I'm spending #InternationalMensDay in the middle of a block of shared parental leave, caring for my 3 month old son while my wife works.

I'm trying to do my bit to fix the problems caused by men not doing enough childcare. 1/

A few weeks ago there was a justified complaint that the proposed English lockdown rules meant that somebody caring for a baby effectively couldn't meet anybody else (for the 1 to 1 meetings outside that were permitted, because babies counted as people for that purpose.) 2/

The way this was phrased on Twitter was "it just shows there weren't enough women in the room"... Well, yes. However, it also shows that the men in the room hadn't done enough childcare. Those tweets were reinforcing the idea that childcare is a female responsibility. 3/

To get the social and economic benefits of equality in the workplace, we need more equality in childcare. Men need to accept the career delay from having kids, the restrictions of options for work, the feeling of embarrassment from juggling home and employment responsibility. 4/

Of course biology plays a part. Women need recovery post-partum and men can't breastfeed. However, a combination of employemnt law, technology and sensible scheduling of leave can largely overcome that. 5/

I'm incredibly fortunate that my employer is very generous and equitable with their parental leave policy. However, that's discretionary and our options have still been limited by the lowest-common-denominator between my employer and my wife's. 6/

There should be stronger incentives for men to take parental leave, and fewer disincentives for women to go back to work (e.g. loss of maternity employment protection when they switch to SPL). This should allow flexibility for individual choice while encouraging equality. 7/

We also need more high-profile and public examples of men making choices and compromises between work and childcare. We've seen the occasional female politician with a child in tow being celebrated in news and twitter, but where are the men doing the same? 8/

This #InternationalMensDay -- start making it normal for men to share responsibility for caring for babies equally with women. 9/9