One interesting observation which came out almost as an aside in Radio 4’s latest report on the Born in Bradford study provided confirmation of my casual observation of a new pattern in family life: parents who are not married & do not live together but who share the upbringing of their children.
They spoke to one such mother who stressed how good was the children’s father – visiting every day, even having the children to stay with him for 2 days a week. Such arrangements seem to be informal, no court or other agency involved.
The most likely explanation remains, for me, the uncertainty & insecurity around male employment these days, especially in the old industrial areas of the north. It must be hard for a man to know what role to play in a family if he is not the reliable provider, just another ‘child’ in his relationship with his partner. And all this reinforced by the emphasis in the benefit system of making sure that children are cared for, which has, perhaps unwittingly, led to it being much easier for a lone mother to negotiate the bureaucracy than it is for a man.
