The charity’s research shows that 150,000 of the UK’s poorest single working mothers could lose up to £3,500 a year, the equivalent of £68 a week, under the new Universal Credit, based on a single parent with three children working full-time receiving minimum wage.
It also found that the reforms will affect second earners, most of whom are women, with some families losing up to £1,800 a year.
While some families will be helped by the new system, including single parents working less than 16 hours a week on low pay, Save the Children warns that a total of 1.1.million families with children will be worse off than they are now.
To support struggling working mothers, Save the Children jointly with Gingerbread, the Daycare Trust and Netmums, has launched a new campaign in the run-up to Mother’s Day on 18 March.
The Mums United campaign - with the slogan ‘Make Mums' Day, Make Work Pay’ - calls on the Chancellor George Osbourne to make work pay for mothers who want to work their way out of poverty ahead of the budget on 21 March.
A poll by Netmums for the campaign revealed that 56 per cent of mothers said the main thing stopping them from taking a job or making them consider giving up work is the cost of childcare.
The Mums United Campaign calls on the chancellor to:
- allow single working mothers to keep more of their incomes before losing any benefits as they are the only earner in the family
- let second earners keep the first £200 of their earnings without losing any benefits, as main breadwinners do
- increase support for childcare costs for low-income families from the current level of 70 per cent to 80 per cent to make sure mothers are not priced out of work.
Justin Forsyth, chief executive of Save the Children, said, ‘Universal Credit will help some families, but mums working hard to stay above the breadline are its big blind spot.
'A single mum on £370 a week simply can’t afford to lose £68. Mothers who want to work more to provide for their children while juggling soaring childcare and living costs should be getting more help, not less. The Government must make sure mums who want to work keep more of their incomes and get more support with childcare. Otherwise we’ll see fewer women in the workplace and more children growing up in poverty.
‘Too many children in this country are going without basics like hot meals or proper clothes because their parents can’t earn enough. We know from other countries that supporting mums who want to work takes children out of poverty, so we need a system which offers mothers that choice.
'Unless we see movement on childcare and benefits for struggling working mums in this budget, it could be too late for hundreds of thousands of children.’
