There was an interesting discussion about poverty on the Today Programme this morning. Talking it over with friends at lunchtime (including a solicitor who defends a lot of petty criminals) the vast majority of social problems can be traced back to family breakdown. Noting down some of the suggestions:
1 Divorce is too easy and encourages people to walk away from their responsibilities – amend the law so that if you have children under 18 you cannot have a divorce.
2 Where a marriage doesn’t exist the law should automatically create a basic civil partnership the moment a child is born, even if both biological parents cannot immediately be identified.
3 Abandoning children before they are 18 (by mothers or fathers) should be socially unacceptable, regarded as a form of child abuse, and carry financial penalties (on top of maintenance payments).
4 Grandparents should have access rights – this would increase the amount of scrutiny and family control over a child’s upbringing.
5 Soap operas have acquired an unreasonable influence over social groups D and E, and they need to be more responsible about the messages they are giving out (lazy writers create attractive characters and then have them drift from one improbable relationship to another – critics need to be a lot harder on these writers).
6 Make the existing laws work.
Friday, November 24, 2006
The vast majority of social problems can be traced back to family breakdown
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5 comments:
"Large influence on the "D" and "E"'s"
"south London kitchen sink estate"
What utter utter rubbish!
Did you think about one word of these posts?
You should look at the subliminals of your own posts/marketing messages......but hey I guess its okay because you've got it all worked out!
Don't think I used the word "kitchen" Anonymous.
"Sink estates" is a description used by politicians (all parties) and commentators, including mainstream newspapers such as The Guardian.
The ABC1 classification is fairly standard in marketing - it really came about because descriptions such as "working class" were not accurate.
Yes, I do think carefully about the wording of the posts. For instance, in this post I thought very carefully before linking the description "child abuse" to parents who walk out on their children. In the end I kept it in although I have left out some of the harsher comments that were also made in the conversation.
Thank you for commenting.
As chairman of the charity National Society for Children and Family Contact I fully endorce all that Anonymous has said. Suffice to say we have deal with the ramifications of family breakdown on a daily basis. That one hundred children per day loose contact with the paternal side of thier family due to lack of parity is a Home Office fact that grandparents have no legal presumtion to see thier beloved grandchild is another, hence at this moment in time there are over one million garandparents denied such contact.
As chairman of the charity National Society for Children and Family Contact I fully endorse all that Anonymous has said. Suffice to say we have to deal with the ramifications of family breakdown on a daily basis. That one hundred children per day loose contact with the paternal side of their family due to lack of parity in family courts which favours mothers is a Home Office fact that grandparents have no legal presumption to see their beloved grandchildren is another, hence at this moment in time there are over one million grandparents denied such contact.
Thanks for visiting Mike.
I ought to explain that in this post I wasn't putting forward a manifesto, I was attempting to record a conversation. Normally I write conversations up immediately, but the day was so busy that I only managed a few notes and forgot most of who said what. Which is why I wrote it up as bullet points. The intention is to capture views and opinions of a particular group at a particular moment.
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