It is good news for Bradford's single mothers that they are to get a share of £5 million in a Government-funded pilot scheme to help them get back to work. On the other hand, though, the fact that only Bradford outside London is to be included in this scheme because of its high proportion of one-parent families does not reflect well on the place.
It casts us in a bad light that we have 9,000 lone parents on income support with 17,000 children. Yet again it will drive the assumption that this is a city of teenage pregnancies and broken marriages and all the attendant social problems.
Quite why Bradford should be so much above the national average is unclear. There are many reasons why marriages break down. Very often the parent - usually the mother - left with the children to care for is not necessarily at fault yet has to struggle on the poverty line, trying to bring up the children and battle with the difficulties of getting a job while looking after them.
In that sense the pilot scheme will be very welcome to the 1,200 Bradford families who are expected to benefit from it over the next two years. It should help to improve the quality of life for the parents who succeed in getting into work as a result, as well as their children.
If on the other hand Bradford's status in this respect is being achieved because of a large number of teenage pregnancies, the Government would do better to spend the money on trying to discover what it is in the city's social make-up that is causing such a problem.
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