childcare costs

Perhaps I am imagining this, or perhaps I am more aware of all things to do with babies because I am pregnant,  but there seems to be an awful lot of fly-on-the-wall programmes, TV series, etc on the box about having children and parenting.  Currently in the news, rising childcare costs in the U.K. is also taking up much column space in the daily press.  It seems procreation is taking center stage, or nearly center stage, in these times of economic turmoil.

Yesterday an article in the Guardian looked at the implications of the 5.8 and 3.9 % increase in childcare costs in 2009- 2010 and 2010-2011, respectively, in relation to the 0.3 % increase in salary over the same period, and the changes in tax credit, for working parents.  The title and punch line were slightly irritating but the article itself was interesting; well worth a read.

Childcare is of course a concern for us at the moment.  I will be returning to work after six months of maternity leave, meaning I will need to find childcare for Sprog.  There is an excellent nursery at work but it is hugely popular and there is an 18 month wait, meaning that Sprog is not likely to get in until he is about 1 year old.  we will need something else as a stop gap and the way to get around this, we were told when we started thinking about this 7 months ago, is to register with various nurseries and hope to get into one.  There is a deposit to be paid at each of these.  The monthly cost of the ones we found were not less than £800 per month.  Fortunately we knew about all this as we planned the pregnancy.  Having a child is expensive business; can't imagine doing this without a financial plan in place.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Baby boom

The wonderful Sam Shephard has died and in memory we started a Shephard season at home. My husband chose the first one and went for Baby Boom (headlining Diane Keaton), because it was too late to start The Right Stuff and still expect to get a decent amount of sleep before we have to wake up to go to work. I had not seen the movie for a good few years- I did not have fond memories of the movie and still did not really enjoy it that much.  It was the style of the movie rather than the subjects that it dealt with that I found difficult to like.  However, it dealt with subjects that were important at the time and still resonate now. Working mum/parent trying to juggle home life with a young child and career progression, the idea that a person who is not available to work 24 h a day as a minus point in an employee (which is pertinent not just for parents but anyone who wants some semblance of work-life balance),  organic/artisan/home-made food as a thing to sell to ...
Read more

Best laid plans

Sorry for the radio silence but I've been busy giving birth and recovering from the experience.  Sprog arrived on his predicted due date in the second week of March 2012 but the manner in which he arrived could not have been further from what we had in mind. The last nine months were pretty easy- I've had no sickness and generally very little discomfort, worked up to a week before my due date (and then stopped only because my Mum was visiting and I wanted to spend some time with her), and every meausured parameter was within the normal limits.  I did have a feeling that Baby would arrive on time and had prepared my birth plan with the expectation that everything would happen as planned- the pregnancy had been so easy there was no reason for me to suspect the birth would be complicated.  I could not be more wrong. We had kept the birth plan fairly flexible, as advised by the midwives, but our preference was for a natural birth with as little intervention as possi...
Read more

Starting Big School

Baby started Reception about a month ago and so far his reaction to school has been very positive.  He loves going there, loves his teacher, and has made friends.  There has been a class election and he was elected class representative of for the school council.  I am not sure he understands what that means but I am trying to explain to him that there is job description (albeit brief) for the position and that is to help with organising e.g. charity drives etc.  He will get it evenutally but right now he thinks all it means is he has to wear a badge to school.  I am really happy that the school has chosen to mimic society at large by organising elections even for young kids.  Overall I am impressed by the school's general attitude that kids will rise to the challenge if you give them something to do, with appropriate guidance where necessary.  I think children behave better when adults treat them as equals rather than speak down to them all the time. ...
Read more