Has Theresa May been reading my emails?
When I Don’t Know How She Does It, my novel about a woman trying to balance a career and family, was published back in 2002, one politician spoke enthusiastically about its message. She said the Government needed to do more to help mothers, be it through flexible working or better maternity leave. That politician’s name was Theresa May.
Now, some 15 years later, I’m getting ready to publish the sequel. In How Hard Can It Be?, Kate Reddy is a woman returner, going back to work after taking a career break to look after her family. She’s still juggling, but this time it’s elderly parents and stressed-out teenagers. Well, barely have I pressed “Send” to the publisher when up pops Mrs May at a Women Returners’ event, outlining policies that almost exactly map on to everything my heroine is dealing with. Is Mrs May spying on my inbox or do we both agree about what really matters?
Under the Prime Minister’s plans, employees have been promised a statutory right to take up to a year off work if family members require fulltime care for reasons of illness or disability. They are guaranteed a return to their job at the existing salary once the period is over.
Cue shrill protests from the Anything That’s Good For People Must Be Bad For Business lobby. “But how are companies supposed to manage?” they cry? Er, by doing what they already do when a member of staff goes on maternity leave. Chances are, very few people will want to take a full year off – most couldn’t afford it – but many will welcome the opportunity to help a spouse or child with a degenerative condition or elderly parents who may be coming out of hospital or in their final weeks of life.
Huge numbers of old people are “bed-blocking” in hospitals because their grown-up children can’t help out and convalescent homes are no
more. The relentless push to drive all mothers into work has left a huge care deficit in our society and, whatever the economists may say, we are the poorer for it.
Most elderly people would much rather stay in their own home than take their chances in an institution. Hardly surprising when we hear so many horror stories. This week, it was a care home in Wales, where Polish-born nurses couldn’t speak English. One used Google Translate to communicate with residents. Imagine being 89 and the person lifting you can’t even ask “Are you OK?” without consulting her phone first.
Time was when families did their duty if an elderly relative was frail or dying. I remember my great-grandmother living in turn with her four daughters. She felt happy and safe.
We live in the fifth-richest nation in the world and the way we look after our senior citizens stinks, quite frankly. Ryanair will soon be offering one-way flights to Dignitas for everyone over 75, the way things are going.
Theresa May thinks that one option is for families to learn to do their duty again, and to help them to do it by letting them take time off to care. I agree with her. How hard can it be?