This briefing outlines the barriers parents who are preparing for work can experience when trying to access childcare in England, using evidence from CPAG’s project work.
Our pre-Budget briefing details how best to invest financial support in children to reduce child poverty and give every child the chance to fulfil their potential.
Potential second earners in couple families, usually mothers, face high barriers to employment. Mothers typically face more barriers to work than fathers in couples, particularly because of issues relating to childcare and time spent out of the labour market due to caring responsibilities. To evaluate barriers to work faced by this group and identify solutions to these barriers, Child Poverty Action Group (CPAG) designed and delivered the Your Work Your Way project – an employment support scheme that worked with 70 potential second earners in couples.
It’s right that benefits are uprated as usual but this should never have been in doubt and legislation mandating inflationary increases is needed as a basic protection for living standards. Struggling families have been worrying themselves sick for months about whether an unmanageable income cut was coming in order to provide the government with a rabbit-out-of-the-hat moment.
More than 8,500 individuals and organisations gave evidence to the latest Work and Pensions Committee inquiry into benefit assessments. Carri Swann considers the government’s response.