How do you do it with childcare in summer?

Summer vacation is a stress test for parents: How should one cover 9 weeks vacation with 25 vacation days? We asked three mothers how things are going for them after the first half of the holiday.

Maria Veit, 35, employee, has a three and a half year old son and lives in Lower Austria, Velm-Götzendorf

"How I should manage financially to pay the childminder is still in the stars."

I am a single parent, both of my parents have died, and I have not had any contact with the child's father since the end of my pregnancy. My circle of friends works all the time. To be honest, I had until last week no plan how i will care for the children to organize during the holidays. The kindergarten is closed for three weeks in the summer, which cannot even come close to being reconciled with my working hours, as I can only take two weeks of vacation at a time. A friend who has always supported me this week is seriously ill. Now I've talked to my boss: I can work from home as an exception and must hire a childminder. How I am supposed to do this financially is still in the stars.

Working from home is also difficult. I have a very stressful job, has to make a lot of phone calls. Telling a three-year-old to keep himself busy for six hours in sight is nearly impossible. I pray that there isn't much going on at work. He is then with the childminder for three days and one afternoon when I have to work another kindergarten mum picks him up from the childminder.

I think that holiday childcare also urgently needs to be expanded in the country! Not all have healthy, retired parents at home who can look after their children. And there can be no sense and purpose to 'crank' your child on someone else every day or in yours Friends go begging to have to. We only have child minders, who of course cost accordingly. One week of care in order to be able to go to work comes to half a month's salary. I hope that I can pay the childminder in installments. That would be ideal.

Sigrid Buchhas, 51, is a single parent communication trainer and yoga teacher from Vienna, she has a ten year old daughter

»In terms of school technology, we are still living in Maria Theresa's time. And today it is largely up to the mothers to ensure that the children are looked after. Sad world."

I'm a single parent, my daughter spends three weeks with her dad during the summer holidays and the rest with me. As a communication trainer and yoga teacher, that works - but only with grandparents.

After fourteen years in IT (sales / marketing), I took parental leave made self-employed - also because I don't want to 'put' my daughter somewhere all the time, but want to enable her to simply relax at home with me during the holidays or in the afternoons. I earn a fraction now of what I used to earn as an executive in the IT industry. But we'll get through and family time is worth a lot more to me than a title on a business card or the company car.

In Austria labor law and education are regulated by the state. According to the law, most of them have five weeks vacation in their employment relationship. The law also provides for 12 or 4 weeks off school. It is obvious that that does not go together. I am surprised that there have not been political initiatives for a long time that urge the legislature to think about something to address this discrepancy. After all, parents are a large part of the electorate. There are nine weeks of vacation because the children were needed as workers on the farms. In terms of school technology, we are still living in Maria Theresa's time. And today it is largely up to the mothers to ensure that the children are looked after. Sad world.

Astrid Schwarz, 39, controller, is the mother of 3 children (6, 10 and 12) and lives in Vienna

"We need affordable childcare places during the holidays!"

The summer holidays are organized in such a way that I am on vacation for two weeks with the children, my ex-husband also has two weeks with them, and then they spend two more weeks in an English & tennis camp. The rest of the time my parents take care. My daughter, 6, is currently still in kindergarten, but that too has three weeks to go in the summer - one week of which she is with my parents. The organization of these nine weeks is already one big challenge. The camps cost me a total of 1,388 euros for two weeks.

Affordable childcare places are needed, especially during the holidays. But also learning support that you can book at short notice, where you don't have to decide in March whether or not you have to register the child for it. Why is there, for example, in Schools with afternoon care no care in summer? At least for a couple of weeks so that vacations could be adjusted accordingly.

The summer city camps and locations offered by the City of Vienna should be massively expanded. If you are not fast enough, everything is booked out. And the improvements this year showed that it was Far too few affordable offers gives. A week of Summer City Camp with 3 children would cost me 90 euros, a week of camp with a private provider would cost me over 600 euros.

Fortunately, I have one very much family-friendly employer and can also do home office. Now I hope that we will get the Corona off the stage as well as possible. If things get tough again, I hope that these will be announced in good time. And not like at the end of June, for example, when school tests and living room tests were invalid overnight.