Sir, - Your correspondent, Eilis O'Donnell (February 11th) blames feminists and political correctness for the plight of young parents who would prefer to spend more time with their children yet are forced by financial considerations to go out to work.
What feminists do not want is to see the continuation of the system whereby the parent in the home, at one time exclusively the mother, is made vulnerable by total economic dependence on their partner. The language of political correctness is used to combat stereotyping of roles within society and also the exclusion of any group from areas of interest or activity.
Few parents, whether mothers or fathers, want to spend their entire lives in the home, and what the women's movement has been arguing for is for people to be offered choices: for greater flexibility and the possibility of moving in and put of the labour market without being unduly penalised in terms of earning power; for a change in the work culture which at present denigrates those who are willing to give a high priority to their family responsibilities. Job sharing and career breaks came out of demands from the women's movement.
Feminists and our supporters in parties such as Labour have been fighting for decades for child-rearing to be awarded its proper recognition, both financially and in terms of respect, and for it to be shared between parents. You have only to read the recommendations in the 2nd Report on the Status of Women with their emphasis on family-friendly policies to see evidence of this. The new EU directive on parental leave, which would allow both parents to have up to three months' leave in the first eight years of each child's life for family reasons, such as an illness or a parent-teacher meeting, is one example of the trend to more flexible arrangements.
Most of these developments have been won through unremitting campaigns by various women's groups and lobbies, with support from progressive political parties, in the face of an opposition made up of a combination of inertia, self-interest and energetic campaigns by employer groups and proponents of the market system. - Yours, etc.,
From Mary E. Flynn
Chairperson, Labour Women's National Council, 17 Ely Place, Dublin 2.