Comment: 'Instability at home puts children at risk'

Without the safety and reassurance of a permanent home, children are extremely vulnerable.

The figures on homeless children in this country are frightening: 142,490 children were in temporary accommodation last year.

As a parent, you know what the effects of instability can be, how much your little ones can be affected by the slings and arrows of your own working life and relationships.

As this week’s cover story of Homes and Property shows, divorcing parents are acknowledging this by ‘birdnesting’: retaining the family home for the children while taking turns to live in another property nearby.

Stability and continuity are about the most valuable thing you can give children when the process of growing up is often bewildering, unsettling and far from the Disney world they thought it might be.

Of course, such an arrangement is not always possible — issues of safety or a lack of finances may prevent such an ideal situation — but you’d hope parents would do what they can to retain the loving and supportive environment they deserve.

And it really is a fight to do what you can to protect your family right now.

The ‘cost-of-living crisis’ is a buzz phrase, but for many families, it is a very real situation. It is a struggle to make ends meet, never mind plan for a bigger place for growing humans or think about giving them a meaningful leg up in the world. Stability is a battle.

Like I said, you do what you can, and these birdnesters should be applauded for trying to create some order out of potential chaos.