I am very pleased to be able to contribute to this debate on parenting and employment. My experience as a woman who brought up four children alone and the necessity to continue working during that period is a handy background, I believe. Taking part in the committee inquiry hasn’t been a pleasant experience, I must say, because we found that women are still facing prejudice, bias and discrimination at entirely unacceptable levels in the world of work today. It’s a cause of concern that some of the evidence that committee heard suggested that things are deteriorating rather than improving, with ACAS, for example, reporting an increase of 10 per cent in calls related to discrimination based on maternity and pregnancy.