Christmas Happy Families

"Christmas during a pandemic is a new experience for us all but it may herald an even greater need for later life financial advice"

Politicians portray a family Christmas as Mum, Dad, two grandmothers, two grandfathers, and children. Once that bubble has been formed, other Mum and Dad siblings will be excluded from seeing their parents and grandparents over Christmas. The game ‘Happy Families’ will have different rules this Christmas as people try to fit in within the three household-only rules.

I have already seen a letter to an Agony Aunt complaining that siblings should step aside to allow the writer’s only child to spend time with some of their cousins rather than be the only child at a ‘family Christmas’. I felt that the writer didn’t really want to spend Christmas with their in-laws and was using the child as a side issue. Maybe that is why I am not an Agony Aunt?

I can see tactical games going on in many ‘happy families’. Who will get to be where they want and who will carry a grievance into next year? Add to this those family members who want to bend the rules a little, and those who want to cancel all gatherings until next summer. Any one family will have a combination of views. This could lead to friction and a lack of ‘happy families’.

There are two very public families who will have to stick to the two household rules: The Royal Family and the Prime Minister’s Family. They will be subject to much public scrutiny.

Assuming the Queen hosts Christmas as usual at Sandringham this year, which of her four children’s families will they invite? As all of their children have adult children who live with their own families, will the Queen and Duke invite two children, or one child and their children?

Any family that covers more than three households will have similar problems. Then amplify the problems by assuming couples will face the usual problem of ‘your family or mine?’

Now take the Prime Minister. His household is himself, his partner Carrie Symonds, and Wilfred. He has been married twice before and has several children, the oldest of which is 27. The Prime Minister has three siblings; Carrie has her own parents and grandparents.

The Prime Minister’s father, Stanley, has six children from two marriages of which the Prime Minister is the eldest. His mother, Charlotte, has remarried following her divorce from Stanley. He is in a more difficult situation than the Queen. One step out of line and the media will be all over him. I suspect it will be a quiet Christmas at home for just him, Carrie and Wilfred.

In a normal Christmas, families as complicated as these two public families, would probably be subject to geography, moving from household to household, to ensure they could see many if not all of their relatives. This could be followed by getting together with friends at New Year.

There are many types of family, ranging from the couple who have always been together and probably always will be, to soap opera family relationships with many deaths, divorces and children born out of wedlock. Many people live in complicated extended families. The more complicated and extended they are, the more rapidly they will change - marriages, divorces and births will not stop because an individual has reached a particular age.

This is the ‘world’ inhabited by the later life adviser when they are working with clients. One day they could be advising a ‘model stable family’, the next they could be advising a member of a very complicated extended family.

The more complicated the family, the more fluid the family situation will be. Some members will be financially successful, others will not. Some younger members will be prepared to care for and look after older generations but not all of them will.

Later life advisers will be familiar with the situation where one child is happy that the best care possible is provided for their parent while another sees their inheritance disappearing. Family relationships are not always that close.

The added pressures this Christmas will bring to family, will inevitably lead onto the financial arrangements. After all, divorce proceedings usually peak after Christmas, and you have to wonder whether this year will see an even bigger increase?

In that regard, it won’t just be solicitors who need to prepare for the 2021 fall-out but later life advisers as well. Things could get very complicated and messy, very quickly. Christmas during a pandemic is a new experience for us all but it may herald an even greater need for later life financial advice – this is a period not for the faint-hearted.