Maternity cover - confused?

[ejclementine]

I told my employer yesterday that I was expecting. Last night he emailed to say the board had made a decision to go to market for a full time marketing manager to join my team as cover for me. This means they'll still be there when I return. Should I be worried or am I protected enough that they can't say I'm surplus to requirements? I thought they would just get maternity cover in...

My employer has recruited 2 new staff to cover me when I go off on maternity leave!! I think it's because he's not convinced I'm going to come back (I'm having twins so will have 3 under 2.5).
However if you are intending to return to work then by law they have to still provide you with a job, although not necessarily the same one.

Copy and Pasted from Gov.uk:

Returning to work
Employees have the right to return to their job if they take only:

Ordinary Maternity or Ordinary Adoption Leave
Ordinary Paternity Leave
Additional Paternity Leave
4 weeks or less of parental leave
The rules are different if the employee takes:

Additional Maternity or Additional Adoption Leave
more than 4 weeks of parental leave
In this situation, employees have the right to their job or a similar job (if it’s not possible to give them their old job). Similar means the job has the same or better terms and conditions. If the employee unreasonably refuses to take the similar job the employer can take this as their resignation.

Hope this helps.

Thank you, that's really helpful. This was the part I was dreading most about starting a family. It's great that the laws are there to protect us, but it's not nice to be 'replaced'. I've already been told I don't need to travel to board meetings anymore - I said 'I'm not sick, I'm find to attend them'.

My employer told me the other day that I'm not allowed to use the stairs any more and must take the lift (I work on the 1st floor!!) and that I'm not allowed to carry the tray of mugs/spoons to the kitchen to be washed! I'm not sure how he thinks I cope at home having a toddler who needs to be picked up, housework that needs to be done and having to walk up and down my stairs!
Is your boss male? I think men tend to panic a little bit when they find out someone is pregnant. It's as if we turn to glass overnight and can't possibly function the same way again. They don't seem to take into account that we've been cracking on as normal for the previous 12 weeks when we've still been pregnant, they just didn't know about it!