Grandparenting in Europe: family policy and grandparents' role in providing childcare

Extract from Key Findings: Our study shows that across Europe grandparents, and grandmothers in particular, are playing a major role in providing both intensive and occasional care for their grandchildren.

Over 40% of grandparents in the 11 European countries studied provide grandchild care without the child's parents present, while in Britain the British Social Attitudes (BSA) survey showed that 63% of grandparents with a grandchild under 16 do so.

Younger grandmothers who are fit, healthy and with younger grandchildren – the most likely to be providing care for their grandchildren – are the very women who governments across Europe are aiming to encourage to stay in paid work for longer, in order to increase productivity and pay for their own pensions, health and social care in later life.

Their vital but invisible role in providing childcare, whether intensive, regular and/or occasional, is likely to conflict with their own ability to self-finance their old age, especially as widow's benefits in both state and employer pension schemes are eroded. 

Report here: http://www.grandparentsplus.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/EU-report-summary.pdf  

This news came to Interconnections News Service from COFACE - www.coface-eu.org/