Gabriel Attal is tackling a new issue, that of single mothers.
Raised by Jeanine Weil, the Prime Minister knows it well: raising your children when you are a single woman is sometimes an obstacle course.
“My mother was very young when she met my father, 17-18 years old, she did not study to be able to take care of us.
She had me at 25, but my parents had been trying for four or five years, he confides in the new issue of
ELLE
magazine , on newsstands this Friday March 8.
I was born thanks to PMA.
In the same hospital as Amandine, the first test-tube baby.
When they divorced, she found herself alone, without a job, with three children.
I remember, as a kid, her first job, assistant editor: she had crazy hours, she came home late at night stinking of cigarettes, she who had never smoked, there were only guys who smoked in editing room.
She climbed the ranks, one by one.”
To discover
Business masterclass: on March 8, treat yourself to some time for yourself
The precariousness of “single mothers”
Building on this testimony, Gabriel Attal today wants to improve the conditions of single-parent families, whose number has almost doubled (they went from 950,000 in 1990 to 1.7 million today).
And, in particular that of “single mothers”.
“I don't like the expression, which gives the impression that there is only one parent, when there are often two,” the politician insists.
That being said, the situation of single mothers is still too often precarious.
In France, if we are to believe figures from 2021, 15% of single mothers are unemployed, more than double of women in a relationship.
A rate which rises to 33% among mothers of two children.
Worse: only 50% of those who have a child under three years old have a job, according to INSEE.
Finally, those who work experience part-time work twice as often as mothers in a relationship.
Result: a third of single-parent families - 85% made up of single mothers - live below the poverty line.
To better support these families - one in four in France today, notes
ELLE
magazine - Gabriel Attal intends to launch an action plan.
The Prime Minister first intends to strengthen the actions of the CAF around “separation pathways”.
How ?
By improving the intermediation of alimony, already made systematic since January 2023. Then, he asks that elected officials not only think about ways to promote the maintenance of co-parenting, but also find housing solutions in the first months following separation.
The question of employment should also be on the agenda for this sensitive project.
To be continued.