Their comments are given in a report, Challenging the rural idyll, published jointly last week by the Countryside Agency and the charity NCH. The report was commissioned by the Countryside Agency to seek the views of families and children living on low incomes in rural England.
Most respondents received state benefits and supplemented either part-time or low-paid jobs with Working Families Tax Credit. They said that because of the narrow range of jobs available to them, they lacked employment opportunities and scope for career progression.
People were prevented from getting jobs by a combination of high childcare costs and poor-quality public transport. Owning a car was 'an absolute necessity' for rural living, though in many households the wage earner used it to go to work, leaving a parent at home with the children cut off from wider social and support networks.
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