Estelle Birdy: Why I'm voting No in the upcoming referendum on women's role in the home

Article 41.2.1 is a strong acknowledgement of the value to society of women’s work in the home, one might have thought, writes Estelle Birdy

After my maternity leave, I returned to a reasonably well-paid, if precarious, job. What of the single mother, living in relative poverty, forced through “economic necessity” to leave her children to work in a minimum-wage job and perhaps, unsociable hours? File picture: Pexels

In 1998, I had to leave my beloved first-born in a creche. My baby daughter was 13 weeks old. 

Back then, statutory maternity leave payments ran for only 14 weeks, and I had done my best, working almost until I gave birth, to maximise my time with my baby afterwards. I had a working partner, but we simply couldn’t have afforded the mortgage had I not gone back to work. I had to leave my baby and my home out of “economic necessity”.