Welfare Reform tightens its grip on lone parents

Keep up the campaigning - many people simply don't understand why the Government is pressing on with this measure at a time of rising unemployment.

"Press Releases
Lone Parents thinking about college or university
Because of the changes in benefits requiring lone parents to work when their children are young, many lone parents in Scotland are now thinking of improving their skills by going back to college or university".

I would like to point out as a note of caution to any single parents considering this option.
I am a single parent student who has just entered my honours year. Previously if I was unable to find work over the summer I was able to claim income support to support myself and my 2 teenage children (19 and 13). This summer due to the changes made last October, I accepted that I would have to claim JSA to get us through the summer. However, I was informed that students on continuing courses i.e more than one year, are unable to claim this benefit despite being willing and able to work. This left my family having to survive on child benefit and child tax credits (£108 per week).
I only tolerated this because it is my final year, and I am very concerned that this knowledge will put many single parents off from studying at Hnd level or above.
Does this mean that, despite the Governements claims that they wish to eradicate child poverty and integrate single parents into the workplace, these people are supposed to be satisfied by low or unskilled work with minimun wages?

I am a single mum home-educating my 7 yr old son...not a "lifestyle choice" as my Labour MP informed me, but because he was miserable at school and is thriving at home.
I will no longer be eligible for income support and will have to sign on as available for work. The government is prepared to pay my childminding costs if I find a job but not prepared to pay me to school and care for my son.
I refuse to leave him with someone I don't know, registered or not, and am appalled at the government taking away the one parent children have. This is going to benefit WHO exactly?? Certainly not me or my son.

I would just like to say that I am a single mum with two boys aged 7 and 6. Now as a lone parent I want to be able to drop them off school and pick them up, I want to attend their assemblies, concerrts, I want to be able to bring them for home dinners, I want to be able to enjoy all the school holidays with them but I won't be able to because I will have to look for work when my younger son turns 7. They havn't got 1 parent there already now the government is taking the other parent away too. The children in these cases should be the priority because if you are there they are less likely to go off the rails or on drugs etc. There aren't many jobs out there which would work around the kids so the children don't feel isolated from being brought up. I'm so stressed about this because its the childrens future now not ours!!!!!!!!!

I have been claiming Jobseeker's Allowance since August and every time I go to sign on I am in despair. There is little work in my area yet the Job Centre refuses to acknowledge this. I do not want my son to be a latchkey child, and don't like the idea of him being alone in the house all through he summer holidays. I also don't understand why the Government keeps training women to become childminders so the mothers can go to work - I don't want another woman looking after my child, I enjoy Motherhood. Relief work is ideal for single parents because they can choose their own hours, yet I had to pack in a good relief job once because although I accepted that money would be taken off my benefits, what happened was that while this was being worked out, my benefits and Housing Benefit would get frozen. If the Government want women to work then more resources should be put into Home and Remote working oportunities.

I think it's just another case of people on fat-cat salaries punishing the people at the bottom for their own excesses.

I for one am totally sick of these 'leaders' in their ivory towers having so much power over people's lives when they neither understand nor empathise...

Hi I am being taken off income support on 12 July as my youngest child is ten.
The job centre has wrote to me 3 times askin me to make an appoinent about my new jsa claim.
I understand that it's really important not to ignore these letters as if you don't make a fresh claim you will loose your entitlement. If you are a single mum please don't ignore these letters as you will loose out on money you are entitled to.

Word of warning though the system is a nitemare.

I did what I was told made appointment filled in forms however when I went to my appoinent this week they sent me away!
The reason? Because my income support ends on 12 July they will not accept my form for jsa or check my form or interview me for jsa.
After ending up intears in the jobcentre they finally gave me an appointment for 13 July to get my jsa claim in.
They have indicated that it will take couple weeks sort out my claim.my circumstances haven't changed they have all my details yet I am goin to be disadvantaged it's very worrying.
There are a handful of part time jobs out there!

im a single mom my youngest will be 7 in march and before then ive got to find a job where is there going to be one that works around school so i can take her and fetch her go to school assembleys and playes also in school hoildays what do i do then who will look after her my parents are in there late sixties and have bad health so they carnt help my daughter is a very nervous and doesnt like going to strangers also doesnt like change as ive had a rough time at school with change just wish there was something in the home that you could work as id work all the while and just pop out out to sort my daughter out also have the evenings free why carnt they leave the age at 12 that would help me

All very well and good expecting lone parents to work once their children are in fulltime education, personally I don't have an issue with it. For me personally, voluntary work & eventually paid work turned my life around albeit not financially. However, where is the childcare to go along with this? Where is the flexible working? Where is the long term thinking? It's all very well providing *some* funding for childcare, what use is it if there is none?

We now face a new generation of children who are "forced" by the Government to be latch-key kids... benefitting who exactly? Not the children... not the parents and not society either. These same children are often (not always) the ones who require the most emotional support and stability, in particular during difficult times (separation/ divorce)... who is going to be around to support them at the times where parents have to be working?

Ultimately, the price that will be paid for this will be paid by society and I don't necessarily think that it will simply be financial :(

Best of luck to those of you finding this a difficult time (F)

I am a lone parent, my daughter is 10 and my income support is due to stop next month.

I am considering not claiming jsa when the income support stops, I realise that this will mean a loss of income, but as long as the housing benefit continues(?) then we will have to suffer the reduction.

The reason?.. like so many other single parents, I do not want to leave my daughter with a stranger, I want to go to her assemblies, concerts and be there during the school holidays. I am not prepared to leave her with a stranger, which she has told me she is not happy to do. I don't want her to be a latchkey kid either.

It enrages me how single parents are the prime target when it comes to government cuts and interfering. Their target should be childless people (there are thousands of young fit able men who choose a life on jsa to stay at home playing on their video games machines).