I dutifully obeyed Norman Tebbit and 'got on my bike'. As a result, I've lived over 100 miles from my parents and my in-laws for most of my working life; this is the norm nowadays, extended families are rarely close enough to provide child care.
I'm with Lox here; this government is living the right-wing dream, having been afforded the opportunity by the sheer incompetence of the bankers. The rich have made a mess, so the poor must pay; this seems to be the way things are going. The opportunity is being taken to break the Welfare State once and for all. The right describe this argument as 'looney left shroud waving', but the scope and savagery of what is happening is breathtaking. This is a serious attempt to solidify the culture of privilege and inequality so that it can never again be dismantled without a full-scale revolution. The next major erosion will be civil rights, especially when appealing against official decisions.