To think this is a more suitable amount for Maternity Leave?

[MortifiedAnyFuckerAdams]

Minimum wage, for your contracted hours, for six months?

Seeing as it is the amount the Govt think we can survive on?

Yes I totally agree.
My point was really that I'm not convinced bf is relevant at all, because it would only be relevant if there were clear evidence that having shorter ML was preventing women from bf.
Or to put it another way: would lengthening ML to 18 months or 2 years encourage more mums to bf? Personally im not convinced there's a clear correlation. I know when I returned to work when my babies were around 12 weeks, I expressed milk and bf them until they were around 1 year. So did most of my professional female friends with babies who were returning to work. At the same time, I knew women who weren't returning to work who didn't bf, or only bf for a matter of a few weeks. I'm just not convinced there's any clear correlation.

Anyway, the main point is that ML is certainly long enough now that bf isn't any barrier to Returning after it if you choose. I think the current entitlement is good, I don't think it should be any shorter but not any longer either. The transferable leave between parents is an absolutely brilliant idea. If I was having kids now, I'd have around 4 /6 months off and then DH would do the same. However I do sometimes wonder whether having longer off work would make it harder for the children to settle in childcare, so that was one huge advantage of returning early- your children don't know any different and adjust very quickly. I think maternity pay is quite generous in the uk too.

The state shouldn't pay for people to have children.

The state needs people to have children.

The state doesn't need to pay people to have children. People have children because they want them, because of the enrichment ot adds to our lives as parents, not because we're funded to do so.

What about those unlucky sods who are on 0% contracts? Or interns? Or volunteers?

I'd be far worse off if my maternity pay were minimum wage. Technically I only work 1265 hours a year so my weekly income would be crap.

For goodness sake why should the government be paying anyone to have a baby. We already get maternity pay. Its not a fortune but surely people should plan for having a baby and make sure they can afford it!

(not that I'm saying all babies have to be planned, one of mine wasn't, I just meant you cut your cloth accordingly and save during the pregnancy)