Record 2.2million mothers are working full time to keep families afloat

Recession effect: Extreme pressure of the super-size mortgages needed to buy a home is a significant factor in forcing mothers back to work

A record 2.2million mothers with children as young as six months are now working full-time as family budgets come under increasing strain.

This is a rise of 30 per cent since 1997 – highlighting the severe financial pressure on families with young children.

And in a further sign of the times, the number of mothers working full-time has overtaken the number looking after their children at home for the first time since records began.

The figures, from the Office for National Statistics, show that the number of mothers working full-time has been increasing rapidly in recent years.

Many women now spend more time at work than with their families, some leaving home when their children are barely awake and getting back after bedtime.

In 1997, there were 1.7million mothers working full-time. By 2003, there were 1.9million. This year, the number reached 2.2million.

And that figure is set to rise still further by 2013, when the Government strips millions of middle-income families of their child benefit – currently worth £1,752 a year for a mother of two.

The inexorable rise in full-time working mothers also coincides with the house price boom.

Experts say the extreme pressure of the super-size mortgages needed to buy a home is a significant factor in forcing mothers back to work.

'I HAVE NO OPTION'

Katie Stewart would love to spend more time with her daughter, Jasmine, who is 18 months old, but money is too tight.

After maternity leave lasting just six and a half months, she went back to work in January and has been working full-time ever since.

Mrs Stewart, from Southampton, who earns £22,000 as a brand executive for Aviva Health, the insurance giant, said: ‘I have no option.’

She added that in an ideal world she would only work two days a week and spend the rest of the time with her gorgeous baby, who she describes as ‘a bit of a whirlwind at the moment’.

But she and her husband, David, 27, simply cannot afford any cut in salary.

She works from 8am until 4pm, which means she always gets back for bedtime every night and spends about three hours with her daughter, but has to leave home before Jasmine wakes up.

Mr Stewart has given up his job in catering to be a stay-at-home father because his salary would only have covered Jasmine’s childcare.

In 1997, the average mortgage taken out to buy a home was just under £60,000, which was 3.5 times the average full-time salary of £16,666.

Today the average mortgage has ballooned to £145,000, which is nearly six times the average full-time salary of £26,000.

Jill Kirby, a director of the Centre for Policy Studies and author of The Price of Parenthood, said: ‘Women continue to prefer more time at home with their children – but they just do not have the choice.

Most families simply do not want both parents in full-time careers.

‘Their preferred option is for one parent, usually the mother, to be working part-time, or not at all.’ But part-time work can be a problem – it either pays too little, or the employer refuses to offer a part-time deal when mothers return from maternity leave.

Dr Catherine Hakim, a sociologist from the London School of Economics, said there are two types of women – ‘Cherie Blair’ or ‘Princess Diana’.

Mrs Blair, a mother of four, has a successful career as a barrister, while Princess Diana stayed at home looking after her two sons.

She said: ‘Mothers are happy when they are doing what they would truly prefer to be doing.

‘If you are a Cherie Blair type, you would be desperately miserable if you were forced to stay at home when you want to get out there and set the world alight.

‘If you are a Princess Diana type, you would be desperately unhappy if you were forced to go back to work, and be sitting at your desk worrying about the children.’

Dr Hakim’s research, which will be published next month by the Centre for Policy Studies, found one in ten women returns to work full-time by the time her child is three.

It comes after worrying research found one in eight working mothers with a full-time office job are ­desperate to quit because it is ­damaging their family life.

The report warns that Britain’s growing army of working mothers is plotting a ‘nine-to-five rebellion’.

It found their current working life ‘cannot accommodate family life’, and they feel that they have no option but to find a different type of career.

When asked how they were going to resolve this problem, the most common answer was that they would set-up their own business ‘to give them better control of working hours’.

The report, from the family website Netmums.com and the beauty firm Avon, polled more than 2,200 working mothers.

More than 50 per cent worked full-time in a traditional office-based job which involves working nine to five, or even longer hours.

All of them had dependent children, but most had very young children who were under the age of seven. One in five had a baby who was under 12 months old.