What’s being done about the lack of child care?
I was interested to see this opinion piece this morning because childcare is on my mind at the moment.
Foozley is booked in for 4 days a week this year. This seemed the best idea given that Mark has a full time study load and finding additional care during teaching rounds is always an issue and will be particularly so if I am working outside the monolith as I won’t have my long service and annual leave to fall back on.
But in a couple of weeks I won’t be working. And I’m thinking of trying not to work for as long as possible - maybe 4 months or so - to have a really good break and do some things I’d like to do. It seems a waste of money and an unnecessary strain on a small boy to have the Foozle in care for all those days that I will be around. I wouldn’t want to take him out of care altogether - he likes going too much and I think at this age he needs the contact with other kids - but 4 days is a lot for a 2 year old. He’s very tired at the end of a week and that seems a bit unfair when it’s not a necessity.
If we reduce Finn’s days at childcare, there’s almost no chance that we’ll get those days back again when I do go back to work because the demand is so high that the centre will fill them instantly. If we go for shorter days so he’s not so tired, we won’t be able to claim the childcare benefit, which would leave us paying full price (which we might have to anyway when my payout increases our income). So, even when we don’t really need it, we have to keep sending Finn to childcare for long days, just to stay in the game. And, of course, we’re then keeping people who need the care out. It’s totally stuffed and there’s no end in sight.
