Jo Swinson

SirChenjin I didn’t vote for the tories during 80s and 90s purely because they were selling off council house stock which worked against poorer families interest. How strange is that?

Twiggy W ,I am with you.
I am sick and tired of being told that men and women are equal in every way.
For Centuries men went to work and the women looked after the children .
Nowadays everyone bends over backwards for women.
I know of a firm where if there are two jobs going one has to be given to a woman even if the best two applicants are men.
The Labour Party had all women short lists.
Why?
There is nothing audacious in Twiggy’s question,Doodledog.
I suspect you are a different generation to me.
I may be wrong about this but I think that in the majority of cases the mother is given custody of the children when a couple separate .
Why is that?
If you want a high powered career then something has to give .
Jo Swinson is missing the best years of her children’s lives even if she can afford to have them looked after by a nanny..
Sir Richard Attenborough once asked one of his children to take something to “mummy”
The child asked”Which mummy do you mean,Miss Simms?”
(Surname may be incorrectly spelt)
(Mother was the actress Sheila Simms

SirChenjin

?????

blondenana When my children were coming into their teenage years, they were mature enough to understand the situation and to know that they had to help out at home and go on to achieve outstanding academic results at school and university and grow into responsible, hard working, well-balanced young people.

Posts like yours make me soooooooooo angry!

To be fair Pantglas the evidence and research on this is pretty unequivocal - it’s not ‘someone’s’. I know we often base our opinions on our lived experiences, but not voting for a party on the basis of robust evidence supporting one of their policies seems strange.

Blondenana
What guarantee is there that children with parents /a parent like yourself, who is always at home when they walk through the door, will not go off the straight and narrow.??

My opinion on drug use is based on what I’ve actually seen with my own eyes not on someone else’s evidence and research varian. And you can pontificate on the virtues of the Lib Dems day and night to your heart’s content, it won’t change my mind.

Blondenana
I am a mother who while her children were at school also had a career.I believe you can have a career / job providing you make edequate provision for your child/children that will ensure they are well cared for. I did NOT have to work unlike so many today HAVE to but my children I can assure you did not get into trouble, unlike, the person you refer to.How can you guarantee that all children with stay at home twenty four seven mothers will be as fortunate as yourself.

Pantglas says "My objection to Jo Swindon is purely based on her glib attitude to drugs and on that basis alone the Lib Dems won’t be getting my vote."

Jo Swinson does not have a "glib attitude" to drugs.

The LibDem policy on legalising cannabis is evidence based. The policy was promoted by Sir Norman Lamb, who is not standing at this election, but is very well respected as the leader of campaigns on mental health.

He made the proposal after going on a fact-finding visit to Canada, where cannabis is legalised and controlled, along with a Labour and a Tory MP.

"Cannabis 'to be legalised in the UK' within five to ten years, say MPs"
www.bbc.co.uk/news/newsbeat-49073222

I think we should study evidence and research findings before coming to a firm view one way or the other on issues like this, but more importantly, I think that your decision on how to vote in a general election, especially this one when so much is at stake, should not ever be based on whether you agree with a party on one policy. I doubt whether there is any voter who agrees with any party on absolutely everything.

There’s so much nonsense being spouted here about working mothers. If you know anything about women’s history you’d know that the stay-at-home mother is a 20th Century phenomenon, encouraged by governments to free up jobs for the men. Look at how, post-war, women were bumped out of the jobs they’d been doing for the war effort, to make way for returning men.

Prior to that, most women had always worked, be it in the fields or in factories. Let’s not forget, too, that many children themselves were put out to work at a tender age. They weren’t living a cosy life, sitting on mama’s knee having fairy stories read to them.

Both my DIL’s and my own DD all work FT and their children are all as happy as it’s possible to be. I am lucky enough to be near enough to help out a little with the youngest one, as do the other GP’s, and to see the joy she gets from having so many people in her life makes my heart swell. She truly lives her best life.

In the interests of full disclosure, I was a SAHM to four. Times change though, and I think it’s wonderful that women can take advantage of a whole array of opportunities.

Who's Joe Swinson?

As for you, blondenana - what on earth are you doing, blaming working mothers for children who go off the rails? You even said yourself, 'no father around' - maybe you could have another think about your attitude, which comes straight from the woman-hating pages of the Daily Mail.

I feel quite outraged by these comments, and would have been really unhappy if anyone had expected me to stay at home with my children. They are have now grown up and have benefited from having an independent working mother as a role model. We do not live in the Victorian age.

I think we should do whatever works for us as individuals and as a family. Fathers who work also miss time with their children. I thought being able to make choices was the point of all the "women's lib"

For goodness sake, we've had a long fight for women to be treated equally to men. Do we REALLY need to have women being our own worst enemies? If this isn't a question you'd ask of the male leaders, then please don't ask it of Jo Swinson.

OMG now women who go out to work are to blame for children in young offenders units. Where the f* are the fathers in this/ Don't they share the responsibility? As for the self satisfied "I did it so well." well bully for you, but actually young offenders units are not the. only places you find kids whose mothers screwed them up. There are plenty out there in society just trying to get through. If Jo Swinson wants to work and be an MP well that's her decision and nothing to do with anyone else. There are women you know who actually find child care difficult just as there are men who love doing it. I thought we had got past all this sexist shit and were working towards true equality.

It is a personal choice whether a woman stays home with children or not but there have been studies that shown benefits to children if their mother works outside the home. More egalitarian sons who spend more time caring for children and daughters who earn more money when they go to work as adults.
hbswk.hbs.edu/item/kids-of-working-moms-grow-into-happy-adults
Personally I always worked with the exception of 2 years. My parent's marriage broke down after 25 years and mom had to return to the workforce to raise my 4 siblings on her own. She is in her late 70s and still working.
I am able to retire now in my late 50s. My children both have university educations, and training as professionals. I was able to help them pay for their education which is a huge amount of money these days.

That said, I also stayed home 2 years when my youngest was born (more because I didn't have a work visa where we were living then) and really enjoyed that time with my children.

My objection to Jo Swindon is purely based on her glib attitude to drugs and on that basis alone the Lib Dems won’t be getting my vote.

Well, my friends and I all have very good jobs and none of our teenagers got into trouble with the police. The ones who did came from chaotic families with a range of complex social problems and the police, social workers, health professionals and courts know very well that they are the children who are most likely to get into trouble - but don't let that get in the way of a good story

Maybe that is why there are so many badly behaved teenagers these days, mums are out working who looks after the kids,when they are home from school etc
Things have certaonly got worse since women are having to work so much
When my children were just coming unto teenage years, i worked school hours, so was home for them, no father around
My friend who had a very good job and worked 9-6 hours had 2 children, guess whose children got into trouble,and the police officer said to her,what do you expect when you are working and the kids had to fend for themselves, from being about 10
Yes she was financially better off than me, but none of mine ended up in young offenders places
These days i know it's harder for families, when both parents work, but sometimes it is to pay for luxuries, in those days there were no such things as mobile phones,playstations, X boxes etc,not many foreign holidays as now, then it was working to live a normal life
Not as much then for children to want

I think you should.

Tickingbird

I totally agree with you, apparently Poppyred has a rock perhaps we might be able to squeeze under with her?

OK tickingbird - what would you like to ask my husband and I, as parents who both worked (and continue to work) when our children were young? Not for the big detached house etc, but to put food on the table and to pay the bills. Even if it was to pay for expensive holidays, that would be no-one else's business to judge, of course.

I can't understand why anyone would choose to go to work instead being with their young children, but I do understand that most of the time these days nobody has a choice. Getting back to Jo Swinson though I'm not impressed, she gives me the impression of being self important.

TiggyW I totally agree with you. Children are precious and those early years are so important.

As for male politicians- well they don’t give birth fo they? I have no time for social engineering and believe that mothers are vitally important for children’s wellbeing. If a mum has to work out of financial necessity then she deserves all the help she can get. I know plenty, including some in my own family, that went back to work when baby was 6 weeks and it was because they wanted the big detached house, big car and expensive holidays. In other words living beyond their means and latch key kids the result.

Fire away......