Anya, volunteer member of Gingerbread’s Campaign Advisory Group. 

“I volunteer with Gingerbread because they are a fantastic charity for single parents, and  have been around for so long, that I remember my mum talking about them when I was a child. 

I first got involved around 15 years ago, after becoming a single parent myself. I found that many of the people I met were, like me, professional women in our 30s and 40s, yet I felt we were being hugely misrepresented in the media. At the time, there were a lot of negative stereotypes about single parents, with stories often focusing on “feckless” teenage mothers on council estates having children simply to claim benefits. Society had been led to believe that this was what single-parent families looked like, and when many people heard the term “single parent”, those were often the images that came to mind. I think many of us absorbed those assumptions without even realising it, myself included. 

But my lived experience told a very different story. Through Gingerbread, I became aware that the average age of a single parent was actually 37 at the time, now it’s 39, and today single-parent families make up one in four families in the UK. Single parents come from all walks of life, yet people don’t always take us seriously or protect us from systems that are often skewed against us. 

I don’t think this is always intentional; often, it comes from a lack of understanding, but Gingerbread has been fighting this stigma and challenging misconceptions for over 100 years. They work incredibly hard to ensure single parents are treated more fairly and better supported. 

I have seen first-hand how committed they are through my involvement in the #FixTheCMS campaign. I witnessed how passionately they believe in single parents and in helping us fulfil our potential.

It is a genuine privilege to be part of their Campaigns Advisory Group and contribute towards creating positive change.”