In a recent interview for Radio 4’s “Woman’s Hour”, Edwina
Currie commented on MP Louise Mensch’s resignation. The thrust of her comments
was that while women can have it all,
they can’t do it all.
I’m not sure that I agree with Currie’s definition of having
it all.
In the course of the interview Currie talked about how she
had managed her personal and family life in order to fulfil her obligations as
an MP. This involved always employing others to care for her children—first
nannies and later boarding school. She even mentioned a succession of “rent-a-grannies”
who taught her children essential life skills such as manners—something she
declared that she would have been useless at doing.
This sounds to me like a failure in parenting, rather than a
family management technique. After all, what’s the point in having children if
you never see them? A large part of the joy of parenthood is spending time with
your children, teaching them, passing your values on to them. And that joy, by
the way, is gender neutral.
I’m not denying that combining a high-flying career with
parenthood is incredibly difficult. I made the decision to step down from a
senior, highly-paid post in order to spend more time with my children, and I
still occasionally feel the odd twinge of regret. But in fact I love spending
more time with my kids, and my family life works much better as a result.
I agree wholeheartedly with Currie that women (or men, for
that matter) can’t do it all. But I don’t agree with her that we can have it all. Two partners with
high-flying careers and children don’t sit easily together. Something has to
give, either career or family life. And a situation in which a working parent
rarely sees or interacts with their children does not, in my books, count as having
it all.
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