Making sense of love and money

Within the context of a relationship, money, it seems, is a dirtier word than sex. According to a survey conducted last year by Relate, the marriage guidance service, financial matters are reckoned to cause more arguments in relationships than any other single factor. And with the high cost of divorce and increasing numbers of lone parents on low pay, or none at all, there is pressure on the government to take a fiscal, if not a moral stand to support marriage.

Agencies such as Scottish Marriage Care, who also provide counselling for couples with relationship difficulties, report that money problems add considerably to the strains on modern relationships. Research shows that poor families on benefit separate and divorce in higher numbers than the better off. And in the unfathomable morass of the benefits system, some women can end up in better financial circumstances if they have split from their partner.

These days couples tend to have a higher level of financial commitment, with borrowing based on two wages. However, even the best laid plans can be completely thrown out by the unexpected - for instance an accidental pregnancy, as the woman stays home to bring up the kids. Sometimes they expect to return to the jobs market but find the cost of childcare too prohibitive. And many report that as time goes on, they feel less confident about returning to a fast changing jobs market. The resulting financial strain can lead them into debt and the break-up of the relationship. Even families who plan for the loss of one income find the pressure piled on in a climate of job insecurity.

Fiona Ashton, 41, of Parents Network, says her decision to give up full time work in customer services to look after her three children was a "quality of life decision", despite the loss of her salary. But as her husband has just lost his job, it means the family's future is uncertain, without the cushion of a second income until he finds another.

Fiona says that the cost of childcare meant that, financially, she wasn't much worse off staying at home than she would have been if she had returned to work and paid for childcare.

"I did look for work that fitted in with school hours but that's quite difficult," she says, "and paying for a childminder for three children would have been too much for our budget. The children are aged 12, 10 and eight now, and I think it does get easier as they get older, but financially our lives divide into 'bc' time - that is, 'before children', when we had much more money and could have a foreign holiday every other year and eat out, things you take for granted before you have children.

"We did notice the big difference in our income when I stopped work and I think relying on one income put a lot of pressure on my husband. Everything depends on his job. For instance we like living in Newton Grange, in Midlothian, but if my husband gets work elsewhere we will certainly have to go.

"The financial facts of life mean there's no flexibility and I couldn't choose to work full time instead because I couldn't earn enough to meet the family's costs. My husband will claim benefits but there may not be any benefit to the family in my working. We'll see. I think there should be more government support for people getting back into the jobs market and tax breaks for childcare."

As well as the practicalities, financial tension can often creep into the relationship if the woman resents not earning and spending her own money.

"I know that for some of my friends having their financial independence is really important," says Fiona. "It's still important for me and I get the family allowance money paid into my own account so I always have my own money to control. But then I pay all the family bills anyway. My husband tends to earn the money and I tend to spend it."

Sadly, money worries and separation often go hand in hand, says the Citizens Advice Bureau, sometimes because splitting up costs so much, but also because debt puts such a strain on people that they do part. The total debt Scots are currently asking CAB to help them with is more than #70 million, an average of #6700 per person, with debt problems increasing year on year for the past four years.

Colin Sim of CAB says couples sometimes have credit card or catalogue debts and then find themselves unable to pay because of a sudden change in their circumstances.

"When you are in financial difficulty it's likely to affect every other area of your life, including your relationship or your family life. It affects people very badly sometimes. We had a young mum of two who tried to commit suicide twice because of money worries, and we had a similar case where someone actually did kill themselves for this reason.

"We see a lot of people who are separating, and either then have money problems as a result, or for whom that was a factor in them splitting up. We help people look at their individual financial situation and in some cases, women are financially better off on their own because of the way the benefits system is structured.

"Where there is a remarriage, we also find cases where second families find themselves worse off financially than the first family and that can cause a great deal of resentment too."

Generally, Sim says, relationship problems appear to improve if the financial ones are helped.

"People don't always factor in what will happen to their budget if they lose their job or give it up to look after children. It has a considerable effect on the family income and there is a lot of pressure on families to have things these days so they take on more debt to achieve that."

The government's declared strategy on tackling poverty is to get more people into more jobs and off benefits. That requires more working mums and, ideally, fewer lone families who slip more easily into poverty. And achieving that without resorting to preaching about moral values isn't easy.

In this month's budget, for the first time ever, Gordon Brown will target benefits directly at women, collecting the money for themselves and their children. Usually the male partner has picked up the lot, but now he will collect only his own entitlement. It's a move that would be welcomed by Children in Scotland, who maintain that it is vital that money directly reaches women to help break the cycle of poverty that currently affects one in three Scots children.

The organisation also warns that parenthood forces mothers into low paid jobs or to give up work altogether. And that those combining work and family are often caught "in a precarious balancing act, rushing from the office to the kitchen to live up to the image of modern day wonderwoman".

Children in Scotland would like the chancellor to dig deep for tax breaks to encourage some of the four million adults in the UK who would like to work but don't. And the introduction of family friendly policies in the work place to encourage them when they get there. They say that more financial support for families will pay real dividends because children brought up in poverty are more likely to offend, more likely to become teenage mums and more likely to be dependent on benefits.

Moral platitudes alone won't keep families together. It's time to invest for the future.

Where to go for help:

Your Local Citizens Advice Bureau can be found in the phone book or by calling 0131-667 0156.

Scottish Marriage Care provide counselling for married or unmarried couples throughout Scotland and can be contacted on 0141 849 6183.

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