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Abstract
This article compares work-family reconciliation policy since 2008 in two contrasting case-study countries, namely France and the UK, and investigates how post-2008 economic circumstances and austerity measures have interacted with other policy drivers to influence the extent and shape of change in this policy area in these countries. The article demonstrates that work-family reconciliation policy in both countries has been resilient in the face of economic and budgetary problems and progress has been made albeit from different starting points and in path-dependent ways to “degender” parental leave and to improve the affordability of and access to childcare particularly for those on lower incomes. However, it also reveals that in both countries, despite partisan consensus on the need to further develop policy, a combination of economic constraints and the opposition to reform of key social and political actors has put a brake on change.
Notes on contributor
Jan Windebank is Professor of French and European Societies at the University of Sheffield.
ORCID
Jan Windebank http://orcid.org/0000-0002-0986-6615
Notes
1 These figures are derived from an analysis of data from EU Statistics on Income and Living Conditions (EU-SILC) by Bradshaw, Skinner, & Van Lancker, Citation2015.
2 France has been visited on a number of occasions in the last few years by UK childcare ministers looking for best practice. For example, in September 2015 Sam Gyimah, on the occasion of one such visit to Paris announced “ … in France high-quality childcare is central to efforts to support families to balance their work and home life. That’s why I’m keen to find out what works for them … .” Department for Education and Sam Gyimah MP (2015) “Sam Gyimah visits Paris to share best practice in childcare”, https://www.gov.uk/government/news/sam-gyimah-visits-paris-to-share-best-practice-in-childcare
3 These figures are derived from an analysis of data from EU Statistics on Income and Living Conditions (EU-SILC) by Bradshaw et al., Citation2015
4 Figures for 2015 (European Union, Citation2016).
5 Figures for 2015 (European Commission, Citation2016)
7 For example, benefit levels, eligibility rules
8 Work-family reconciliation policy is constituted of a number of different types of policy instruments the principal ones of which are: provision of childcare places, subsidies for purchasing childcare, parental-leave rights and parental-leave benefits and rights to flexibility at work (Ferrangina and Seeleib-Kaiser (Citation2014)
9 For example, Mazur (Citation2002) identifies three possible goals for work-family reconciliation policy: (i) to make stay-at-home mothers financially independent from their husbands’ salaries; (ii) to ensure that women’s primary parenting role does not prevent them participating in employment; (iii) to redefine gender roles, focusing policy on men’s contribution to the family as well as women’s participation in the labour market.
10 Benefit for childcare costs
11 Nursery school which had existed since the late nineteenth century
12 Education-by-Parents Benefit
13 Since 1945, the UNAF had been an institutional partner advising on all areas of family policy.
14 This is essentially the under-threes since all French children have the right to a place in nursery school from the age of three to school age with nearly all families sending their children to the maternelle.
15 Benefit for the free choice of economic activity
16 Benefit for minding a child at home
17 Support for families employing a registered childminder
18 Supplement for the free choice of child care option
19 In the UK statutory school age is five but children start school in reception classes normally in the September after their fourth birthday. In France, although the statutory school age is 6, almost all children attend the école maternelle from three years of age regardless of whether their parents work or not. Therefore in the UK there was a problem regarding both care for the under threes and as regards early-years education whereas in France the issue is with care of the under-threes.
20 Shared benefit for raising children
21 In 2016 this was 390 euros per month which is 34% of the net full-time (35 h) minimum wage of 1144 euros http://www.wageindicator.org/main/salary/minimum-wage/france
22 See for example a report by Michel Laroque, the General Inspector of Social Affairs in 2006: Congé parental fractionnable indemnisé, rapport no. 2006–97, http://www.ladocumentationfrancaise.fr/var/storage/rapports-publics/064000687.pdf
23 The optional supplement for the free choice of activity
24 In the latest figures for December 2014 to December 2015, the first year of operation of the PreParE, there was an increase of 1.8 points in terms of fathers taking up parental leave: from 3.3 to 5.1%. La lettre de L’Observatoire national de la petite enfance, no.1 September 2016, p.4. https://www.caf.fr/sites/default/files/cnaf/LettreOnpeN1.pdf
25 Congé parental: les députés PS proposent un compromis, Les Echos, 14 October 2014 http://www.lesechos.fr/14/10/2014/lesechos.fr/0203856834751_conge-parental---les-deputes-ps-proposent-un-compromis.htm
26 Opinion surveys have showed that strong support for long parental leaves for mothers, for example, Kesteman (Citation2009).
27 This payment is 60% of the net minimum wage per week (based on a 35-hour week) of £232 in the UK
28 The Women’s and Equalities Committee inquiry into the gender pay gap which reported in March 2016 http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm201516/cmselect/cmwomeq/584/58403.htm#
29 The low qualified are more likely to be obliged to work irregular and non-standard hours than those who are more highly qualified (Haut Conseil de la Famille, Citation2011).