Quite surprised by Treeoflife's posts - is it really the norm for STEM depts. to employ unqualified people like the OP on a FT basis as lecturer equivs? It would be v v unlikely in my area. What about eg TEF?

I think there are two things that can be issues for mature students, one of which is easier to fix than the other.

The easier one is understanding that the odds are against any PhD student regardless of age getting a permanent academic job, and that anyone wanting this has to use the time to get their academic cv into the best shape possible. This applies to mature students as well as younger ones. I have seen a number of mature students fall into the trap of believing their greater life / work experience overrides the need for this kind of continual career development, whereas the reality is you need to have the publications (in good outlets), conference presentations, teaching experience, evidence of getting funding available etc regardless of age.

The harder one is that for most fledgling academics, the first few years of an academic career feature financial uncertainty and frequent moves to different cities / countries. Naturally more mature students tend to be more likely to have family responsibilities / mortgages etc that make this more difficult. So I think early on you need to think this one through and accept that if you can only apply for jobs in a small geographical radius that your chances are lower. In that case, a non-academic plan B (which frankly everyone should have anyway) becomes more important to develop.

You won't be able to go to another university and get them to award you a PhD for work done at another institution I'm afraid. It is a big no in quality assurance agency terms. So I think you need to burn some bridges and kick your complaint up a level at the university you are registered at.
You have a significant cause for a extension to be granted -poor supervision, which helpfully the head of the doctoral college has agreed is the case. Therefore, I would suggest looking up the formal complaint procedure for your institution and complain now about both your supervision and the head of the doctoral college's refusal to give you an extension. Follow the procedures meticulously. There is nothing high ranking administrators are more scared of than a student with a case, who is following procedures. Use evidence from whatever annual progress reviews you have had / upgrade reports etc to show how you were not discouraged from following this line on enquiry. If this is an RCUK-funded DTC, then threaten to complain to the research council too. Be unemotional and legalistic in the way you complain and evidence your claims. I suspect that pretty quickly they will find a mechanism to grant you that extension after all.
I know this means burning bridges with your supervisory team but you have probably done that already by complaining to the head of the doctoral college. And given the remedy you seek is fairly easy to supply, then I think the university would rather give you an extension now, than deal with you renewing the formal complaint after a failed viva.

PS Sorry i forgot to add the rules vary quite a bit from place to place so no-one other than your uni documents can say for sure.

Check your programme handbook, but if not there: on your uni website search for university regulations. The one you want will be called exam conventions or similar.

Essex has the strongest Politics department in terms of the research rankings, and of all the UK's Politics departments, it's probably the closest to US style political science with a lot of expertise in quantitative research. If you are even considering a US PhD programme afterwards, that's the choice that will have name recognition in US academia. Aberystwyth is the other well-known name in US academia for IR (historically one of the first places to teach IR) but generally for the opposite reason - it is known for post-positivist work and as you'll know that's less popular in the US, but makes Aber attractive for those students looking for something different.
As you've got Exeter and Durham on your list, I'm guessing you are interested in Middle East politics. If that is the case, I think employers in the US are going to be interested in language abilities and experience in those countries ahead of university name, as I've seen enough articles bemoaning the lack of people with those skill-sets. Outside academia, I don't think any of your choices are going to be well-known in the US. Durham is the most prestigious university in the UK on your list but that doesn't necessarily translate to US name recognition. Out of your choices, I think I'd go for Essex if a PhD is a possibility and probably Durham if it's Middle East politics driving your interest. QMUL offers internship possibilities but Paris is very expensive for housing, and the module options are limited (although perfectly fine - the only one of your 6 I'd avoid is Kent).

Tricky. Given that we look to be headed into extremely uncertain economic conditions for the next decade or so, which do you think is most likely to keep you in adequately paying employment? Brexit is looking like very bad news for research careers in the UK, so maybe the quality career, while not exciting, might be the better bet for paying the bills.
Something else to consider: could you earn enough on the quality side with the professional qualifications while working standard hours to fund a lifestyle / hobbies that you'd want to pursue? Work to live rather than live to work attitude?
I don't know - I'd love to say follow your heart but if you've got dependants or have financial responsibilities then in your 40s it's a massive risk to take.

if the research involves vulnerable human subjects you will need a CRB check to be allowed access - will that be an issue?

Maybe it's my field, but it's become very unusual to go straight from PhD to a secure academic post - most now do a postdoc / teaching fellowship as they are not immediately competitive for lectureships. So I suppose question 1 is are you applying to that sort of job as well?
Second thought - can you do some detective work and see who was hired for some of the jobs you applied for - how does your cv stack up? If you only have one publication, my guess would be that's your weakness but it's hard to tell. I'd also get an academic who has been on the job market in the last few years to take a look at your application materials and see if you're making any easy to fix errors.
Third thought - yes I did set a deadline as I didn't want to waste my life on an industry (HE) that didn't want me. I got lucky, but I found looking through all the alt-ac resources on the internet really helped me to think through plans B, C and D. It's rather US-centric but I found the resources on Versatile PhD useful.

Hi, I think there's massive differences between the arts/social sciences and sciences in how funding is applied for and awarded. There is a lot less funding around for a start. In Politics the main funder is the ESRC, which funds you either as 1+3 or +3 (so MA + PhD or just PhD). You apply to a university in one of their doctoral training centres (a consortia of universities but only some institutions are in DTCs so check the ESRC list) with a fairly advanced research proposal usually separately to your application to do a PhD there (adverts tend to go out before Christmas). To be competitive you need to have worked on this with your proposed supervisors for quite a while, so it's not very feasible for the OP at this stage. To have a good chance of funding generally you need evidence of a u/g 1st or an MA / MSc distinction and a very strong proposal, so for the OP, the best strategy would be to begin the MA and try to impress so that people are willing to work with him/her on a PhD funding application. You might though get a partial scholarship to go towards funding the MA - there are pockets of money around eg fee reductions for graduates of that university etc. A 2:1 is all they need for a place on the Masters though so that wouldn't be an issue.

Honestly yes particularly for funding in Politics where a 1st is usually required in practice. You'd be better applying after completing the Masters if you got a distinction.

I think it's very easy for part-time students to underestimate how much time needs to be dedicated to the PhD to have a chance of completing in time, and I wonder if this is what is happening here. The supervisors know that you need to reach milestones by certain points and you're off target. I know you think they are unfair to complain about your progress but if they know you are heading towards failing an annual review / upgrade process, then they do have to warn you.

Do not do an unfunded PhD in Politics, just don't. It's a field (my own) that produces far far too many PhDs for the academic jobs out there and where a PhD is not much more help than an MA in other politics-related careers (it may even be a negative). If you get funding, then at least if it doesn't work out, then you can look on it as an interesting if poorly paid job for three years, but I know too many self-funders who now bitterly regret having risked it, to recommend doing that. Look beyond your undergrad university as well for the PhD - there will be funding and suitable supervision in many places, so it's worth checking out what's out there.
If you've been away for twelve years, you might also be shocked by how much universities have changed. Many are very corporate and target-driven indeed these days. It might not be the environment you want - might the third sector be better? With your current job, it might be worth investigating whether you can take a career break to do the MA (social science research methods can often be sold as 'useful'), so you could test the waters and see how you like it but with the safety net of a job to return to if not?

Hi yes I do. When I came back I had a temporary teaching fellow job for a year and then got a lectureship. I think I did make my life harder than I needed to because I was enjoying life in Germany and was interested in staying there longer, so tried to do things to make my cv attractive there. But academic and non-academic jobs in my field there are heavily dependent on patronage, and as I hadn't done any of my degrees there, I was out of those channels. But when I realised and started applying for jobs in the UK, I'd taken my eye off the need to have the perfect cv for the REF, so was at a bit of a disadvantage. If I did it again, I'd make sure I kept in touch with UK contacts more, tried to co-author things with them and made sure I had someone from the UK system look at my application materials to check they were as effectively presented as possible.

I did this. I did a two year Marie Curie postdoc in Germany. I had a great time, but I already spoke German and had lived there for a year as an Erasmus student so it wasn't new territory. I knew other foreign postdocs who didn't speak German but tried to learn and they did find it quite frustrating, as they didn't make much progress and so felt they were stuck in a international bubble and not as integrated as they hoped. If you want to do it, go for it before Brexit starts limiting options. Two things that are worth thinking about if you want a UK academic job afterwards - make sure your supervisor has an international profile i.e. they're known outside their own country and that you have an academically plausible reason for going.