For a while now I have been wanting to put Maxwell into nursery, not because I am a lazy parent and I don't want to spend time with him, or the fact that I can't cope with him. Its more the fact that I feel that he needs to spend time with children of his own age and interact with others without me there 24/7. Other reasons I am wanting Maxwell to go to nursery include I hope it may bring on his speech a little and he also may learn new things in a different environment, as well as do different activities which I may not be able to do with him or thought to have done with him.
I expect you are now thinking well why havent you put Maxwell into nursery? Well the problem stands that me and Ben have limited funds to pay for Maxwell to go. We are no way poor, we get by. We pay our bills on time, always make sure Maxwell is well dressed and never goes without. There is always food on the table and we always have a warm home but we do not live like kings and we do not have a lot of luxuries in life. We rarely go out, we don't drink and we don't smoke. We do not waste our money and make sure we spread it as far as it will go.
For Maxwell to go to nursery we are looking at around £17 for one morning a week. This is a expense that we can not afford so over recent weeks I have found a cheaper option which would be for Maxwell to go to preschool when he is 2 and half. This works out at around £11 for one morning a week. This is an option which is now looking more feasible for us. We have found 2 preschools in our local area and we are hoping to perhaps look around them next week.
The point of me writing this post however is the frustration I feel at the government and how they have allowed certain 2 year olds to get free childcare and others not. To fall into the category of getting free childcare at the age of 2 you have to qualify. To qualify in my local area you have to be on certain benefits which include being on jobseekers allowance and income support, as a working family me and Ben are on neither. My question is why do the government and even the local authorities think its okay to pick and choose who is entitled to free childcare and why do they think that someone who is unemployed is more needy to free childcare when working parents aren't? I can not quite get my mind around the whole situation and I simply think it is wrong. How can these people determine that because we work we are any better off than someone who receives benefits? In my mind they can't. Surely working parents should be getting the help as well?
A 2 year old who is entitled to free childcare is entitled to 15 free hours a week... Their parents do not have to pay a penny however if I want to send my child to nursery or a preschool I am expected to find around £60 for these hours which in the end adds up to around £240 a month which is over £2000 a year. Quite frankly I find it sickening and hugely unfair. I know for a fact we do not have this money just laying around and for now there is no way we can send Maxwell to nursery or even preschool for 15 hours a week, we are looking at just the 3 hours instead.
In the next few years I really do hope the government and even the local authorities can pull their fingers out and help those working parents who are struggling. Nothing will help me and my family and our situation however I think the government need to take a step back and evaluate how certain things are looked at. I think we now are in the day and age where people should be encouraged to work however these days it seems those working are getting penalised.
