Punitive cost of childcare is holding British women back
IMPROVING childcare tax breaks and benefits would boost the number of female entrepreneurs and successful businesswomen in Britain, guests at a First Women Awards roundtable heard.
Annabel Karmel, an author on parenting who has just launched a baby food range, said that childcare was ‘so expensive that some mothers cannot afford to get back into the workplace’.
The UK has the highest childcare costs of any country apart from Switzerland. On average parents spend nearly 27 per cent of their income on under-fives compared with an average of less than 12 per cent for the 34 countries that are part of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development.
Only 15 per cent of firms in Britain are started by women, compared with half in the US.
Christina Vaughan, founder of photo agency Image Source, said the UK needed a stronger entrepreneurial culture, with women encouraged to take part. She said: ‘In America there is a culture of business, of feeling that anyone can set up on their own. They have more confidence, but also they are not afraid of failure. This needs to become more widespread in Britain too.’
Topics discussed at the event, hosted by Lloyds in central London and chaired by Financial Mail, included how to get more women in the boardroom and whether more needs to be done in schools and colleges to foster entrepreneurialism.
The First Women Awards were set up by Real Business magazine with the backing of the Confederation of British Industry to recognise pioneering women in business.
For more go to fmwf.com.