The question that needs to be addressed, then, is why don't men want to work in childcare? In the vast majority of couples the mother will do more than her share of caring for the young child's basic needs such as feeding and nappy changing, so why would men want to make this their work and earn a pittance for doing it?
Must we suffer low pay just because men are not featured strongly in childcare work settings? We shouldn't have to have men in our day nurseries and playgroups just so that we can earn more money. How degrading.
We have discussed this in our day nursery, talking about how more and more men in Britain are now taking on, dare I say it, 'womanly' jobs such as cooks and nurses.
But it will take many more decades for our society to change its attitude towards treating women as equal to men and to get more men into working as nursery nurses in daycare settings. I certainly don't see it happening in my lifetime - my lifetime of low status, low profession and a pitifully low wage.
Jenny Clifford. Uppingham, Rutland
