Dear
@MattHancock
can you please explain to us why it is not okay for a partner to attend scan appointments and early labour, but it is okay for people to drink in pubs? Could it be that pregnant women have been ignored and forgotten?
#pregnancysupport
Jeremy Hunt says he wants to understand why the UK has so many people of working age who have left the labour market as he believes this is why our economy is falling behind other nations. 👋 There are at least 870,000 stay at home mums who want to work but can’t afford childcare
Thread: Paternity leave in the UK is an embarrassment. 10 measly days for £318. It’s as if people think caring for children is a woman’s job.. ehem. Today, we are releasing the findings from our survey which show that..
Well done
@JohnLewisRetail
for being the first UK retailer to launch six months’ equal paid maternity and paternity leave and two weeks paid pregnancy loss leave.
Dear
@BBCNews
you do know that women can be on maternity leave and also remain ambitious, right? Exactly who is questioning whether
@_KateForbes
will want the job ‘given she’s on maternity leave’
We ran a poll yesterday with over 2000 mothers of primary school aged kids. 21% said they had either lost their job or quit since the second lockdown started. TWENTY ONE PERCENT. We are witnessing a generational roll back in maternal employment that will take decades to repair
Uk energy prices are set to rise to £4,266 a year. Women on maternity allowance receive a maximum of £6,109 a year. Can you imagine how terrified you would be if you’re about to have a baby?
Specifics aside - Today was remarkable. When we started campaigning on childcare, we were repeatedly told that neither politicians or the public had any interest in this issue. But mothers were furious, and together we made a noise so deafening that today it was the top line of
We appreciate that the rule to meet only one other person not from your household outside will help to reduce the spread of covid, but babies under 18 months should not be counted in these figures. New mums are having a hard enough time as it is. They need support and company
Absolute madness that the Government’s plan for levelling up doesn’t include any mention of investing in the early years. You cannot level up if parents can’t afford to work & children have unequal access to education
1) Do you remember Melissa Glover? The mother who was refused flexible working by
@lacoste
. They said that all managers have to work full time, or if they work fewer days, then they have to be fully flexible - which is of course impossible if you need childcare.
Dear NHS. If a male partner does household chores, they are not ‘helping’ because unpaid labour is not the responsibility of women. They are simply doing their fair share of the housework. Surely this should simply say, do less of the household chores
Rishi Sunak presided over the self employed income support scheme (SEISS) which gave new mothers a much lower payment because they had taken maternity leave. When questioned on this, the response was that maternity leave is the same as taking a holiday.
We have taken the difficult decision to block a number of accounts who have sent us messages where they have repeatedly vented their anger and frustration about the very imperfect childcare system at us. We are not responsible for Government policy and have expressed our own
Thread: buckle up, we’ve got a story to tell you.
Meet Melissa Glover. Mother of one and the person taking
@Lacoste
to an Employment Appeal Tribunal tomorrow.
Our research is front page of Saturday's Guardian.
We're really pleased to see the discourse on childcare hit the headlines.
@BorisJohnson
loves 3-word slogans except the one that goes like this:
CHILDCARE 👏 IS 👏 INFRASTRUCTURE 👏
Today, we publish the findings of our research with 24,000 parents which has found that THREE QUARTERS of mothers who pay for childcare say that it doesn’t make financial sense for them to work. That makes working completely pointless.
We did it! We proved in a court of law that the Government discriminated against new mothers in the way the Self Employed Income Support Scheme (SEISS) was calculated.
The
@metpoliceuk
are preventing women from protesting AGAIN by blocking
#MarchOfTheMummies
due to take place on 29 Oct in London. 6000 attendees were to march on Parliament to demand Gov action on childcare, flex working & parental leave. This is sexism
Morning to the 15,000
Parents who will take to the street today to demand Government reform on childcare, flexible working and parental leave. Don’t forget to use the hashtag
#MarchOfTheMummies
- let’s get it trending
THREAD: This is a story about how David (or in this case Donna) beat Goliath (in this case
@Morrisons
). It is a story of one woman’s resilience & how an employer that promotes itself as ‘family friendly’ pushed a new mother to the brink of collapse. Here goes..
Someone used our letter template to email their MP to express their concerns about the EU Retained Law Bill and a potential reversal in their employment rights. This was John Howell MPs response to her concerns and questions:
Katy does not make your point well at all. Katy does not have children to clothe and she does not have to pay for childcare. I’m not sure how you don’t understand this?
@leeandersonmp
Katy works for me. She is single & earns less than 30k, rents a room for £775pcm in Central London, has student debt, £120 a month on travelling to work saves money every month, goes on foreign holidays & does not need to use a foodbank.
Katy makes my point really well.
Thread:
@RishiSunak
just said he will improve the cost, availability & flexibility of childcare, so let’s talk about our early years sector - why is it in crisis, what this means, and why we should all care…
Sir William Cash MP just stated in the House of Commons that women can access 52 weeks of maternity pay. He said this in defence of UK employment rights. The issue is that statement is inaccurate - women can access 39 weeks of maternity pay.
Welcome to freedom day. The day thousands of pregnant women, who have been repeatedly forgotten by the Government, have no choice but to go into lockdown to keep themselves safe. It could have been so different if they had been considered from the outset
4) I come bearing good news - Melissa WON her appeal. She did it! They ruled that it was wrong for the initial tribunal to claim she wasn’t disadvantaged because she was on maternity leave.
Tomorrow, we will be in Parliament making our case to the House of Lords for dads to get 6 weeks paternity leave paid at 90% of salary as part of our campaign -
#LetsTalkAboutSix
.
Really pleased to hear that
@Tesco
are suspending all of their pregnant workers who are 28 weeks pregnant or more on full pay to ensure they are safe. What about you?
@asda
@sainsburys
@LidlGB
are you doing the same?
Yet again, the Government has failed to understand what is required to fix the childcare crisis and to support parents to return to work. There is no evidence that relaxing ratios will reduce costs - there is evidence it will reduce quality and it is likely to make the staffing
Happy new year to the mothers. Those who survived pregnancy during a pandemic; those who attended hospital appointments on their own, who gave birth without the support they needed, who spent days or even weeks in a hospital bed broken and bruised and without the people they love
How to increase child poverty in one simple step - shrink part-time work benefits (38% of mothers work part-time) whilst doing nothing to improve the infrastructure which would enable mothers to work longer hours
@KwasiKwarteng
THREAD: Our survey on the impact of childcare costs on families, the biggest survey of its kind ever conducted, found that two-thirds of families in the UK are paying the same or more for their childcare as they are for their rent or mortage.
Today we are launching a campaign with
@GraziaUK
to demand
#childcarechangenow
. We want an independent review of the cost & affordability of our childcare sector
Dear
@BorisJohnson
there are thousands of women with PTSD and mental health issues after they were forced to give birth alone or they were told they had lost their baby on their own. Will you ensure these women receive good quality free mental health support?
Here we go! The day has arrived. Our judicial review against the Chancellor for indirect sex discrimination in the SEISS is being heard.
Maternity leave is not a holiday.
Maternity leave is not a sabbatical.
Care has value.
Read about the case here 👇
Many self-employed parents cannot afford to take the day off work on Monday 19th September, yet schools and childcare settings will close forcing them to lose a day’s pay. Bank holidays are only positive for a select group of people.
We are obviously elated to see the Government is now considering investing £4 billion in childcare BUT from previous experience we know that the treasury doesn’t give anything, without taking something. The devil is in the detail.
Yesterday’s evidence to the Covid inquiry from senior civil servant, Helen McNamara, vindicated everything we campaigned on during the pandemic. Women were ignored - whether you were pregnant, giving birth, or a mother, your needs were neglected by those in power. And we all
7. It went on for 5 gruelling days. But every day she thought about the women who had come before her & those to come after.
She bloody won, lads! She WON. She got £60k payout & the satisfaction that she forced this ‘family friendly’ employer to air their dirty laundry in public.
This is political, it was political choices that got us where we are and we need political investment to get us out of this
@ManduReid
at
#MarchOfTheMummies
I wrote a book & it’s about you. It’s about us. It’s about why mothers get shafted by the system and what we need to do to fix it. It’s the culmination of 6 years work & you can pre-order it now ready for publication on 4 March. I really hope you like it
6) A great big thank you to the
@EHRC
for funding her case and to her legal team at
@rfb_legal
and Gus Baker, who have fought her corner every step of the way.
I’ve just asked this same question on Instagram and the responses are devastating. A woman is currently sitting in hospital waiting to find out if she has had a miscarriage; she’s terrified and she’s completely on her own. It’s in humane
@MattHancock
#Butnotmaternity
New Zealand just approved a new measure allowing for paid leave after miscarriage. The legislation is believed to be among the first in the world, applying to couples who lose a baby at any point.
BIG NEWS: We are taking the Chancellor to court. The Self employed grant scheme discriminates against women in the way it has been calculated and they must be held to account
Thread: Are you sick of living in a country that has the 2nd most expensive childcare in the world, the 3rd worst ranking maternity pay in Europe, the least generous paternity leave in Europe, where we work the longest hours in Europe
What’s your childcare bill? Add up what you have spent, or will spend, on childcare costs by the time your child is 5 years old. It will make your eyes water
#childcarebill
#paytowork
#marchofthemummies
It was this time EIGHT years ago that I woke up and thought - today is the day! Whilst bouncing my 1 year old son on my knee, I fed him porridge with one hand and taught myself to use Wordpress with the other. By midday, Pregnant Then Screwed was born. It
Yes
@Keir_Starmer
‘’Invest in childcare so parents go back to work and growth improves.’’ We couldn’t agree with this more & look forward to hearing more about your childcare policies tomorrow
Mothers. It’s time to share our stories of discrimination in the workplace. I realise for many of you, this will be too hard or you will have been legally gagged by an NDA; but for those that can, it’s time we had the
#metooformums
#endthemotherhoodpenalty
#pregnantthenscrewed
Minister
@lucyfrazermp
just said childcare is NOT infrastructure. Labour front bench disagree. Retweet this if you think Childcare IS infrastructure & it should be considered as such in the Levelling up Bill. The vote will take place this evening
Our research is headline news in the
@guardian
today. We are on the brink of a disaster for maternal employment. If the Government doesn’t act now, we will set women’s equality back decades. Childcare is infrastructure & it needs investment - are you listening
@RishiSunak
?
The judge has reserved judgement in our case against the Government for indirect sex discrimination due to the way the SEISS scheme has been calculated. We are really happy with how the case went today and hopeful the judge will ultimately rule in our favour. A massive thank you
Why can’t the new funded childcare places start earlier? We’ve received this question more than any other since Wednesday so here’s what we know..
The problem is that the childcare and early years system is on the brink of collapse. We’ve lost 5,400 providers in the last year
Over the moon that
@MattHancock
listened to sense and has announced that informal childcare can continue in lockdown areas. Thank you to everyone who signed the petition and shared their story and thank you to brilliant MPs (inc
@CatMcKinnell
) who fought hard for this change
The UK has just moved into the top spot for most expensive childcare system in the developed world. Right in the middle of a cost of living crisis and at the start of the longest recession since records began. Hurrah to us.
NEWS: We are taking the Chancellor to court for Indirect sex discrimination due to the way the SEISS has been calculated. The judge has said that our case has merit and has agreed to expedite the process because of its urgency
Pregnant Then Screwed is taking legal action against the Government because it doesn’t exempt periods of
#maternityleave
when it assesses earnings for the purposes of the Self Employment Income Support Scheme -
#SEISS
@PregnantScrewed
Our campaign with
@GraziaUK
for an independent review of the childcare sector has over 50k signatures in just 48 hours. We need 100k to get a debate. Please keep signing and sharing if you think childcare is prohibitively expensive & not fit for purpose
It is crucial that under 5s remain exempt from the two people meeting outside rule. Parents, particularly mothers, are isolated and their mental health is rapidly deteriorating. Please help
@aliciakearns
@NadineDorries
@MariaMillerUK
Delighted to see that the Covid inquiry will now include: ‘the mental health impact on parents from difficult experiences during pregnancy — such as attending scans and giving birth without the support of a partner being present.’ Thank you to everyone who made this happen
Research we conducted last week with almost 7,000 women who had used maternity services in the last 2 months found that 1 in 5 had either given birth alone, or been told they would have to give birth alone if they caught Covid. This goes against NHS guidance
#ButNotMaternity
Our survey of 20K pregnant women and mothers found that 15% either have been made redundant or expect to be made redundant in the next 6 months. Just under half (46%) say that the reason they were made redundant was a lack of childcare. CHILDCARE IS INFRASTRUCTURE. Tweet your MP
And on Thursday we go to court - Thread. The Self employed income supports scheme (SEISS) discriminates against women in the way it has been calculated.
Dear
@maggie_erewash
@sajidjavid
pregnant women will not queue at walk in centres for a booster. Pls ensure pregnant women can be vaccinated at antenatal clinics. This should have happened months ago. Our poll of 3k pregnant women showed only 2 in 10 say this is possible
Women must not be forced to go through any stage of labour or attend scan appointments on their own ever again. Surely we have learnt by now that this can cause serious trauma for women, & has a negative impact on the whole family
#ButNotMaternity
Hurrah! Children under school age are now exempt from the rules when a parent is meeting a person from another household. Thank you to
@aliciakearns
for all her support with this.
Children under school age who are with their parents will not count towards the limit on two people meeting outside. This will mean that a parent can see a friend or family member with their baby or young children.
To all the companies who treat their female employees appallingly when they become mothers - then use mother's day to extol the wonders of motherhood in return for great PR - We are watching. We know what you've done. You can't cover up your actions with NDAs forever
1 in 4 dads & non-primary carers don’t even use their full entitlement due to pressure from work & financial issues, and even if they do, a quarter continue working whilst on leave due to pressure from their employer.
Meanwhile, 80% say they don’t have enough time to bond with their baby. They don’t have enough time to get to know their own child. That’s devastating, isn’t it? And as a result, almost half say they experienced a new mental health issue.
For every month of parental leave taken by the father, a mothers annual salary can increase by almost 7%. Without ring-fenced & properly paid paternity leave, the notion of sex equality is fantastical absurdity
Things aren’t going to change overnight, but if we’ve learnt anything from 7 years of campaigning it’s that you need persistence, volume, organising & hope to trigger radical change. Please sign our petition
#FathersDay
#paternityleave
"Pregnant Then Screwed did a survey this year of 27,000 parents and they found that two thirds are paying more for their childcare than their rent or mortgage. That is simply unsustainable for many, many households." Huge thank you to
@munirawilson
for raising our work tonight.
1/ We are pleased to hear that the government is finally taking the cost of childcare seriously but are deeply concerned that the plan to extend the free entitlement, if not properly executed, could cause more problems than solutions.
Paternity leave improves the wellbeing & educational attainment of children, it improves the mental & physical health of mothers, it means couples are more likely to stay together and it ensures a more egalitarian split of the unpaid labour…
We are back in court today appealing our claim against the Government for indirect sex discrimination due to the way the self employed income support scheme has been calculated. The hearing will be streamed live and we will post a link when it starts at 10.45am. Wish us luck!
Really pleased the Government will finally fix some of the issues with Universal Credit so childcare costs don’t have to be paid upfront. But let’s just be clear - charities have been asking them to fix this for YEARS and have been told it wasn’t possible. A single mum was forced
Big news: Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie is attending March of the Mummies in London. The woman who triggered a world wide conversation about feminism will be coming to our protest to show her support for our campaigns. Have you registered yet?
This is a picture of 7 masked dads waiting outside a maternity ward in the desperate hope they can go in to support their partner through their scan or early labour. It’s not fair. This needs to change
#butnotmaternity
Thread: I get it. This is not a nice stat and after the turmoil of this week you probably don’t want to hear it. But it’s real. This is happening. Women are being forced to terminate wanted pregnancies because of childcare costs.
1. Today we are releasing new data which is the latest awful detail in a horrifying pattern of discrimination towards pregnant women and mothers.
1 in 61 pregnant women say their boss suggested they have an abortion. Yes, you read that right.
1. Freedom day is a nonsense for many pregnant women. They are the only vulnerable group not prioritised for the vaccine; & with new isolation rules for double jabbers, thousands of pregnant women will have to lock themselves indoors whilst everyone else party’s like it’s 1989.
So grateful to
@CCriadoPerez
for talking publicly about her traumatic experience of miscarriage during a pandemic. When will we give pregnant women the protection and support they need & allow partners to attend scans & the duration of labour? This cannot continue
@birthrightsorg
THREAD: This is Caroline. She looks happy here. But the last couple of years have broken her. In 2020 she was made redundant whilst heavily pregnant. She suspected this was because she was expecting her first child..
Better late than never
@BorisJohnson
. This is what we need: 1) affordable, good quality childcare 2) ring fenced paternity & maternity leave paid at 80% of salary for 6 months 3) a 4 day working week for all 4) better workplace protections & access to justice. I’m free for a chat
Dear
@Tesco
@tesconews
we are receiving calls and complaints from single mums who have been told they can’t enter your supermarket with their children. As they are single mums they have no other option. Could you clarify your policy please?
Hi Mel 👋! So many mothers already desperately want to work! Maybe if childcare was affordable, true flexible working arrangements were actually available and women weren’t penalised for having children then more mums would be working!