Join the fight to win justice for mothers

If they're lucky they get flowers or chocolate on Mother's Day, but they get no recognition for their vital life-giving caring work.

Worse, they get attacked for being mothers - by government, business and even some feminists.

Tony Blair called mothers on benefits "workless," as if raising children is not a full-time job. This attack was the prelude to his welfare "reform," which has forced mothers out to work regardless of the impact on children. Even women with disabilities or with children with disabilities are not exempt.

If you can't find a job amid this recession you'll be forced, US-style, to work for benefits - at £1.53 an hour.

But why should employers pay the minimum wage if they can get someone on benefits?

This is the biggest attack on wages for decades.

The Global Women's Strike and Single Mothers' Self-Defence are two of the organisations calling the Mothers' March this weekend.

Together with WinVisible (women with visible and invisible disabilities) they have spearheaded opposition to welfare reform. The stories they tell are harrowing.

Jean had to attend a work-focused interview while still breastfeeding. She says: "Mother's milk is the first and best food.

"Why should my son be deprived of it? Is his health and well-being of no concern?"

Others have seen the pressure mount while pregnant.

Helen was called to an interview when she went on maternity leave despite having a job to return to. Elaine had her benefit cut when her disabled daughter was sick and she couldn't attend her interview.

The Mothers' March will remember Christelle Pardo, a pregnant single mother driven to suicide with her five-month-old son Kayjah in 2009. All her benefits had been cut despite her having been a student and then in work. Her sister said: "She felt she didn't exist."

The march brings together mothers of every race, age, passport, income, sexuality and occupation.

All are overworked and underpaid and demand recognition and support for our caring work.

Women in cities, towns and villages in other countries are participating. In India, tribal and Dalit women from rural Chhattisgarh are demanding equal rights to land and property, ration cards for mothers below the poverty line, higher pensions for single, widowed and divorced women and compensation for mothers and children released from bonded labour.

In Mexico indigenous women will broadcast discussions on their workload and the government repression they face when they organise.

In Peru domestic workers are campaigning to see protective employment legislation implemented.

In Haiti victims of the earthquake are demanding not only food and shelter but the return of their elected president Jean-Bertrand Aristide, who was deposed by a US coup in 2004.

In Guyana the Mothers' March has broken new ground. For the first time in this racially divided country, women of African, Indian and mixed descent on the coast travelled to the interior to march with their indigenous sisters. They are demanding clean potable water, electricity, housing, money for carers, protective rape law and an end to racial and domestic violence.

In the US low-income mothers whose children have been taken from them by social services because of racism, poverty and other forms of discrimination are marching for their children's return. Some have already won their cases by working together in their campaigning organisations.

The march was the initiative of the All African Women's Group Mothers' Campaign.

The mothers are asylum-seekers and refugees separated from their children after fleeing persecution, war or dictatorships.

Many have suffered rape and other torture - and then detention and destitution in Britain.

Maureen from AAWG says: "Our campaign highlights the tragedy of mothers separated, often for many years, from their children. Some of our members have been and are in Yarl's Wood Removal Centre, where women are on hunger strike because of the conditions there. Many are mothers."

Payday men's network is calling for fathers and other carers to march with them in support of mothers.

The group says: "We personally and the whole society would benefit if more men backed their mothers' and partners' demands for recognition and support. It would establish the centrality of caring and command men's respect and commitment to do our share."

Kim Sparrow is an activist for Single Mothers' Self-Defence. Join the Mothers' March in demanding investment in caring not killing on Saturday March 13. Activists will assemble at 2pm at Trafalgar Square, then march to Parliament Square. For more details visit www.globalwomenstrike.net.