thats on TOP of other. this is just childcare costs.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=418657&in_page_id=1770
from 2006
Single parents on the poverty line are getting over £100 a week more in state benefits than couples facing the same difficulties
And to get there single mothers will be given £132.79 a week from the state in tax credits - over £100 a week more than the £29.55 in tax credits that the couple will be given.
The analysis is based on the level of income that, according to the Department of Work and Pensions, was the poverty line in the financial year 2004/5.
For a single mother with two children living in a council house, the poverty line would have been £186.
A couple in the same circumstances, however, would have needed £325 to be out of poverty because of the living costs of the extra adult.
and
http://www.mailonsunday.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=400309&in_page_id=1770
But under EU rules, Polish and other Eastern European parents working in Britain can leave their children at home and still qualify for UK money - £907.40 a year for a single child and £608.40 for each additional one
from 2004 http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/newscomment.html?in_article_id=401859&in_page_id=1787
Meanwhile, the annual bill for benefits to single-parent families has spiralled to an enormous £5 billion over the past seven years. We are the capital of Europe when it comes to handing out benefits to lone mothers.
Today, 8 per cent of British women aged between 18 and 35 are bringing up children on their own. That's nearly four times the level in France, twice the rate of Germany and twice that of liberally-inclined Holland.
One in four of these single mothers is claiming the highest lone-parent benefits of £6,400 a year, according to a recently published study by the Pompeu Fabra University in Barcelona. And, dispiritingly, this research shows that the more money a British single mother is given in benefits, the more likely she is to have another baby.
a list of benefits women with children can get
http://www.dwp.gov.uk/lifeevent/famchild/
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I just post the stories, for interest.. for everyone
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