The research, out today, found mothers experienced a crash in well-being when schools closed during the pandemic on a scale equivalent to a divorce, or a partner losing a job. For fathers however there was ‘no effect whatsoever’.
Speaking at a childcare and gender equality themed event at the Nuffield foundation today, Professor Birgitta Rabe, University of Essex, said ‘Childcare has always been discussed in the context of labour supply, and little attention is given to parent mental health’.
She said the research was ‘evidence of substantial mental health benefits of childcare - and this benefits particularly mothers. These should be factored into cost-benefit analyses of childcare – not just the fact it enables women to work.’
Widespread school closures during the pandemic meant that researchers were able to test the impact of having children in school on mental health.
Her team measured the mental health of parents of children in Reception, year one and year six, who were given priority to return to school after the first lockdown ended in June 2020, with parents of children in other age groups who were not.
It is well documented that women tend to take on more childcare and housework duties than their partners and this inequality increased during the pandemic. Researchers in this study found the negative mental health effects of this were measured to have worn off when children went back to school.
Also speaking at the event, Coram Family and Childcare’s Megan Jarvie, said the role of mothers’ mental health in discussions on childcare had been overlooked, adding, ‘for a long time I have been talking about childcare availability in the context of mothers going to work but it turns out mothers are doing it all.’
She added that availability of early years childcare was precarious with increasingly frequent no notice and short notice nursery closures, saying ‘It is going to become harder to find childcare which meets children’s and parents’ needs. It is a troubled sector which is too often viewed as a market.’
Lucinda Platt, from the London School of Economics, said the gender pay gap was around 40% having declined from about 50% in 1995.
Since the Equal Pay Act and Sex Equality Act in the seventies, some progress has been made on women entering the workplace, and becoming better represented at senior levels, but women still ‘do the lion’s share of care work, are subject to male violence inside and outside the home, and continue to experience a large gap in average and life time earnings’ she added.
John Penrose, MP, who sits on the recently launched cross-party Commission on Childcare, said, the evidence presented ‘confirmed what all of us feared’.
He said, ‘A lot of the time the debate in Westminster is about government subsidy. That is going to be a factor but there is a whole series of things about social attitudes and long term social trends about gender roles in families and workplaces. There has been some progress but my goodness what a lot of work we have got to go.’
In response to a question about why the status quo has been so slow to change, he said, ‘this is about driving long term social attitudinal change. Governments have a role in that certainly and can do nudge programmes and education…. Attitudes do change. We have made a lot of progress in this area but we are right to say we have more to go – anyone who says you can give this a massive shove and you can move 10 years in 10 days is kidding themselves.’
For more information on the event see here
For the Essex University study see here
