So I had this baby in lockdown, I mentioned it, I think – this fabulous boy, sort of oniony looking, divine. He grew gently and without much fuss, evolving over the next two years into a kind of Bernie Sanders-type, gentle, fair, tender, made a lot of sense when you thought about it. The tenderness has been a big thing – he likes sometimes to very gently stroke my cheek and solemnly gaze, and has gone through phases of identifying strongly with mice. Which is why his recent… change, into a child who screams until he’s red at the suggestion that he, say, might put a jacket on, has felt particularly galling.
This is not my first tantrum rodeo. My daughter, too, “found her voice”, to use the parlance of the parenting books, at a similar age, a voice she continues to find most evenings and some mornings, too. But while I might have spent the minutes she was screaming harriedly panicking, today I use the time to rock quietly on the floor nearby and distract myself with the news. Which is where I was when I read about Jeremy Hunt’s plan for a £4bn boost for childcare in England. It sounded good, it sounded like he had listened to the charity Pregnant Then Screwed, who recently reported that three-quarters of mothers who pay for childcare say it doesn’t make financial sense for them to work. But then the screaming cut through again and I wondered what this boost would actually look like.
