What enables young people with significant impairments to make the transition to adulthood? Becoming householders, finding work, becoming parents, feeling included as citizens: these are all more challenging in the context of housing needs, a discriminatory labour market, the need for personal assistance and transport. Our study interviewed a group of 31 young adults in receipt of disability living allowance, who had jobs and independent households, and smaller comparative groups, who had one or neither of these. We explored disabled people’s own accounts of adulthood and what had facilitated their achievement of jobs and independent living. Education, family, employment, personal assistance, housing, benefits and welfare services were on our agenda, but respondents’ own accounts are of ‘exceptional’ parents as the key.However, not everyone can have exceptional parents. We discuss the politics and economics of parenthood that prevailed while our respondents grew up, when parental responsibilities were extended and parental resources reduced. And we ask how much the politics of parenthood under New Labour offers to families with disabled children.
Get full access to this article
View all access options for this article.
References
1.
Advisory Group on Marriage and Relationship Support (2002) Moving Forward Together. London: Lord Chancellor’s Department .
2.
Baldwin, S. (1985) The Costs of Caring: Families with Disabled Children. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul .
3.
Baldwin, S. and Carlisle, J. (1994) Social Support for Disabled Children and Their Families: A Review of the Literature. Edinburgh: HMSO .
4.
Barlow, A. and Duncan, S. (2000a) ‘Supporting Families: New Labour’s Communitarianism and the “Rationality Mistake”, Part I’ , Journal of Social Welfare and Family Law22(1): 23–42 .
5.
Barlow, A. and Duncan, S. (2000b) ‘Supporting Families? New Labour’s Communitarianism and the “Rationality Mistake”, Part II’ , Journal of Social Welfare and Family Law22(2): 129–143 .
6.
Batty, D. (2002) ‘Councils “Need £40m” to Support Carers’ , Guardian(25 Apr.).
7.
Beresford, B. (1994) Positively Parents: Caring for a Severely Disabled Child. London: HMSO .
8.
Beresford, B. (2000) Expert Opinions: A National Survey of Parents Caring for a Severely Disabled Child. Bristol: Policy Press in association with the Joseph Rowntree Foundation and Community Care .
9.
Brewer, M. and Gregg, P. (2001) Eradicating Child Poverty in Britain: Welfare Reform and Children Since 1997. London: Institute of Fiscal Studies .
10.
Burchardt, T. (2000a) ‘The Dynamics of Being Disabled’ , Journal of Social Policy29(4): 645–668 .
11.
Burchardt, T. (2000b) Enduring Economic Exclusion: Disabled People, Income and Work. York: York Publishing Services/Joseph Rowntree Foundation .
12.
DfEE (Department for Education and Employment) (1998) Meeting the Childcare Challenge. London: HMSO, Cm 3959 .
13.
DSS (Department of Social Security) (1998) A New Contract for Welfare: Support for Disabled People. London: DSS, Cm 4103 .
14.
DTI (Department of Trade and Industry) (2000) Work and Parents: Competitiveness and Choice. London: DTI .
15.
Duncan, S. (2002) ‘Policy Discourses on “Reconciling Work and Life” in the EU’ , Social Policy and Society1(4): 305–314 .
16.
Emmerson, C. and Leicester, A. (2002) A Survey of the UK Benefit System. London: Institute of Fiscal Studies .
17.
Farmer, E. and Boushel, M. (1999) ‘Child Protection Policy and Practice: Women in the Front Line’, pp. 84–101 in S. Watson and L. Doyal (eds) Engendering Social Policy. Milton Keynes: Open University Press .
18.
Finer, M. (1974) Report of the Committee on One Parent Families. London: HMSO, Cmnd 5629 .
19.
Fox Harding, L. M. (2000) Supporting Families/Controlling Families? Towards a Characterisation of New Labour’s ‘Family Policy’. Centre for Research on Family, Kinship and Childhood, University of Leeds , Working Paper 21.
20.
Gordon, D. and Heslop, P. (1998) ‘Poverty and Disabled Children’, in D. Dorling and L. Simpson (eds) Statistics in Society. London: Arnold .
21.
Gordon, D., Parker, R., Loughran, F. and Heslop, P. (2000) Disabled Children in Britain: A Re-analysis of the OPCS Disability Survey. London: Stationery Office .
22.
Hasson, E. (2002) ‘The Construction of Policy in the Context of Divorce and Relationship Breakdown’, PhD thesis, University of Nottingham.
23.
Hendey, N. (1998) ‘Young Adults and Disability: Transition to Independent Living?’, PhD thesis, University of Nottingham.
24.
Hendey, N. and Pascall, G. (2001) Disability and Transition to Adulthood: Achieving Independent Living. York/Brighton: Joseph Rowntree Foundation/Pavilion .
25.
Heron, E. and Dwyer, E. (1999) ‘Doing the Right Thing: Labour’s Attempt to Forge a New Welfare Deal between the Individual and the State’ , Social Policy and Administration33(1): 91–104 .
26.
Hills, J. (2000) ‘Taxation for the Enabling State’, pp 115–141 in N. Fraser and J. Hills (eds) Public Policy for the 21st Century: Social and Economic Essays in Memory of Henry Neuburger. Bristol: Policy Press .
27.
Hirst, M. and Baldwin, S. (1994) Unequal Opportunities: Growing up Disabled. London: HMSO .
28.
Home Office (1998) Supporting Families. London: Stationery Office .
29.
Jones, G. (1995) Leaving Home. Milton Keynes: Open University Press .
30.
Jones, G. (2002) The Youth Divide: Diverging Paths to Adulthood. York: Joseph Rowntree Foundation/York Publishing Services .
31.
Jones, G. and Bell, R. (2000) Balancing Acts: Youth, Parenting and Public Policy. York: Joseph Rowntree Foundation .
32.
Kestenbaum, A. (1997) Disability Related Costs and Charges for Community Care. London: Disablement Income Group .
33.
Kestenbaum, A. (1998) Work, Rest and Pay: The Deal for Personal Assistance Users. York: York Publishing Services .
34.
Kestenbaum, A. (1999) What Price Independence? Bristol: Policy Press/Joseph Rowntree Foundation .
35.
Labour Party (2001) Ambitions for Britain: Labour’s Manifesto 2001. London: Labour Party .
36.
Land, H. (2002a) Meeting the Child Poverty Challenge: Why Universal Childcare Is Key to Ending Child Poverty. London: Daycare Trust .
37.
Land, H. (2002b) ‘Spheres of Care in the UK: Separate and Unequal’ , Critical Social Policy22(1): 13–32 .
38.
Lewis, J. (1980) The Politics of Motherhood: Child and Maternal Welfare in England 1900–1939. London: Croom Helm .
39.
Lewis, J. (2001) ‘The Decline of the Male Breadwinner Model: The Implications for Work and Care’ , Social Politics8(2): 152–170 .
40.
Morris, J. (1999) Hurtling into a Void: Transition to Adulthood for Young Disabled People with ‘Complex Health and Support Needs’. Brighton: Pavilion .
41.
Morris, J. (2001) ‘Social Exclusion and Young Disabled People with High Levels of Support Needs’ , Critical Social Policy21(2): 161–184 .
42.
Morris, J. (2002) Young Disabled People Moving into Adulthood. York: Joseph Rowntree Foundation .
43.
Oliver, M. (1996) Understanding Disability. London: Macmillan .
44.
Read, J. (2000) Disability, the Family and Society: Listening to Mothers. Milton Keynes: Open University Press .
45.
Riddell, S. (1998) ‘The Dynamic of Transition to Adulthood’, pp. 189–210 in C. Robinson and K. Stalker (eds) Growing up with Disability. London: Jessica Kingsley .
46.
Smart, C. (1996) ‘Deconstructing Motherhood’, pp. 37–57 in E. Bortolaia Silva (ed.) Good Enough Mothering? Feminist Perspectives on Lone Motherhood. London: Routledge .
47.
Thomas, C. (1998) ‘Parents and Family: Disabled Women’s Stories about Their Childhood Experiences’, pp. 85–96 in C. Robinson and K. Stalker (eds) Growing up with Disability. London: Jessica Kingsley .
48.
Tisdall, K. (2001) ‘Failing to Make the Transition? Theorising the “ Transition to Adulthood” for Young Disabled People’, pp. 167–178 in M. Priestley (ed.) Disability and the Life Course: Global Perspectives. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press .
49.
UNICEF (2000) A League Table of Child Poverty in Rich Nations. Florence: UNICEF , Innocenti Report Card No. 1.
