Introduction

The introduction of Universal Credit in the UK entails the most intensive and extensive application of conditionality to date (Dwyer and Wright, 2014; Wright and Dwyer, 2022). As women are particularly affected by the new conditionality regime for lead carers of children, investigation into how women experience and view this policy was essential. This book has reported on research that explored over time the impacts of the new conditionality regime for lead carers on the valuing of unpaid care, women's position in the paid labour market and women's agency in relation to engagement in unpaid care and paid work.

This concluding chapter starts by highlighting the key findings. It then discusses the implications of the conditionality within Universal Credit for women's citizenship and the social security system, and explains how the social security system can be changed to promote a more gender-inclusive citizenship framework. It gives specific recommendations for the conditionality within Universal Credit. The chapter ends by articulating how the conditionality within Universal Credit furthers an androcentric concept of citizenship and highlighting the importance of seeking and incorporating the views of claimants when devising welfare reform.

Effects on mothers’ caring roles and responsibilities, employment trajectories and agency

The research shows that within Universal Credit policy and practice, there is an almost exclusive emphasis on paid work and a routine failure to recognise and take into account mothers’ caring responsibilities (see Chapter Four). As a result, mandatory expectations of work-related requirements and paid work hinder mothers’ ability to deliver unpaid care by limiting time to undertake unpaid care and increasing tensions in interactions with children. The longitudinal analysis shows that these impacts are sustained over time and are often exacerbated by entrance into paid work. There are also considerable challenges in taking children to appointments at the JCP. This also undermines mothers’ caring responsibilities and roles. Additionally, there were indications that the conditionality erodes mothers’ caring identities as some of the participants experienced shame and stigma on account of undertaking unpaid care. This emphasis on paid work to the detriment of unpaid care and caring identities devalues unpaid care.