News

Lord Northbourne gives notice...

An important step forward for the Family Day campaign was made during the Second Reading debate of the Welfare Reform Bill in the House of Lords on Wednesday April 29th, when Lord Northbourne concluded his speech by saying: 'The realistic solution is to continue, where necessary, to let parents care for their own children when they want to. If the Government want to press forward with Part 1 of the Bill, I shall press in Committee for at least one relatively small amendment to the flexible working provisions of the Employment Rights Act, as amended, to ensure that all parents with young children have at least one full day a week together with their families on days when their children are not at school.'

Keep watching this space for developments!

Lord Northbourne's speech begins at the bottom of the page at the following link and continues onto the next page:

  http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/ld200809/ldhansrd/text/90429-0012.htm

Weekend Workers: Part-time Parents?

Published in advance of Mothering Sunday 2009, the pamphlet produced by the Relationships Foundation Weekend Workers: Part-time Parents? makes the case for the proposed Family Day Bill for which Keep Time for Children is campaigning.

Mothering Sunday generates big business for florists, chocolatiers and the greeting card industry. However, recent research shows that up to 1.5 million families will have a parent at work on Mothering Sunday – and regularly on Sundays. Perhaps even more surprisingly, 1.34 million families with children have at least one parent working on both weekend days. These parents are at work when their kids need them the most – at the weekends, when they are not at school. The Family Day Bill proposed by the Relationships Foundation would allow all parents the opportunity to spend a weekend day with their children.

Michael Trend, the Executive Director of Relationships Foundation comments: ‘The issue is about more than one day of the year. It is not simply about mothers, but fathers too. Men in the UK are more likely to work at weekends than men in any other EU country. 44% of female UK employees work at least one Saturday a month and the UK tops the European tables for evening and weekend work.’

‘In Weekend Workers: Part-time Parents? we ask whether parents have a real choice to spend weekend time with their children. The research shows that the UK has a serious problem – the impact of unsocial hours on parenting and family life. The Bill is not about prescription, but about potential. It gives parents the choice to be responsible.’

Research shows that three out of four working families experience some weekend work and in over half of these – 2.41 million families – at least one parent is working regularly at weekends. In the EU, only Bulgaria and Romania have longer average working hours than the UK. Parents tend towork even longer hours than other employees. When parents work at theweekends they see less of their children that day and less overall because there is no significant evidence of them making up the lost time on another day.

The pamphlet concludes that the time has come for a Family Day Bill. It would give every parent of children under the age of 16 the right in law to a weekend day off each week. This right would be established through an extension to current flexible working legislation.

Significant change is necessary. Our pamphlet highlights the negative impactof unsocial working hours on family life. Most parents want to be responsible parents – the Family Day Bill gives them the choice.

For more information please contact: Peter Lynas – p.lynas@relationshipsfoundation.org 01223 341286 or 07546 590902

Unsocial Hours: Unsocial Parents? Working Time and Family Wellbeing

Just published is the full report of the Relationship Foundation's recent major research project into Working Time and Family Wellbeing: Unsocial Hours: Unsocial Families?

The impact of long and unsocial hours on family life has been a focus of significant research in the high income world in the last 10-15 years. The Relationships Foundation has had a strong interest in this area for some while and has previously commissioned two studies with the National Centre for Social Research:

• Keep Time for Children: The incidence of weekend working (Barnes and Bryson, 2004) - which used Labour Force Survey data to investigate the extent of parental working at weekends.

• Working Atypical Hours: What happens to family life? (Barnes, Bryson and Smith, 2006). This work used data from the Time Use Survey to look at how parents and children used their time, with a particular focus on unsocial hours working.

The new report takes this research area considerably further. It is an international literature survey focusing on the impact of long and atypical hours on family life, particularly on couple relationships and the wellbeing of children.

The report benefits from the availability of up-to-date and rich statistical material on working patterns across Europe. It sets out the major social trends bearing on employment policy and practice in the EU, particularly where these specifically relate to working hours. It outlines the policy context both within the EC generally and specifically in the UK.

It goes on to describe the prevalence of long and atypical working hours, and levels of work intensity, using international comparisons and focusing particularly on the UK. Key findings are that the UK continues to have one of the highest proportions of man working long hours of all EU countries and in an overall European index of unsocial hours working (combining night, Saturday and Sunday work), the UK had significantly the highest proportion of employees working such hours.

The impact of these work patterns on personal health and wellbeing and the resulting work-life compatibility issues are closely examined. Long and atypical hours are associated with poor physical and mental health outcomes for both man and women. Those with higher job demands and less control of their working methods suffer most. The following chapters detail the impact of working patterns on couple relationships and relationships with children and associated child wellbeing. Around a third of UK employees report that their job prevents them spending enough time with their partner/family and those reporting higher role conflict also report poorer relationships with their partners. Both mothers and fathers working long and unsocial hours feel they do not spend enough time with their children. Children whose parents are in lower occupational groups may be more affected than children in other groups, partly because of lack of control over their working hours.

The final chapter summarises the main conclusions and makes key recommendations in the UK context about how the impact of working time on family life might be ameliorated. The key recommendation is that a Family Day Bill should be introduced to give parents the right to a weekend day off - for which see the pamphlet Weekend Workers: Part-time Parents?.
News added: Thu 19th Mar, 2009

4.5 million more families can now Keep time for children

The government has announced plans to extend flexible working rights to all parents with children under the age of 16. This would mean rights for flexible working would be extended to 4.5 million more parents. The changes are as a result of a review carried out by Imelda Walsh, Director of Sainsbury’s, to consider where the age limit for older children should be set. Speaking on BBC Breakfast, Gordon Brown commented that “The right to request flexible working has been working for lots of people over the last few years. It is working for parents of young children and now it can apply to children under 16 where families need time off to help bring [them] up” Keep time for children welcomes this news, as extending flexible working for parents with school age children, has been a key campaign goal: “We are pleased that the Government has accepted the recommendation of its Review Body, after strong lobbying from Keep time for children and others, that a further 4.5million parents should be able to request flexible working. - though not until 2009. We see this as an important step along the road to all parents of school-age children having the right to a weekend day off, so that families can spend at least some of their weekends together”. Michael Clark, Chief Executive of Keep time for children. At a time when there is unprecedented concern for this generations children, whether it is antisocial behaviour, growth in child depression or worrying educational standards. It is important to remember that the true benefactors of these findings is not, the government or even the parents but millions of children who will now look out of the school gates, to see their parents smiling back at them.
News added: Mon 19th May, 2008

Keep time for children welcomes flexible working promise

We welcome this week's promise by the UK Government to extend parent's right to ask for flexible working arrangements. This has been a key goal of our 'Keep time for children' campaign for the last 3 years. David Cameron backed this as a policy last October, and recently it was reported that 93% of flexible working requests under the existing law, which covers parents of children up to age 6, have been responded to positively by their employers. However, before deciding on whether this right will be extended to parents of secondary school children there will be a review. Why such caution? Surely the public benefit of allowing parents to organise their lives to spend more time with their children considerably outweighs the logistical problems of businesses adapting to this new way of working? At a time when there is unprecedented concern about, for instance, antisocial behaviour among young people, growth in child mental health problems and educational standards which stubbornly refuse to improve, unequivocal commitment to this kind of preventative measure looks like a no-brainer. We hope that Imelda Walsh and the government review group will not only conclude the review quickly, but will also ensure that parents of teenagers are also covered. The benefits of having a parent at hand at critical stages in adolescence and the school career are incalculable.
News added: Thu 8th Nov, 2007

Working unsocial hours biting hard into family life

New research to be launched on Monday finds that working unsocial hours is biting hard into family life. The research was carried out by NatCen in association with Keep time for children to examine how unsocial working by parents affects both the amount of time parents can spend with their children and the activities they can do together. For the full press release, click here to go to the Relationships Foundation website, or you can download a summary report of the latest research and previous research findings here.
News added: Fri 15th Sep, 2006