When I placed my first male nanny in a full-time family job I bought a bottle of wine to celebrate. After nearly 15 years of running the agency I felt I had broken through a considerable barrier. When I was growing up and making career choices in the 1960s, most jobs were still defined by gender.
Women were expected to be nurses while men were doctors. Girls worked as secretaries while boys looked forward to becoming managers. Many women trained as teachers, but it was usually men who were headteachers.
My best friend prepared for her interview for medical school by scraping her hair back into a middle-aged bun and wearing her flattest shoes and her plainest suit. 'They'll only consider you if you're so ugly that no one will ever want to marry you, so you'll never stop work to have children,'
she said. In spite of her brilliant exam grades she was asked if she had any serious boyfriends and warned about how long the course would take and they hoped she wouldn't leave it to get married. And after she qualified, while she was working in A&E she would often be told, 'Can you fetch a doctor, love', or 'Not you, I want a proper doctor!'
Since then legislation has been passed to protect people from sex discrimination. Yet I see men who want to care for babies and pre-school children suffering the same levels of prejudice as the young women of my generation who tried to break into traditionally male-dominated occupations.
In 1991 I interviewed the first male to apply to the agency. Billy was 21.
In common with many nannies at that time he had a diploma in Family and Community Care, and although he had largely worked with the elderly he had done a lot of babysitting and part-time childcare for family and friends.
He was prepared to work anywhere, no matter how long the hours, and had glowing references from his childcare placements and his current employers.
He had applied to all his local day nurseries but none of them had offered him work.
Most of the families I approached on Billy's behalf sounded quite surprised at the idea of a male nanny, admitting that they would prefer a female.
Then I thought I had found the ideal family. The mother had three boys and was expecting her fourth baby, but needed a lot of rest. She would be in the house to supervise the nanny, so it was really more of a 'mother's help' position.
Billy was happy to take any job to start his career in childcare. The family lived in a boys' public school, where the father was a housemaster.
In such a predominantly masculine environment I was sure Billy would be welcome. To my immense surprise, however, it was the father who objected.
He expressed shock that I would even suggest having an adult male living in the same house and having to share a bathroom with his wife!
Sadly it was an attitude I was to meet again elsewhere. In another family, the father insisted that there was no such person as a male nanny, since 'no real man would ever want to do a job like that'. I never managed to place Billy in a family and eventually he got a full-time job working with the elderly. I came to the conclusion that trying to place a male nanny was virtually impossible.
Then, in the mid-1990s, lots of au pairs were coming to the UK from eastern Europe. Many of them were young men. They were bright and enthusiastic and they desperately needed to learn English. They earned a great deal less than nannies. The families hiring them would say, 'We need a driver, and men are better at driving than women', or 'We live in the country and I would worry about a girl coming home late at night', or 'I'm not going to pay that much money to a nanny because my children can look after themselves, they just need an adult in the house'.
Whatever their reasons, most families liked their male au pairs and recommended them as carers. These young men certainly helped to change attitudes to men in family childcare - though I still had trouble placing them with children of pre-school age.
Also by this time, more fathers were taking over as carers of their own children. This was due largely to the rise in information technology, which meant many more people had the flexibility to work from home. For example, one such father came to me looking for a nanny in 1996. He was a systems analyst who had taken a two-year break to care for his youngest child when his wife, who was a neurosurgeon, finished her maternity leave. He told me he had enjoyed his time at home and he hadn't been the only man to turn up at mother-toddler groups.
Ian Stephenson was 26 when he came to my agency last year. After leaving school he had gained a national diploma in animal care. He then worked as a veterinary assistant and in kennels and catteries. Ian says, 'I enjoyed looking after animals, but I knew I really wanted to work with children. I had always done a lot of babysitting and had a lucky break when a family friend offered me a job as a nursery assistant in her pre-school day nursery. I loved working with the children, and soon I undertook the training and qualified to NVQ level 2.'
Ian had also worked in a playgroup and an after-school club, but it was when he was asked to care for two children before and after school and during the holidays that he discovered how much he enjoyed the one-to-one time he could spend in a family situation.
When he applied to my agency for nanny positions he was working at the Rocking Horse Nursery in Godmanchester. His employer, Jacqueline Barringer, says, 'Ian is a lovely chap. He has been popular with the children, staff and parents. I've only encountered prejudice from one family who enquired about the nursery. They asked if the male staff member was allowed to change nappies. When they heard that he does, as he has been police-checked and reference-checked and is not treated any differently to the female staff, they were not pleased. I feel Ian has been an asset to the nursery and would certainly have him back.'
Ian himself says, 'I phoned several agencies and their responses varied from bored - "Ian who? Ah yes, well we don't get much demand for male nannies but we'll phone you if we do" - to helpful people who were obviously encountering an anti-male bias from their clients. I was prepared to live in or live out and to work anywhere. The only drawback was that I don't drive.'
After about seven months the right job came into the agency. Ian now cares for a four-year-old boy who is still at home and two brothers who are at school. Two female nannies had turned down the job without even meeting the family - one because she wanted a job with a baby, the other because this job was only going to be for six months.
Ian's employer says, 'When we set out to recruit a nanny we didn't initially think of taking on a male one. But we have found Ian to be excellent. He is pro-active with the children and they think he's great. He even involves them in tidying. He is punctual, reliable and very considerate.'
Ian says, 'I love my job and when it finishes in September I'd like to continue to work as a nanny. Now I'm working for my NVQ level 3 and I hope to pass my driving test soon. I would really like to work abroad. I think childcare is a great career.'
So what does the future hold for the male in childcare? Penny Evans, who manages Snap Nursery School in Cambridge, says that 12 years ago, when she first worked as a nursery nurse, there was a lot of disquiet among parents when male trainees were taken on placement at the nursery. Now, however, she employs three male nursery nurses who are all popular with the parents and children. Indeed, most nursery managers say they have no problem employing men, as long as the candidate is good at his job, and a mixed staff usually makes for a more balanced atmosphere.
Nanny agencies, on the other hand, give a more varied response. Some I have spoken to say they have never placed a male nanny and never been asked for one.
It seems as though men are now welcomed by nurseries, and there is even a growing niche for the male nanny, but I expect their numbers will never equal women. Just as some parents exercise the choice of sending their children to single-sex schools, so people will always reserve the right to choose the gender of their childcarer. The male nanny has to be a totally capable and committed professional to succeed in a female-dominated field.
But each successful male nanny is the best possible advertisement for all the men who wish to follow him into family childcare.
Helen Kewley is the proprietor of Nice Nannies Now in Huntingdon
