His latest concern is for the future of British society. Although he welcomes the Government’s moves to create more flexible working hours, he suggests that they could do more to support the family. “For a long time, it’s been the finding of research that the breakdown of the family is a huge contributor to social cost. I think it would be good if policy-makers could think of ways that they could support the family: give tax breaks and more incentive to people to marry and stay together.”
He takes this position not out of some ideological view that other patterns of family life are inferior, but rather, he says, because “the pragmatic evidence is there that children fare best, grow best, and then eventually contribute most positively to society when they enjoy that stability in childhood”.
I suggest that the Centre for Social Justice has been proposing that the Conservative Party adopt similar policies. Last month, its chairman Iain Duncan Smith published a paper recommending that married couples should have to endure a three-month “cooling off” period before divorce.
“We want to slow down the rush towards irrevocable decisions, to help people to pause and to ponder a bit more deeply,” he demurs. “It’s still perfectly clear that a divorce is a trauma that takes a great deal of getting over.”
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Sunday Telegraph–Archbishop of Westminster: 'My every word is picked over'
His latest concern is for the future of British society. Although he welcomes the Government’s moves to create more flexible working hours, he suggests that they could do more to support the family. “For a long time, it’s been the finding of research that the breakdown of the family is a huge contributor to social cost. I think it would be good if policy-makers could think of ways that they could support the family: give tax breaks and more incentive to people to marry and stay together.”
He takes this position not out of some ideological view that other patterns of family life are inferior, but rather, he says, because “the pragmatic evidence is there that children fare best, grow best, and then eventually contribute most positively to society when they enjoy that stability in childhood”.
I suggest that the Centre for Social Justice has been proposing that the Conservative Party adopt similar policies. Last month, its chairman Iain Duncan Smith published a paper recommending that married couples should have to endure a three-month “cooling off” period before divorce.
“We want to slow down the rush towards irrevocable decisions, to help people to pause and to ponder a bit more deeply,” he demurs. “It’s still perfectly clear that a divorce is a trauma that takes a great deal of getting over.”
Read it all.