Growing up in homes where no one works
LATEST FIGURES SHOW ALMOST 35,000 KIDS AND TEENS LIVE IN ‘WORKLESS HOUSEHOLDS’
MANCHESTER prides itself on its industriousness.
So much so that the city has even adopted the humble worker bee as its civic emblem. But many of the next generation of Mancs are growing up in homes where no-one works.
It’s having a devastating impact on their lives and potentially on our city’s future.
According to the latest figures from the Office for National Statistics, more than a quarter of kids and teenagers in the city live in a ‘workless’ households.
That’s almost 35,000 youngsters, one of the highest rates in the country. The bitter irony is Manchester is, in many respects, booming in a way not seen since the city became the birthplace of the Industrial Revolution. A property explosion has seen thousands of flats being flung up to house the people flocking to the city.
But in many of the estates just a few minutes’ walk outside the city centre it’s a vastly different story.
And it’s not just Manchester. The figure – which includes teenagers up to the age of 19 and takes in issues such as sickness or disability which mean the parents can’t work – is also particularly high in other parts of the region.
In Salford, 22 per cent of children are in a workless family, while in both Rochdale and Oldham 21pc are, compared to a national average of just 16pc.
Across our region as a whole, about two thirds of the children in workless families have a single parent – 85,400 children in total – while 45,500 children live with two parents, neither of whom works.
SO HOW DID WE GET HERE?
Manchester is often held up as a shining example of how a post-industrial city can reinvent itself for the 21st Century.
Over the past 20 years or so thousands of new jobs have been created in sectors such as retail, financial, technology, tourism and the media.
But it’s estimated that over the past century Manchester lost about 400,000 jobs in the manufacturing industry.
Other traditional industries such as textiles and engineering were also decimated in that time. And the new jobs which have been created, while coming close, are yet to fill the gap.
In fact a report by influential thinkthank, Centre for Cities, estimated that in 2015 there were one per cent fewer jobs in Manchester than there were in 1911.
And that’s left large swathes of the
population struggling to find employment. “Even with the creation of jobs in new areas, the process of reinvention has not been able to keep pace with the speed of decline in more traditional areas of employment,” the report stated.
“The result is that today Manchester has one per cent fewer jobs than a century ago.
“But the problem that Manchester has faced is not that it hasn’t been able to attract knowledge-focused businesses, but that it hasn’t, as yet, generated enough of these jobs to offset losses in more traditional industries.”
The nature of work has also changed drastically over the last few decades. Zero hours contracts, the gig economy and the cost of childcare can often mean holding down a job while trying to raise a family, especially if you’re a single parent, is extremely difficult. In April the M.E.N. spoke to out-of-work parents at Newton Heath Job Centre.
Gemma Dearlove, 31, from New Moston, is bringing up two young children on her own.
She told how she would rather work than be on Universal Credit, but has no relatives nearby to help her balance motherhood with employment.
“It’s impossible when I don’t have that family support network here,” she said.
“Realistically I could only work from 1pm - 4pm but I would need to leave at 3.30pm to pick my daughter up from school. How can I get a job within that timeframe? My sister lives down south and my mum lives in Lancaster – I’m on my own. It’s impossible. It’s overwhelming. All I want is what’s best for me and my kids. If I could go to work I would, it would be so much easier than Universal Credit.”
WHAT’S THE IMPACT ON FAMILIES?
Government research has shown the profound impact that parents who are workless, regardless of the reason, can have on children’s chances of success. It obviously reduces family income, can lead to parental conflict and poor mental health, and many workless families are also held back by debt, drug and alcohol problems, and homelessness.
Having working parents also means a child is more likely to do better at school.
It’s good for their health, their education and for their prospects, and means they are less likely to fall into crime. The government’s analysis shows children in workless families are almost twice as likely to not reach the expected level at all stages of their education. Three quarters of children from families where no one works failed to reach the expected level at GCSE, compared to around half of children in lower-income working families.
But experts argue that the main issue is actually poverty – whether or not the parents are in or out of work. Alison Garnham, chief executive of Child Poverty Action Group, said: “The bigger picture shows that a full two-thirds of children below the official poverty line have at least one working parent.
“We have very high employment but child poverty is rising. So a job is no longer a guaranteed route out of poverty. There’s no doubt that poverty damages children and throws a long shadow over their lives but the research shows it’s poverty – not worklessness itself – which does the harm.
“Most parents want to work when they can and most do, but child poverty is rising largely because big cuts to benefits for working and non-working families have blown a hole in family budgets.
“Child benefit alone will have lost 23pc of its value by the end of the decade.
“Restoring the money that’s been taken out of tax credits, universal credit and children’s benefits will be crucial if we are to reduce the poverty in working and non-working families.”
WHAT CAN BE DONE ABOUT IT?
Des Lynch is the manager of city centre-based Wood Street Mission. The 149-year-old charity helps children and families in Greater Manchester living in poverty, often providing basics such as school uniform, clothes, toys and bedding to those who can’t afford them. And Des believes education is the key is helping children and families improve their lot.
“The way we free these kids from the situation they are in is through education,” he told the M.E.N.
“If you have children living in poverty, for what-
ever reason, you are seeing these kids coming to school who do not have a coat or who haven’t had breakfast that day.
“They could be really talented, really capable children, but it’s really difficult to teach children who are cold and wet or hungry.
“Increasingly teachers are clothing and feeding kids and dealing with issues they shouldn’t be dealing with.
“It’s a crying shame that this is happening in this day and age.”
Living in poverty can also wreck a child’s confidence and affect their mental health, says Des.
He said: “Fitting in is everything when you’re young, but these kids feel different to their peers so they lack confidence.
“When the teacher asks a question they’re probably not going to put their hand up, even if they know the answer, because they do not want to put their head above the parapet.
“If they are held back, if they leave school with no qualifications, they will struggle to find work, they’ll end up on benefits and the next generation of kids will be growing up in homes where no-one works. “It’s a vicious circle.” And Des also believes there are a number of factors which are holding parents back from getting into work.
“Some parents want to work,” he said. “But if you’re on a zero hours contract how can you plan a household budget if you don’t know how much money you’re going to be making from one week to the next?
“There’s also the question of childcare, which is so expensive. The city centre is booming. If you look at what’s happened since 1996 it’s fantastic.
“But if you walk for 20 minutes in pretty much any direction you have some of the highest rates of deprivation around.
“And the people who live there, by and large, very rarely come into the city centre because they think it’s not for them. They don’t come here to shop or socialise because it’s too expensive and they don’t come here to work.
“We’re risking creating almost an exclusion zone and the city council, who have been very proactive on many issues and have done some fantastic work, are not doing enough to address that.”
WHAT NEXT?
The good news is that the proportion of families where no-one works is actually falling. Six years ago in Manchester it stood at 31pc. And Coun Nigel Murphy, executive member for work and skills at Manchester council, said a number of things are being done to reduce that number even further.
He said: “We’re determined to do everything we can to further reduce the number of children living in workless households and have a dedicated Work and Skills Board made up of partners including business and education leaders that drives our approach to helping families into work.
“This involves working directly with families to give them the skills they need to get back into work through a range of services such as work clubs – of which there are more than 50 across the city that help people find out about job vacancies and how to apply for them, as well as providing careers advice.
“We’re also doing a lot of work with schools and colleges to prepare children and young people for the jobs that are already in high demand in the city including construction, digital and finance.
“Manchester is a growing city with a growing economy and making sure our residents have jobs and can take advantage of all the city offers now and in the future is a key priority for us.”