Crunch crunches family freindliness

The credit crunch is not good for business (its official, the gov says so). Some suggestions are reducing red tape (by applying for red tape reduction with more forms no doubt), to reducing NI payments for small companies for 6 months (could save them £600 - whoopee, less than a weeks wages for a minimum wage employee), and by pitting on hold the 'family friendly' measures proposed by lilly livered bleeding heart lefty liberals.

Now, far be it for me for the cynic in me to raise its ugly head again, but increasing paid maternity leave, and creating virtually compulsory paid paternity leave, has always seemed like a strain to small businesses to me - whether the government pays for it or not.

But, it raises to questions - doesn't it show that perhaps it wasn't a good idea in the first place, and are the gove realising now that it might actually cost them a teensy weensy bit more than they thought?

Of course, the next thing would be just to make the businesses pay for it.