Should parents be paid to stay at home and look after their children?

ROSIE Wall's response to Archbishop John Sentamu's latest suggestion is instant.

"I wish someone had paid me to look after the children," she says.

Rosie brought up three children, and is now a grandmother as well.

She stayed at home to look after all of her children, while her husband went out to work. "I wanted to enjoy their childhood," says Rosie, the chairwoman of the Chapelfields Residents Association. "If you have a family, you look after them."

She has more reason that most to be glad that she spent time with her children when she was young: her son, Daniel, was murdered in 2003 by heroin addict John Paul Marshall. "Thank God they enjoyed their childhood," Rosie says.

So does she think the Archbishop's suggestion that in a stable, committed family, one of the parents could be paid to stay at home and look after the children is sensible?

On balance, she thinks yes - certainly in an idea world. "There was always a parent at home when I was a child. We came home from school, and my mum would be cooking the tea, and then my dad would come in later. That makes you feel secure, and it is important."

Nick Seaton, York-based chairman of the Campaign for Real Education, agrees.

"I think it is an excellent idea," he says. All-too-often these days, both parents have to work to make ends meet, he says - and the children suffer, by being neglected. "This would give one of them the choice of spending ore time with their children, and bringing them up better. As a society, we would be better for it."

Mark Barnett, head teacher of Westfield Junior school, disagrees.

Yes, he says, the role of the parent is undervalued in society today - but paying a parent to stay home to look after children isn't the answer.

Most parents take their responsibilities very seriously, he says. A minority don't - and it's that irresponsible minority that tend to have problems with their children.

But paying a parent to stay at home wouldn't address that, he believes. "I do worry that some people might see it as a way to get a wage, in the same way that some people may see having a child at an early age as a way of getting local authority accommodation."

Anne McIntosh, conservative MP for the Vale of York, shares that concern.

The Conservative Party is all in favour of marriage, and of making it easier for one parent to stay at home to look after the children. But that can be done through rebalancing the tax and benefit system, she says - not by out-and-out paying a parent to stay at home.

"That would beg the question who pays for it - and are you encouraging people to have children just to get a salary?"

Yes... says Graham Taylor

Archbishop Sentamu is absolutely right when he says that as a society we undervalue the role of parents, says Graham Taylor, who lives near Scarborough. He likes to listen to BBC Radio 2 talk shows, in which callers ring in to give their views. "The presenter says What do you do?' and you get some women saying I'm a publicist for a marketing company'," Mr Taylor says. "Then you will have another woman saying I'm only a housewife.' It shouldn't be like that! It should be: I'm a housewife. I bring up the children and I'm proud of it.'"

His own wife, Kathy, gave up her job as a police officer to look after their three children Hannah, now 20, Abigail, 16, and Lydia, eight. That involved making sacrifices, Mr Taylor says.

Until his success as a children's writer following the publication of Shadowmancer, they had to get by on his vicar's salary, and it wasn't always easy. "I got all my clothes from Oxfam, and I drove a car with 120,000 miles on the clock."

But it was worth it. "Having a parent at home is far more valuable than having a parent at work." That doesn't stop when your children leave school, he adds. His eldest, Hannah, is at university now. "She needs her mum and dad even more than she did when she was six."

The relationship between parent and child is vital, Mr Taylor says. The parent is the role model - not a friend, but a person from whom a child learns what is right, what the boundaries are, how to behave.

The consequence of a society which undervalues the role of parenthood is visible all around us, Mr Taylor says, in rising teenage crime rates, single parenthood and increasing numbers of illegitimate children.

"We need to have an era where we consolidate the family," he says. "If the family breaks down, then society will break down."

And is paying a parent to stay at home and look after the children the right way to consolidate the family?

It might encourage us as a society to value parenthood more, Mr Taylor says - and it might make it possible for more parents to stay at home and give their children the time they need.

"And society would reap the benefits in terms of less crime, less social deprivation, better adjusted children, fewer problems at school."

Graham Taylor is a former vicar turned bestselling author.

No... says Tracey Simpson-Laing

TRACEY Simpson-Laing admits that after having her daughter, Niamh, seven years ago, she couldn't wait to get back to her job as office manager of a York-based charity once her maternity leave ended.

That doesn't make her a bad mum, she insists. In many ways, having her own income from her three-day-a-week job enables her to be a better mum.

"Having a bit of money means I'm able to do things with her. The other day, for example, we went down to London to look at the art galleries and so on."

The young Niamh also benefited from going to nursery three days a week, she says. "It was the best thing for her, socially and educationally. By going to nursery, Niamh learned to mix with children, learned social skills which were really important."

Because of her role as a York councillor, which often involves evening work, Niamh also spends time alone with her dad Iain, which is also important, Coun Simpson-Laing says. "He looks after her, takes her places, and they can build up their own relationship."

Coun Simpson-Laing has nothing against women - or, indeed, men - who want to stay at home to look after their children full time. But she is just not the stay-at-home type, she says. She has a decent education, having recently completed an MA in social policy and criminology with the Open University, and wants to give something back to society.

There are far more women (and men) today with degrees, A-levels and NVQs, and there is nothing wrong with them wanting to use them, she says. If they don't go out to work, where are we going to get all our teachers, doctors, nurses, school canteen workers and so on?

"There would be big gaps in society. People wouldn't be able to go to hospital, and there wouldn't be any school canteens or even teachers. And I do believe that society as a whole is better for women in particular having a wider role."

Coun Simpson-Laing doesn't accept that the fact both parents tend to go out to work these days has led to a surge in disaffection and alienation among young people. Twenty-five years ago, as a teenager herself, she was just as bored as any modern teenager, she says.

The answer to the problem of disaffected teenagers is not to pay parents to stay at home, but to provide more for teenagers to do.

So there is no merit to the Archbishop's suggestion? "The Archbishop has views that are based on his beliefs," she says. "But not everybody has the same beliefs as him."

Tracey Simpson-Laing is a York councillor and working mum.

"You miss a lot when you're at work"

SINGLE mum Allison Dodd would welcome a "living wage" to stay at home.

It would be more than she gets at the moment, points out Allison, who is a full-time mother and carer - and it would highlight the importance of being a mum.

Allison has not worked since her second son, Louis, was born 22 months ago.

She worked full-time when her eldest son, Scott, was born, but gave up because of child-care difficulties.

"It can be very difficult with the cost of child care," said Allison, of Clifton Moor.

"It can be difficult finding it too, depending what you want and where you want them to go.

"I think children learn more when they are with their parents. I think it's helpful to them that I'm at home.

"You miss a lot when you're at work."

Because Allison is a full-time carer, she does not qualify for Income Support. Instead, she gets Carers Allowance, Child Tax Credits and Child Benefit, which comes to about £100 a week.

A "living wage" would have to be more than that, she says, to cover bills. She could not estimate what would be reasonable, as it depends what individual families were accustomed to, she said.

She would be happy to do voluntary work in exchange for it, but as she is a carer, could not contemplate it at the moment.

Allison plans to get married next year and fully supports the idea of a traditional family life.

What the Archbishop said...

MARRIAGE is the bedrock of society, the Archbishop of York said in his original article in a Sunday newspaper.

He added: "There is an opportunity for the Government to further invest in our society by supporting parents who stay at home for the purpose of raising their children.

"A well-raised child is a benefit not only to the parents but also a gift to tomorrow's world. Hence when a married couple on a low income have children below the age of 11, one of the parents should be given the incentive to stay at home and be paid a living wage, if they also commit themselves to voluntary work in the community."