Quality | 2009.11.28
Fathers must learn to juggle family time
A new report on parenting warns that men face a struggle to spend quality time with their children
The next 10 years is going to be a period of radical change for Britain\'s fathers, according to a major report that predicts more and more men will be living apart from their children and struggling to spend time with them.
For men already trying to cope with family lives dramatically different from those of their own fathers, the shifts ahead will leave a whole generation trying to parent without a road map, said Dr Katherine Rake, new chief executive of the Family and Parenting Institute (FPI). The organisation\'s research report, Family Trends , points to changing attitudes among men, and changing demands from working women, which have led to a rise in the number of fathers now trying to spend more time playing and interacting with their children – a trend which is set to increase.
But with far more fathers expected to be living apart from their children in the future – because of divorce or separation – men will have to make more effort if they want to be a significant part of their children\'s lives.
"Mothers have been at the forefront of social change over the last few decades as they have moved in unprecedented numbers into paid work. But in the next decade it will be men," said Rake, who will unveil the research at the organisation\'s 10th anniversary conference tomorrow.
She said politicians should support men in their desire to spend more time with their children. "What\'s emerging from the data we have is the increasing expectation for dads to be taking a more active role with their children, but they will be doing that within much more complex circumstances, just as the notion of fatherhood is itself becoming more complex with separation and step-families and all the rest of the new models of family life," she told the Observer .
"What we don\'t know is how men are going to respond. It remains to be seen if men can adapt to that shift over the next decade – as well as women have over the past 10 years." Cohabitation has doubled in the past decade, and is expected to continue to rise to an estimated 22% of couples by 2021, and the number of people who will never marry is also rising steadily.
With statistics suggesting that 65% of cohabiting relationships into which children are born currently break up, it is a picture of more and more broken families and extended step-families.
Other findings in the research show families are getting smaller, couples are having children later and 70% of mothers will be working in 2010 – factors which mean fathers are more likely to be involved with their kids.
Fathers who are lone parents account for just 2% of all families with children, and 10% of single parents, and the dad who raises his children alone is still a rare phenomenon.
"Our report poses a challenge to central and local government," said Rake. "Health, education and family services are going to have to look at how they support fathers\' roles within families from the time things start going wrong to the time when fathers are in danger of losing contact.
"Policymakers cannot fall into the trap of investing large sums of money trying to reverse the tide of trends by trying to encourage more \'traditional families\', nor will parents allow them to fall back on old assumptions which have meant mothers carrying the burden of changing families and parenting demands."
"We have to make sure fathers aren\'t overlooked any more. They haven\'t got a clear route map through this social upheaval and are going to need support.
"Of course, that will often have to come from their female partners. But despite these trends, and the expectations from women of increasing equality in their relationship, we have to remember we are a very long way away from achieving equality in childcare. Women are still carrying the load."
For more information, please visit
http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2[...]athers-must-juggle-family-time
