Family Breakdown - One in Two Children Will See Parents Split

A new study published by the Bristol Community Trust (BCFT) and the Centre for Social Justice, found that nearly one in two children born today will experience family breakdown by the age of 16. 

The latest figures from the report titled "Family breakdown in the UK : It's not about divorce" reveals that there has been a ten percent increase in family breakdown over the past decade to forty-eight percent.  The report concludes that divorce is not the main cause for family breakdown and that in fact it only contributed to twenty percent of break-ups.    

Gavin Poole, executive director of the CJS says that "these new figures underline the alarming and growing level of family breakdown in the UK.  This imposes huge costs on society - both in terms of human unhappiness and financial burdens." 
It has been documented that children from broken homes not only perform less well at school but are more likely to turn to drugs, alcohol and crime. 

Harry Benson, author of the report and director of the BCFT, believes that the new findings demonstrate the need for policy solutions focused on improving stability among unmarried new parents.  These include re establishing the need for and importance of marriage, as well as prioritising a national programme of relationship education.

The BCFT have been running a relationship programme locally, "lets stick together" that has succeeded in helping 30 percent of all new parents.  However Gavin Poole proposes that more needs to be done nationally to help strengthen relationships "new steps such as tax breaks for marriage and far better relationship education, should be taken by Ministers and society at large to reverse these worrying social trends."

For a copy of the report click here