work the community drains away. Schoolchildren return to an empty home and there’s no one
to care about the ill and the house-bound.
No wonder the demands on the NHS have increased.
While
women have fought for the right to an independent life outside the home
and to share the caring work with partners and children, that work can’t
be ignored; those who depend on it can’t be neglected.
We don’t stop worrying about our loved ones because we have waged
jobs. But there is no
‘reward’ for our concern. We
get the taxes, not the breaks.
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While
large companies enjoy huge tax breaks, and the top fifth of
households pay 36.5 % of their income in tax, the bottom fifth pays
41.4%!
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Corporation
tax = £38 billion; Income tax = £104 billion!
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Glaxo
Smith Kline, one of the biggest drugs multinationals, has £1.50
knocked off their tax for every £1 they spend on research and
development!
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Rupert
Murdoch’s UK media empire paid no net corporate tax in 12 years to
1999. They got more rebates than they ever paid in taxes!
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Owners
and directors of big firms, including public services, help themselves
to obscene salaries. The director of the Royal Bank of Scotland gets
£9,600,000 a year; that of British Airways £2,480,000; and that of
British Telecom £1,225,000!
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The
Duke of Westminster (Britain’s wealthiest man) received a government
farm subsidy of £3 million, but small farmers are driven off the
land!
Mothers
and Grandmothers
All
Women Count |