to think that anything other than total gender equality in the parental leave system is an absolute outrage?

[joanneg20]

Well, am I?

Now that all the political parties are packaging themselves as 'progressive', have to be seen to be shaking hands with black and/or gay people on their leaflets, why is no-one willing to tackle this properly?

Surely any system other than a set period of parental leave to be shared as the two partners see fit is massively sexist and discriminatory and how Labour can be promising 'a future fair for all' whilst refusing to commit to this baffles me.

Imagine a similar discriminatory system applied in any other way. Different holiday entitlements for gay and straight people? Different working hours for Asians and non-Asians? I don't think so. But parental leave is obviously a different matter - why? Why does anyone assume that because I was born female I wish to 'enjoy' (to use the terminology of the Labour manifesto) 9 months' maternity leave, and that my partner only wants 4 weeks - or possibly the ability to share the period after 6 months (which hardly anyone takes anyway).

Why aren't we all out on the street about this? And I include myself in that question. I think it really is the major feminist issue remaining to be tackled in Britain - almost on a par with getting the vote in terms of what it could do for gender equality.

I would be interested to see that stuff too please AngryWasp.

Me too. Enjoy yourselves finding it. I'm off to bed.

I agree with the OP.

No stats here, so reverting to personal anecdote . Before DS, I earned 3 x as much as DH. Me taking time off to spend at home with DS caused us immense financial hardship - and cost the state some too, in terms of tax credits. Had the leave system been more flexible, I could have gone back to work earlier more easily, leaving DS in the care of his dad (which, incidentally, we're opting to do now anyway) - we'd have been better off, so would my employers, so would the state.

OK, so higher earning mums are still a minority perhaps but surely if we all have the right to choose, we can do what's best for our families? Going back to the OP, it's a shocker that the political parties are too scared to run with this one - and instead we've got married couples tax breaks on offer. . Glad I'm emigrating next month to a country that does share parental leave....

I am the major wage earner of our family. We are trying for a baby and as much as would like it to be different I will have to take as little maternity leave as I can. It would be fantastic for our child if dp could be at home with it for the time I would be entitled to.

only read the first couple of pages, but i thought id just throw in that if parental leave was, for example, 6 months mother and 6 months father, there would be loads of people going on about breastfeeding and that the mother should have more time.
men should get more time, but making it equal isnt going to solve everything.

but we definately do need more male leave, i think men feel very left out sometimes, all the focus on the mum, fathers make babies too!

i must admit though, i get annoyed at women who think you should just be able to take unlimited time off until they are ready to return, and that they should just get their own job back and everythings fine and dandy.
im talking 3 years like an ex-colleague thought was appropriate.
flame me if you must,
but i wouldnt expect my family, who love me unconditionally, to take me back just as things were if i buggered off for 3 years, why would i expect a company to?
i think 12 months is the limit. as well as fathers.
i feel sorry for the people who cover maternity leave and then have no job when the mother returns! a taste of success....

Just catching up on all the responses here, and glad to see a few people are as cross about this as I am!

Wanted to respond to two of the main arguments 'against' what I've said:

First 'business leaders won't like it'. I'm sorry, but that's just not enough reason for maintaining an inequality. You could have said the same thing about child labour 200 years ago. Sometimes practices that are unjust need to be forced out by law. This law is openly discriminatory.

Second I am shocked that some women here are honestly bemoaning the fact that men who take leave might not be taken seriously in the workplace! Gobsmacked. So we're happy for this to be our remit our we? And for employers to take us less seriously for that very reason?

I honestly find it depressing that no politicial party is tackling this in the way it deserves. I'm not a single issue voter, and I've always voted Labour in the past, but if one party seriously committed to this, I would actually consider switching (if you're listening Dave!)

"If the woman was the breadwinner she would feel propelled back to work sooner than she might want"

That happens anyway. If you are the main earner you have to go back to work early. As I said earlier that is what happened to me. I would have much preferred to leave DH at home with the babies than use paid childcare - but that option isn't available.

Exactly Ormrenewed, I can take afford to take 6 weeks I think.

Pressure on the man to do this, pressure on the woman to do that. All completely true I'm afraid, but they would have a legal right to choose, which they don't have at the moment. Have to start somewhere don't you.

When I had DD, DH took one week of annual leave and the one week of paternity leave he was entitled to. When I had DS, DH was entitled to 2 weeks paternity, and had saved up 2 weeks annual leave (we thought it was more important for him to be around - mainly to entertain DD).

He ended up taking the 2 weeks paternity leave, but only 1 week of annual leave in one go. His employers made it clear to him that it was a 'bad time' for him to take leave. He agreed to take the remaining week over the next month or so, a day a week. All the time he was off on paternity/annual leave, his employers were ringing him up (many times a day) and he spent at least 50% of the time on the computer.

When DS was about 5 or 6wo, DH was called in to see his boss, and told that they were very disappointed that he hadn't been meeting his deadlines over the last month or two (noone covered for him whilst he was away) and he was basically told he had to buck up his ideas or his job would be at risk.

I felt terrible cos I had persuaded him that he should take the full 4 weeks, against his better judgement. He basically took his entitlement, nobody covered for him whilst he was off, and then when he went back he was in trouble for not meeting his deadlines!

Is there any surprise that Dads don't take more time off, and would anything actually change if they were entitled to more?? I doubt it somehow (sorry about the rant!)

It's no surprise at all. Dh took a couple of weeks with ds1 as it was touch and go whether he'd pull through, but only 3 days with ds2.

To take months off at that stage would have been career suicide.

mumble, so if your dh gets to be the boss one day, and there's a government in power that says 'parents can share parental leave for babies', will he a. think it's great that the world has moved on or b. resent anyone getting a better deal than he did and stymie the career of any man or woman who takes parental leave?

(Not having a go at your dh, just all this stuff about paternity leave being career suicide is profoundly depressing.)

EDAM, he is the boss now (Vice President of a pharma giant).

I think he'd obviously go with the letter of the law as of course he'd have to, and if one of his team did decide to take six months off in the middle of a project, he'd do his best to make sure that they guy's career didn't go off course, but at the same time the success of the project would always be paramount and if the absence of the guy meant that it was compromised, the team member would quite possibly be sidelined. I don't know, though, I'll ask him next time I see him.

Thing is mumble, not all our dhs are the VP of a pharma giant or have big careers in business. Some of them just have average jobs in a call centre, or in a shop, or in a factory, or admin roles in an office.

So I get that high-fliers might have to weigh up career progression v family leave, but it doesn't mean that a lot of families who maybe don't have these issues wouldn't benefit, especially where the woman's career is maybe more pressured.

That's true, SK.

Those years of babyhood are long gone for us and maybe it would be different if we were going through that stage now.

cat - if both parents get to share 10m or more, the mother will be well recovered by 5m postpartum. Then it's dad' turn. And you can bf and work - I did, 17m, 3 yrs and 4 yrs respectively.

I think that both the impact on employers and the impact on careers is being overstated. The reality is that MOST people are just not that important to their organisations. This is why companies can make 10% cuts in staff and everyone else just works a bit harder. Also, as in general women will generally take the first part or even half of any leave, there is plenty of time to PLAN for the fathers leave. Handovers can be done, projects passed over etc. And there is not the whole uncertainty around when the leave will start that there might be with a women as pregnancy's are unpredictable things!

Of course someone who leaves their colleagues in the lurch when they don't have to is going to damage relationships with them and their management, and their may be people who decide they can't take the leave - for this reason or others. That's reality but no reason not to give them the choice.

Many men don't HAVE careers to damage - they have jobs. If you aren't in a large company on a promotion track, then your priorities may well be to your family rather then the company. Which is as it should be, as the company certainly doesn't give a shit about you.

I happen to know a father who is relativly senior in a large utility - he has arranged a six month sabbatical for a month or so after the birth of his second child. These things need not be career limiting if you plan them and work with your employer.

Paternity leave is no more career sacrificing than maternity leave is. Why should men not share in the pleasure of that career obstacle?

Men will start taking paternity leave when it is paid at 90%. Discrimination in the work place (i.e. not hiring the recently married woman because she will go off on maternity leave in a year or two... and then again) will only change when men and women are both seen as likely to to take time off. Then, and only then, can we start to chip away at the glass ceiling.

Just give men 6 weeks of 90% and make it transferable. If the man doesn't want to take it, then the woman get's twice as much time at 90%. Seems like a win win situation to me. And leave the 2-4 weeks of mandatory maternity leave exactly as it is. Some women NEED to return to work in 4 weeks. Let them. You won't be doing her any favour if not going back to work means she and her baby are homeless.

AND... single mums whose partners have done a runner should get to take his 6 weeks of 90% without his consent. (and I suppose vice versa should apply although I doubt many new mums do a runner so probably not much of an issue)

I would like to see a man asking for paternity leave in a large investment bank in the City. Career death and loss of many £100k of bonus would follow. Guaranteed.

BeenBeta - as I said above most men don't work in investment banks in the City.

because women give birth. men dont.
becuase women breastfeed men dont.

if men could do those two things, then yes, it should be equal, but until men can do that, then, no, the leave should NOT be equal.

RedNinaBlue - very good point about Germany. I used to work for a Geman bank both here and in the UK. It was very noticeable how professional women just disappeared from the workplace once they got to child bearing age. Still a very male dominated culture in Germany despite equality law. Indeed, I would say worse than here in some ways.

"Just give men 6 weeks of 90% and make it transferable. If the man doesn't want to take it, then the woman get's twice as much time at 90%"
his 90% or hers?

There will be some very cunning men timing girlfriends carefully to get a couple of years off