The Fatherhood Institute Is Calling on the Government to Stick to Its Guns and Introduce

Press release 3 July 2012

Stick to your guns over parenting leave reform, FI urges Government

The Fatherhood Institute is calling on the Government to stick to its guns and introduce a more flexible system of parenting leave that could transform family life and the British economy – in the face of misguided opposition to the proposed reforms, which has not been rigorously thought-through.

The Government announced in the Queen’s Speech that it plans to reform parenting leave so as to allow families more choice and flexibility over who takes time off in the first year after a baby’s birth – without reducing mothers’ current entitlement to a full year’s leave. To make sure that women’s rights remain intact, the proposals include four weeks paid parental leave for fathers – additional to the nine month’s paid leave mothers have access to now, and would have access to then.

But an alliance of campaign groups and unions are mobilising against the plans, advising members to write to their MPs complaining about Government plans to ‘cut maternity leave’ even though the same amount of leave would still be available to women in the form of18 weeks’ maternity leave followed by 34 weeks’ parental leave. Misinformation has also included the suggestion that after 18 weeks, women would have to ‘negotiate’ with their employers about taking more leave. In fact, before giving birth mothers would, as now, give notice to employers of the amount of leave they intend to take – which remains up to 52 weeks.

There are signs that employers are happy with the principle of parents sharing leave, even if they object to any extension of paternity leave. For example theInstitute of Directors said“Allowing parental leave to be shared is a sensible proposal that we welcome – it makes sense as an arrangement to give families more flexibility in how they use their allowance. The Government should be careful not to use this as an opportunity to increase levels of leave, though. Sharing the allowance is fine, but putting heavier burdens on business in these tough times would not be a sensible move.”[1]

However employers have failed to acknowledge that for every father taking parental leave, a mother would be returning to the workplace. Employers have also worried that when leave is called ‘parental leave’ rather than ‘maternity leave’ they will have to give the same benefits to fathers as to mothers. In fact, they already have to: once parenting leave is for the care of a child, rather than for recovering from the birth (normally judged to take about fourteen weeks), an employer (or country) that does not accord fathers and mothers the same rights is vulnerable to challenge under equalities legislation – whatever the leave is actually called.

The Fatherhood Institute believes that the UK is in danger of wasting a golden opportunity to bring our old-fashioned parenting leave system up to date and reduce the gender pay gap, which is actually increasing faster in the UK than in any other of the richer nations[2]. When mothers take long maternity leave and/or are seen as solely or largely responsible for looking after children, they pay a lifelong ‘motherhood penalty’ in terms of earnings and career progression. It is estimated that the UK economy loses more than £20 billion a year through under-use of women’s skills and qualifications[3]. Meanwhile, evidence from Sweden suggests that a mother's future earnings increase on average by 7% over a four year period for every month of leave the father takes[4].

The Government’s planned reforms contain the essential building blocks of a fair and gender-equitable parenting leave system that is normative in other countries and would bring us more in line with Europe’s most family friendly countries.

It’s vital that the Government’s plans not be derailed, according to Fatherhood Institute joint chief executive Adrienne Burgess: “Both mothers and fathers are happier, their relationship is more stable and children flourish when fathers play a greater role in caring for them and mothers earn more. We need a parenting leave system that supports this – not one that gets in the way”.

For more details about the systems currently being considered by government, see our summary table and briefingPARENTING LEAVE CONSULTATION 2012 – WILL THE GOVERNMENT BACK-TRACK?, below. Contact details are at the end of the briefing.

UK PARENTING LEAVE DESIGN: CURRENT AND UNDER CONSIDERATION

Type of leave / Option A
Government’s first suggestion / Option B
An option the government is now seriously considering / Current system
Total leave available to family / 58 weeks / 58 weeks / 54 weeks
Maximum available to mother / 52 weeks / 52 weeks / 52 weeks
Maximum available to father / 36 weeks / 32 weeks / 28 weeks
Maternity Leave - available to eligible mothers only, on a ‘use it or lose it’ basis (i.e. if mother doesn’t take it, father cannot use it). Must be taken in one continuous block from the birth, or just before. N.B. ‘Eligible’ means that she has worked for her employer for the required time before becoming pregnant. / 18 weeks
(All paid – 6 at a high rate) / 26 weeks
(All paid – 6 at a high rate) / 26 weeks
(All paid – 6 at a high rate)
Maternity Leave – available to eligible mothers AND transferable by her to the father if BOTH are eligible (must run on directly from mother-only Maternity Leave in a full-time single block) / None / 26 weeks
(13 weeks paid at low rate) / 26 weeks
(13 weeks paid at low rate)
Mother-only paid Parental Leave (‘use it or lose it’). Can be taken flexibly in blocks of leave (not yet part-time, but could be in the future) and is available to eligible mothers directly / 4 weeks
(paid) / None / None
Shareable Parental Leave – available to the mother or father (whichever is eligible – or to both if both are eligible). Can be taken flexibly (not yet part-time, but could be in the future). / 30 weeks
(17 weeks paid) / None / None
Paternity Leave (father-only, use it or lose it’). Must be taken close to the birth and while the mother is still at home.(father needs to be ‘eligible’ – i.e. have worked for his employer for the required amount of time) / 2 weeks / 6 weeks / 2 weeks
Father-only paid Parental Leave (‘use it or lose it’). Can be taken flexibly (not yet part-time, but could be in the future). Available to eligible fathers directly (not ‘given/transferred’ by the mother) / 4 weeks / None / None

PARENTAL LEAVE CONSULTATION 2012 – WILL THE GOVERNMENT BACK-TRACK?

BACKGROUND

Britain has one of the most old-fashioned parenting leave systems in the world. It allocates almost all the leave in the first year after a baby is born to mothers. Only three other European countries do this – and two of them are Eire and Greece. By contrast countries with a good track record in gender equality tend to have flexible leave which can be divided between parents.

We think Britain’s families deserve a more flexible system of parenting leave allowing both parents to share the hands-on caring which is so important to babies’ healthy development and future happiness, while allowing both to have a fair crack at continuing to flourish in their careers.

The Coalition thought so too. Working with the world’s leading experts on parenting leave systems, the Government, in 2011, identified and put out to consultation

a system that would give fathers and mothers real choice over ‘who does what and when’ without reducing new mothers’ entitlement to a full year’s parenting leave when their baby is born. Sadly the Government are now at risk of back-tracking, stuck in behind-the-scenes negotiations with employers, unions and lobby groups who, for various reasons (outlined below), would rather stick with the status quo or an unhappy compromise.

The driving force behind the Government’s radical stance was gender equality and, in particular, reducing the gender pay gap: when mothers take long Maternity Leave and/or return to work part-time they pay a ‘motherhood penalty’ in terms of current and future earnings and career progression that lasts a life-time. This not only contributes to female ‘pensioner poverty’ but also to the hardships experienced by lone parent families: because women typically scale back their work involvement once they become parents, they are usually unable to support their children if their partner loses his job or if they separate. The ‘motherhood penalty’ also has serious, negative implications for the economy (which, it is estimated, loses £15bn-£23bn per year through underuse of women’s skills and qualifications - EHRC, 2009) and for employers, who lose women in whom they have invested substantial resources. Enabling more use of leave by fathers, while it would take them out of the workplace, would at the same time allow mothers to return to it more quickly – benefiting employers who find it particularly difficult to cope when mothers are out of the workforce for longer than six months.

HOW THE GOVERNMENT’S PROPOSED SCHEME WOULD WORK

Currently new mothers have the right to one year’s leave from around the time of the birth. Nine months of this is paid. Under the proposed system, this right would be maintained but the name of the leave would partly change: 18 weeks of it would still be called ‘Maternity Leave’ with the remaining 34 weeks called ‘Parental Leave’.

Why would this be better?

FLEXIBILITY: For legal reasons, Maternity Leave can never be flexible: it must be taken in one full-time block from near the birth. If the mother returns to work before using it all, she loses the rest. Parental Leave, by contrast, can be taken flexibly: once she’s on Parental Leave (rather than Maternity Leave) a other can go back to work for a bit and then stop again for bit. And in the future, Parental Leave could be made even more flexible: it could be taken part-time. A mother could choose to work, say, two days a week and stay at home on Parental Leave for three days. Because most of the Parental Leave in the UK is currently so poorly paid, that might help a lot of women, because on their ‘work’ days they would be earning at their normal rate.
FATHERS CAN SHARE: Another feature of Parental Leave that is different from Maternity Leave is that fathers and mothers can share it. Each parent’s entitlement to the leave is based on their own employment situation. .
FATHERS GET ADDITIONAL PARENTAL LEAVE: Under the proposed new scheme, fathers would also have a new entitlement to four additional ‘reserved’ paid weeks of Parental Leave (as well as their existing two weeks Paternity Leave). They would be able to take their own ‘reserved’ Parental Leave quota once the mother had gone back to work. This could be very helpful for families: for instance, if the mother were the higher earner, she would be able to go back to work after 18 weeks, knowing that her baby’s father was receiving Parental Leave pay to look after their baby, as well as retaining the right to return to his old job, or its equivalent, afterwards.

THE IMPORTANCE OF A PARENTAL LEAVE ‘QUOTA’ FOR FATHERS

Reserving’ a quota of paid Parental Leave for fathers can help stamp out sexism by employers, sending a clear signal to them that when people become parents, they’re going to take a sizeable chunk of time off work – whether they’re a man or a woman. Evidence from Sweden suggests that a mother's future earnings increase on average by 7% over a four year period for every month of leave the father takes[5].

Once there is a dad-only Parental Leave quota, conversation at home changes, too: couples start to negotiate to make the most of it – and fathers then start taking more of the rest of the leave. Iceland reserves 13 weeks for mothers, 13 weeks for fathers and 13 weeks of joint leave to be used as the family wishes. Ninety-one percent of Icelandic fathers now take leave, with 83% using all their own reserved leave and 23% also taking some of the joint leave.

SO WHAT NOW IN THE UK?

So far, so sensible – but the Government has run into trouble. The very people they thought would ‘be in favour of what we are doing’[6] (some organisations which espouse a strong ‘women’s empowerment’ perspective) are attacking the proposal. Further, they are making things very difficult by spreading mis-information. For instance, in a recent memo to interested groups they advised that the message ‘appropriate for people wanting to write to MPs now’ would be ‘don’t cut maternity leave to 18 weeks’. In fact, as we have seen that is not the proposal that is on the table at all: it is proposed that mothers still have access to a full year’s leave on the same terms as before – only now part of it is called ‘Maternity Leave, and the rest ‘Parental Leave’.

THE ‘UNHAPPY COMPROMISE’ SCHEME

As it back-tracks, the Government has started to consider a different model, promoted by their scheme’s opponents. Under this model, the whole of the first year’s leave to which the mother is entitled would, as now, be called ‘Maternity Leave’. After six months, if she went back to work, she would (as now) be able to TRANSFER the rest of the year’s leave, or part of it, to her baby’s father. However, this isn’t the same as his having his OWN entitlement to leave (he’d only have that if the leave were called Parental Leave).

FEWER FATHERS WOULD BE ABLE TO TAKE LEAVE: When Maternity Leave and Pay is transferred from the mother, she has to be eligible for it in the first place – and a lot of men’s partners are not eligible for Maternity Leave and Pay. In these cases, if a mother started work in the year after giving birth, her partner would not be eligible for Parental Leave (and Pay) to look after their child, even if he had his own eligibility through his workplace.
LESS FLEXIBILITY: Because the whole of the mother’s first year would be called Maternity Leave, this closes the door on her being able to take it in shorter blocks or – at some time in the future – part time. This would only be possible were the leave she took called Parental Leave.
SEXISM BY EMPLOYERS: With the whole of the first year’s leave still called Maternity Leave, the message sent to employers would be that mothers, and mothers alone, were liable to take leave.
ADDITIONAL PATERNITY LEAVE: The ‘unhappy compromise’ scheme includes an extra 4 weeks’ paid leave reserved for fathers. BUT this would be an extension of Paternity Leave (to be taken after or near the birth, while the mother was still at home on Maternity Leave). This would close the door on the possibility of the father using his leave to look after the baby once the mother had returned to work. There is plenty of evidence that when fathers are just ‘helpers’ they don’t develop confidence and skills as quickly, and are less likely to stay involved in active care of their child than fathers who have cared for young children for a sustained period alone.

REASONS GIVEN FOR OPPOSING THE SCHEME

WOMEN WILL BE FORCED BACK TO WORK EARLIER: Clearly, if it is believed that Maternity Leave is being ‘cut’ to 18 weeks, then some employers (and mothers) may believe that is all they are entitled to. Ironically, by promulgating that mis-information as part of their campaign, the opponents of change are making this more likely. In fact, bad employers already try to force women back to work earlier than 52 weeks, so having 52 weeks actually named as Maternity Leave (as currently) does not seem to be much protection. The answer here is enforcement and clarity of message – not sticking to an outmoded parenting leave model.
EMPLOYERS WILL REDUCE THE PERIOD DURING WHICH THEY ‘TOP UP’ STATUTORY MATERNITY PAY. Employers usually have strong business reasons for introducing such schemes – generally to attract and retain female staff – and these business reasons are likely to drive top ups, whatever the name given to the leave the mother takes.
EMPLOYERS WILL HAVE TO GIVE MEN THE SAME RIGHTS: They already do. Once leave is for the care of a child, not for getting over the birth (normally judged to be about 14 weeks after the birth), a father whose employer (or country) isn’t offering him the same benefits they are offering to mothers, is vulnerable to challenge under Equal Opportunities Legislation.

WOMEN WON’T HAVE AS GOOD PROTECTION WHEN THEY ARE ON ‘PARENTAL LEAVE’ AS WHEN THEY ARE ON ‘MATERNITY LEAVE’ – BECAUSE THEY WON’T BE ABLE TO CHALLENGE EMPLOYERS ON GROUNDS OF SEX DISCRIMINATION. Women will still be able to claim sex discrimination if badly treated by employers when on Parental Leave, just as, currently, mothers (but not fathers) can invoke sex discrimination to challenge employers who will not allow them flexible working.
WHO GETS THE LEAVE IF THE PARENTS HAVE SEPARATED? Once parents separate, the parent who holds the child benefit book (which by default goes to the mother) becomes a single parent. Single parents have full entitlement to the year’s leave. If a father has primary care of the child full-time then it is right and proper that he should be able to take some leave. This would be negotiated along with residence and contact, financial support and so on. .
MEN CAN’T BE RELIED UPON – IT IS MUCH BETTER FOR WOMEN IF THEY ARE SUPPORTED BY THE STATE: This is implicit, not explicit. As an eminent journalist recently put it: “It's as if the opponents of change find it hard to give up the negative, antiquated stereotypes that split men into patriarchal, abusive disciplinarians, a breadwinner distanced from the or the macho, deadbeat, useless, narcissistic, serial philanderer”.[7]