Time for Parenting...

...because raising children is a full-time job

October 2000 Newsletter

Editorial; Notice of AGM; Feeling under pressure; Marriage and Parenting; Motherhood mady sexy; Survey Results; Warning! Motherhood can damage your wealth; What the papers say

Marriage and parenting

For once a senior Government minister has come out in favour of marriage.Paul Boateng, who reports to Home Secretary Jack Straw, admitted at a conference in September that cohabitation is less likely to inculcate stability in a family than marriage and said: 'That is not making a moral judgment. It is just a fact. We need to make this argument on the basis of evidence.'

The same week, research emerged from the think-tank Family Matters to show that divorce and family breakdown costs the British taxpayer more than £15bn and rising - not to speak of the emotional damage to children. And 4 out of every 10 live births are now outside marriage.

Surely it's time for ministers to take the next step from talking about the value of marriage to children, and actually build a tax and benefit system to encourage couples to get - and stay - married.