‘Happy Families?’: Single Mothers, the Press and the Politicians

Abstract

FOR THOSE OF US who have been following how lone parents are represented in media and political debates over the last few years, the shift was all too apparent. By Spring 1997, the political scapegoating of single mothers as being responsible for tearing apart the moral fabric of society had become less frequent; tabloid headlines which screamed ‘family breakdown’, ‘scroungers' and ‘welfare benefit crisis' appeared less often; and many politicians had started to project themselves as, at the least, concerned about the welfare of lone parents and their children. Surprising really, that is, until we remember the backdrop—the UK General Election and 1.3 million UK lone parent voters. By April 1997, a growing backlash against the more extreme and pathologising accusations against single mothers had rendered explicit vilification unacceptable. To pull votes a different sort of language had to come into play—one which didn't risk turning off the electorate but would still allow a freezing or cutting of welfare spending on lone parent families. Since it was now politically inexpedient to engage in vitriolic attack, there emerged a new discourse—one which reappropriated and redefined lone parents as chief targets of government aid. Close scrutiny of the texts circulating from 1992 to the time of the General Election offers insights of how policy agendas, political rhetoric and news interweave to construct a definition of lone parents which bears little resemblance to how they may see themselves.