Katie Loo's Blog

I empathise with your position. One of the main rants I have about childcare is that parents (especially mothers) are pressurised into the extremes of having either the career or the children, with nothing in between.

It seems that most people who want better childcare are fixed on the idea that we should go back to the old family values, where one parent stays at home and the other goes to work. Some will be happy with that, but many others won't be, and I believe that in addition, the possibility of job/child sharing should be explored as an alternative. Flexible and part-time work options for young parents would provide a beneficial balance for many, I think.

Sadly, the 'social inertia' I mention in the environment threads- the reluctance to try anything new- results in people either wanting things to stay as they are, or go back to how they were, with the job/child sharing option remaining neglected as a result.

My big boss is a woman but doesn't have children, so is not as keen to encourage job share etc

I shall plough on