Broken Britain. Moral decline. Feral youths. These and many more weary clichés were trotted out over the summer in an attempt to explain the rioting, looting and vandalism witnessed in cities across the country. And none of them came even close to doing so.
The crushing inevitability of the rush, in some quarters, to blame family breakdown and single parents was as depressing as it is familiar. Of the 3 million children being raised in 1.9 million single parent families in the UK today, only a miniscule fraction will have been involved in the riots, alongside a tiny fraction of those being raised in families with both parents. But certain sections of the press and commentariat were swift to judge single parents, as they often do, as ultimately responsible. One MP even used this reasoning to shoehorn a call for marriage tax allowance – one of the biggest wastes of government funding imaginable – into the subsequent parliamentary debate.
But it’s vital that we inject some perspective into the debate that has rumbled on ever since: the vast majority of single parents, alongside the vast majority of parents in general, do a great job of bringing up their children. Many of them do so despite the odds being stacked against them, with single parent families twice as likely to live in poverty as couple families. And let’s not forget that being poor doesn’t automatically mean being a poor parent; it just means parenting while struggling against the many challenges of living on a desperately low income.
That is why Gingerbread last year launched our “You’re Brilliant” campaign, to remind single parents – and society at large – that they are just like other parents; doing a great job in what can often be particularly difficult circumstances. For we know just how important it is to break down the barriers between the ‘them’ and ‘us’ stereotyping that can be constructed around single parents and (preferably married) couple parents by the media. In reality, I defy anyone not to know at least one single parent in their family or close circle of friends, and to know full well that they’re doing a fantastic job of bringing up their kids. And there are endless examples of adults today who prove that being raised by a single parent was no barrier to them doing well and achieving in their chosen field – look at Bernard Hogan-Howe (the new Metropolitan Police Commissioner), Gary Oldman, Carol Vorderman or Plan B, to name just a few.
It was, therefore, disheartening to see the immediate knee-jerk response to the riots, when it seemed all too easy to resort to lazy stereotypes and sweeping generalisations. But worse, in many ways, has been some of the analysis in the cold light of day, when the legitimate shock, fear and anger generated by those dark nights has hardened, for some, into brutal assessments of how those who took part should be treated. Does anyone really think that evicting people from social housing will do any more than foist their problems onto a different neighbourhood, when the evidence shows that what works is an intensive intervention to treat the root causes of the most dysfunctional families? And by all means use the full force of the law and sentencing options available to punish those who have committed criminal acts, but where is the sense in taking away benefits from offenders’ families and plunging them into abject poverty?
Fundamentally, what is most important is providing support to all parents in bringing up their children – and by this we mean everything from supporting them in work which allows them to earn a decent income as well as combine work and parenting (such as the provision of affordable high quality childcare, and ensuring that there are more flexible jobs across all workplaces and levels of seniority and income), tackling child poverty, through to working positively and in partnership with parents when they or their children may have additional support needs.
Over the days, weeks and months ahead there will continue to be much soul-searching about the riots, and – particularly in the current constrained economic climate – the potential for further hardening of hearts and tightening of purse strings is all too strong. But we do all parents a disservice if we don’t take this time to understand in full how best to provide them with constructive and effective support, and put in place the framework to make sure this happens.
This article has been adapted from one published in the Huffington Post.
