Miscarriage leave petition - sign by Friday to send a message to parliament!

[JuliaMumsnet]

Hello

As many of you know miscarriage was the very first issue Mumsnet campaigned on. In our most recent survey two weeks ago we found that 96% of you supported the proposal for three days of paid leave for women and their partners who experience miscarriage, ectopic pregnancy or molar pregnancy before 24 weeks. They are not covered under bereavement leave.

Scottish MP Angela Crawley has put a bill forward in Parliament about this subject, which has its Second Reading on Friday 3rd December - in two days! She has started a petition so people can show their support, and so far she has nearly 25,000 signatures - wouldn’t it be amazing if we could give it a boost to show Parliament how much support her proposal has?

You can sign the petition here. And sign up to our campaigns newsletter here if you’d like to stay in the loop about our miscarriage care campaign or any other campaigns, and how you can lend your support.

[Blueberryflavour]

@Firsttimemummyworries you need to start your own thread about this. You won’t get any replies here, report your own post and ask for it to be moved.

[Firsttimemummyworries]

[quote Blueberryflavour]@Firsttimemummyworries you need to start your own thread about this. You won’t get any replies here, report your own post and ask for it to be moved.[/quote]
Sorry I don’t know how to use this site yet. Apologies

[Blueberryflavour]

@Firsttimemummyworries No worries I didn’t mean to sound abrupt have a look in the main menu, then talk and you’ll see a range of different options where you could add a post asking for advice, if you don’t want to report and ask MNHQ to move it to an appropriate topic. If you do want to report your post click on the three dots beside your post. It’s a long time since my DC’s were little. Good luck.

[RogueHair]

@MrsBison

At what stage would this leave be available and/or how do you prove miscarriage?

E.g. If prior to the 1st antinatal appointment, how will someone evidence that they were pregnant in the 1st place?

Or, if you are pregnant according to the test, but then have a period after 1 week / only 1 week late. Does this still count?

These are the sort of questions that need to be asked.

[Viviennemary]

I don't think I would be ready to support this. A miscarriage would be covered by a sick note from a doctor. I don't really see the necessity for further legislation.

[pompomsgalore]

@Viviennemary because many won't be eligible for sick pay and dads wouldn't be eligible for sick on account of the partner miscarrying.

[PeskyYeti]

I once hit sickness triggers at work because of two miscarriages. I was called into meetings with HR to set targets about how I would improve my sickness record. I had only had time off due to miscarrying. Later my team was being cut in half (local authority if you hadn't guessed already) and I was made redundant. I was chosen as one of the ones to go due to my sickness record. I was actually made redundant because of miscarrying.

[Babyghirl]

@peskyYeti
That is awful losing a pregnancy is not meant to go against you, did you seek legal advice when this happened. So sorry this happened to you my last miscarriage 5th one including the cp I was off for 9 weeks and my manager (male) never battered an eye lid. 💐

[PeskyYeti]

[quote Babyghirl]@peskyYeti
That is awful losing a pregnancy is not meant to go against you, did you seek legal advice when this happened. So sorry this happened to you my last miscarriage 5th one including the cp I was off for 9 weeks and my manager (male) never battered an eye lid. 💐[/quote]
No, and I regret it now. I had it all in writing, but I was 24 and gutted and just ran. Worked out in long term, but if it happened to me now I wouldn't have gone easily.

[gogohm]

It's a bit of a tricky one because a miscarriage at 18 weeks apart from the upset can have medical complications and procedures, etc whereas at 4 - 6 weeks in the past many wouldn't even know they were pregnant. One day paid as a right then additional paid sick leave for medical reasons up to 14 weeks would be realistic, a week for 18-24 weeks is probably needed.

Decent employers of course already off this on a discretionary basis

[sashagabadon]

This isn’t just for women it’s for parents so both. Now in theory fine of course but it’s a gender neutral policy according to what was said this morning on the Today show so I can imagine a scenario where poor old mum doesn’t get the leave as her work doesn’t have it and good old dad gets to sit at home for two weeks. No thanks!
A policy specific for mothers I would support.
The example given on the Today show was a dad that wanted the leave. It’s always funny to me how women have been having miscarriages since in silence forever but a dad complains and we need a “parent policy” for miscarriage

[megletthesecond]

Signed.

[Missmissmiiiiiiiiisss]

[quote TinyTickler]@hibbledibble I would imagine because sick leave can lead to disciplinary action and count against you in redundancy situations[/quote]
I’m also confused about this. I’ve had multiple miscarriages and had time off with most of them. Every time I took paid sick leave and as per equality legislation it was not considered as adding to my number of sick days taken as it was a pregnancy related time off. I thought that was a statutory thing rather than an employer discretion thing. My worry is that I actually took 2 weeks off at one point for a loss, I was paid for that whole time. Under this proposal someone would only get 3 days which depending on the individual circumstances might not be nearly enough.

[pompomsgalore]

@PeskyYeti that's absolutely awful

[ValentineC]

I had 3 miscarriages, 1 at 5 months gone and naturally called in sick as I’d had a D&C and needed time to grieve. My (ex) workplace hounded me about going back despite what had happened as nobody could cover due to staff on holiday. I didn’t even get sick pay for first 3 days.
I resigned over the phone and never went back. A change in legislation to allow leave after a miscarriage is vital so workplaces can’t refuse or hound someone to return to work after such a trauma.

[AlexaShutUp]

I'm not sure if separate leave is needed. Personally, I'd rather campaign for better paid sick leave, including the first three days. That would cover miscarriage, and women already have protection due to it being pregnancy related illness, so I don't really see the need for a separate type of leave tbh.

All miscarriages are different. Some women won't need 3 days off, and some will need much longer than 3 days.

[flashbac]

@MrsBison

At what stage would this leave be available and/or how do you prove miscarriage?

E.g. If prior to the 1st antinatal appointment, how will someone evidence that they were pregnant in the 1st place?

Or, if you are pregnant according to the test, but then have a period after 1 week / only 1 week late. Does this still count?

This. Not signing until these questions are answered. If the leave applies to the latter example it would not be practical.