Childcare the grey way
Every week Ann Mason makes a 130-mile round to help support her family. On a good run the drive takes a little more than an hour each way but it can take as many as three.
Once she arrives at her daughter’s home, however, the journey is soon forgotten as her two-year-old grandchild, Scarlett, bounds down the hall exclaiming, “Grandma’s here.”
Ann, 60, is among an army of grandparents pitching in with childcare - usually to enable their own offspring to work.
Working, middle-class parents are struggling with high childcare costs and relying primarily on grandparents to care for their children, according to a recent report.
‘The Real Cost of Childcare’ report says: “Parents’ wider family members play a vital role in childcare, with 71 per cent of those polled relying on family for childcare to enable parents to work.”
It adds that more than “92 per cent of that help comes from grandparents (or 65 per cent of the total respondents), who are increasingly being called upon to help with childcare as parents struggle with costs and balancing work.”
Killik & Co surveyed 2,000 working parents across the UK with children aged five and under, where household income is between £40,000 and £200,000 for their report.
They also found that aunts and uncles also play an important role in helping with childcare according to 34 per cent of those polled, while greatgrandparents and cousins also get involved. The findings have come as no surprise to national charity, Grandparents Plus. “Grandparents are doing a huge amount to support working families by providing childcare, and it’s important that we don’t take their contribution for granted,” said Lucy Peake, the charity’s chief executive. “Practically this means that as well as supporting parents to find childcare solutions that work for them, the government also needs to look at ways to better support grandparents, many of whom will still be working when they’re called upon to help out. We know that children can really benefit from being cared for by someone they know and love, but we need to make sure the arrangements work for grandparents too. “I have three young children and work fulltime,” said Lucy. “I get around five weeks’ annual leave a year, which means I rely on my parents to have the children to stay during school holidays. If I didn’t have them, it would be a real logistical and financial challenge.”
Ann, a part-time schools exams inspector, and her husband, Kevin, look after their youngest daughter’s 16-month-old child, Primrose, at their home in Yorkshire two days a week.
For another two days Ann travels to Greater Manchester and stays overnight to help with Scarlett and her seven-month-old sister, Lucy, while her oldest daughter is on maternity leave.
“The downside is the travelling,” said Ann. “Luckily we are fit because I think if you weren’t you would really struggle; you do have to have quite a lot of energy. But you build up this really close relationship. You are part of their development. It builds up a really strong bond which I think is lovely.
“I have more time to do the nice things with them, the playing and the chatting we have lovely chats.”
Ann estimates that around half the adults at a local playgroup she attends are grandparents of her own age group.
“It’s a bit like a school reunion,” she joked.