Why not workplace nurseries?

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The recent Woman Worker article on workplace nurseries seems to be very confused on why you are opposed to them.

The various horror stories you relate about workplace nurseries (eg. a civil service nursery closed because the employers claimed they couldn't afford it) don't seem to me arguments against workplace nurseries in themselves.

They are just examples that show that with the slump women are being thrown out of work, and nurseries everywhere are under attack.

Also, it seems a bit ridiculous to argue that union leaders must be made to fight closures of workplace nurseries when Woman Worker wouldn't support a campaign to open a workplace nursery!

The TUC Under 5's Report referred to does not, as is claimed, take a position against workplace nurseries.

In fact their view seems to me more acceptable than that of Woman Worker.

They examine the problems of workplace nurseries-in particular the danger that they may be used as a "tied cottage" to depress women workers' wages and employment prospects. And they try to find solutions:

They conclude that while the only fully satisfactory solution is state facilities on demand to all parents wishing to make use of them, workplace nurseries can make a contribution towards meeting the day care needs of working parents provided they are removed from unilateral employer control.

They recommend joint union/parent/employer control over the setting up and general administration of company nurseries; the full involvement of the local authority and possibly places allocated to other parents in the area.

It seems to me that it would be a lot more constructive if Woman Worker were to fight for workers' management over workplace nurseries-so that the nursery place couldn't be used to depress working conditionsrather than to oppose all campaigns for workplace nurseries.

To take up briefly some of your other arguments:

a) you say that trade union bureaucrats are using workplace nurseries as a diversion from the need to defend state provision.

But trade union leaders who want to find excuses for not defending state provision of nurseries can always find excuses and I'm sure it will prove no easier to make them fight for workplace nurseries than for state nurseries.

I know of no current examples where there is a serious fight to extend state provision. At the moment the workers' movement is mainly preoccupied to defend the public services they have rather than to extend them.

But circumstances may arise where one could go on the offensive and demand a workplace nursery: Many hospitals for example have wards closed because they say they don't have enough nurses.

One could use this to demand a nursery for any staff needing it and maybe mobilise layers of workers around the need for more nurseries who have never seen any possibility for making nursery provision meet the needs of parents.

b) You mention the high cost to emplovees of some of these schemes.

Whilst I think that workplace nurseries should he free, you must realise that local authority day nurseries are far from free.

Coventry Council have a means-tested scale of payment -but for most workine parents this means the full amount of £12.25 per child per week; hardly chicken feed!

c) You say that management only provide nurseries for their own convenience (eg. reduction in absentee rate). The TUC Under S's Report shows that in the absence of any union pressure, most nurseries were started on the employers' initiative most often because of staff shortages.

But does this mean that the unions shouldn't fight to control them, or in other circumstances, have them set up?

d) You mention that management at the Chix factory provide scab women workers with child care facilities. Is this really an argument against workplace nurseries? If it is, then surely we should oppose work buses because scab workers are usually brought to work on special buses!

Finally, I don't think we should be blind to the potential advantages of workplace nurseries. As someone who has to travel one way to take my child to nursery and the exact opposite way to go to work, I can see many advantages of having a workplace nursery.

It would also mean that parents could drop in during the day to see their children and maintain some contact with their activities.

Provided that we fight for workers' and parents' management over workplace nurseries it seems to me we can only gain from supporting these struggles.

Carol Jones Coventry

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John Lister reports on the CDLM/SO Cuts Conference held Saturday March