So what do we think about these parental leave proposals?

[ElephantsAndMiasmas]

Obviously first thought is "about bloody time too", but on listening, I'm not sure how good the details are.

Pstartingafresh* "It also undermines women who do not share their leave because it suggests it is their CHOICE to scupper their career, not because it is in the best interest of their health, their children and society"

Why is it in the best interest of society or children that women stay chained to the house and are not given choice? What does it have to do with health (once recovered from birth)?

It will help couples where the woman earns more to do what's financially best for them if they choose to. I earn more than my DH and were I to take maternity leave it would be impossible for us to live on his salary plus maternity pay after the first 6 weeks. I'd have to go back to work. This way, it means my DH could take the parental leave.

I don't think it would affect the majority of families where the man earns more, all it does is gives a choice and doesn't make the assumption that the man is the breadwinner when more and more that isnt the case.

It can take a long time to recover from a birth. It can also take a long time to establish and continue breastfeeding.

I do not believe that the mother is the only one capable of caring for and loving a child and don't think that mothers who cannot be there for their child at the beginning are bad mothers if that is what you think I might be saying.

But you might like to read about the 4th trimester. Babies are not born ready for the world and are incredibly clinging at the start, and need quite a bit of attention that the mother is biologically and hormonally programmed to deliver. The breastfeeding relationship is a dance that has been prepared for for the past 9 months. The birth is quite brutal, with minimal opportunity to recover given this 'fourth trimester'.

I am not saying for one second that this is the only way to do things, but I do believe that the current proposals make this harder for women as it seems like a choice, when actually it is biologically drive. Implying that men can and should do it I feel is minimising it's importance.

Having said that, I do think that the promotion of choice is important. I just worry that some choices are disguised anti-woman.

"It also undermines women who do not share their leave because it suggests it is their CHOICE to scupper their career, not because it is in the best interest of their health, their children and society"

I don't see how either. Currently women have the choice not to take maternity leave (other than the first 2 weeks after the birth, I think) so either way it's their choice to do so or not. These proposals just means there's a third choice as well as the existing ones of the birth mother solely taking leave or the child being looked after by someone else e.g. a nanny, namely the father or non-birth mother taking part of the leave instead.

Also it's not just about men vs women, is it, presumably this would apply equally where both the parents are women?

And exclusive breastfeeding whilst working in the first 6 months is a goal quite out of reach for the majority of women. Hell, it's hard enough for the majority to do it when they aren't working.

I wish it had been in place when DS was born. At the time, I earned more than DH so we were financially worse off for it being me that was off. In addition, I hated maternity leave and missed the job that I loved, while DH was in a poorly-paid job that he detested, hating that he was missing out on time with his newborn.

Also, my job had much more family-friendly hours than DH's, so if we could have done this, DS would have seen more of both of us!

Maternity leave was the first time in my life that I've been told we had to organise things a certain way because I was the female. I'm still angry about that.

(With regard to breastfeeding; I went back to work when DS was 5.5 months, and he was breastfed until he was 15 months)

StartingAfresh I utterly agree with you:
"I think it is terrible for feminism and further reduces the value of childbirth and breastfeeding to society.

It also undermines women who do not share their leave because it suggests it is their CHOICE to scupper their career, not because it is in the best interest of their health, their children and society."

It takes 18 months or so for a mother's iron levels to replenish. Mothers who need to recover, or indeed want to spend time with the baby they carried inside them for 9 months may be obliged to give up their leave to the father.
It also suggests that the father and mother both have an equal stake in the pregancy, birth and post partum period...

I absolutely think men will use this to their advantage, possibly to the detriment of the mother. WHen has this never happened????? Men have always turned legislation made for women to their advantage. I remember Greer writing that more men complain to the equal rights comission for unfair treatment than do women.

So I agree with HB'S suggestion that paternity leave should not be at the expense of maternity leave. I think that is the answer.

Society must recognize the intrinsic value of birth, and of women's contribution to society, and understand that this is somethign that women do . They are not rewarded economically for this work under our patriarchal-capitalist system and therefore it is assumed that the work has no value: it is merely a hindrance

Paternity leave will help women in an economic sense, but I'm not sure how it will address the basic tenet of radical feminism, which is to liberate women from the capitalist system that oppresses them.

"It takes 18 months or so for a mother's iron levels to replenish. Mothers who need to recover, or indeed want to spend time with the baby they carried inside them for 9 months may be obliged to give up their leave to the father."

Where's the evidence for the iron levels claim?

And what about fathers who want to spend time with their baby?

As for the time to get breastfeeding established - the current proposal is that only the AML can be transferred to the father, the OML stays with the mothers, and by 26 weeks it really shouldn't be an issue anymore. If someone hasn't established breast feeding by then, they most likely will have long given up anyway.

As for the iron levels/recovery from the birth arguments, I don't really see the relevance - if someone is too ill to go to work, aren't they likely to be too ill to have sole care of a small child as well? So seems like that's a problem whether you go back to work or not. We often argue on this forum that parenting is a 'job' and as difficult and demanding a one as a lot of paid employment! I still feel that if you're still too ill to go to work 6 months after giving birth, that should be considered as any other sick leave, not maternity leave.

As for women being 'forced' to give up part of their leave, would argue that it's only recently that any women had such long periods of maternity leave anyway, and that it's not really any worse than the situation for fathers who are 'forced' to go back to work after 2 weeks.

It's interesting though to think about what would happen where there was a dispute between the parents about who would take the leave - how on earth would that be resolved? I guess a lot of these teething issues (sorry) will have to be ironed out once the new rules are in place.

In countries where paternity leave is extended it is often used more as a sabatical to further the fathers career by studying or networking, whilst babies go into childcare or mothers are expected to continue to care for the babies at that time.

I would worry about periods of leave that men are not used to will be used in a competive way rather than direct input into the family unit.

As I said, I don't have a problem with increased choice but I DO have a problem with the potential further devaluing of the roles for which women are biologically predetermined to undertake.

"In countries where paternity leave is extended it is often used more as a sabatical to further the fathers career by studying or networking, whilst babies go into childcare or mothers are expected to continue to care for the babies at that time."

Evidence? (Btw I used my maternity leave to study and further my career whilst looking after my daughter - why should my lack of penis mean that I'm more entitled to do that than my husband?)

Oh are they still saying this only works after six months? I thought they'd abandoned that?

Bah then. Even I went back to work at 5.5 months, we couldn't have afforded for either of us to be out of work longer. How utterly stupid, parading as equality when it's anything but.

Past the time needed to physically recover from childbirth, which parent stays off should be the choice of the couple, no one else. It's simply nobody else's business.

Exactly, women can just as well use their leave for studying/networking if they want to and they have time - maybe that isn't strictly what parental leave is 'for', but as long as the child is being looked after it's not really anyone's business how the parent spends their free time.

I've heard of women having full-time nannies while on maternity leave, which seems a bit odd to me, but it's their business and their money, and certainly isn't an argument for all women being denied parental leave!

I really welcome these plans and feel they have been a very long time coming. I was on a management course last week being run by a very well-respected lecturer at a well-respected university. She was also a mother of two grown-up children. She told us that she was seriously considering not hiring any more women of child-bearing-age because all their maternity leave was making it impossible for her team to meet their targets. I had really enjoyed the course up to that point, and was developing a huge amount of respect for her, but was and and at this remark

If nothing else, these new plans should contribute to stopping this kind of discrimination against women in the jobs market and not before time IMHO

And isn't it convenient fascinating how the jobs that men are just not 'biologically programmed' to do (according to Toby Young/Derek Draper-style wankery theory) are the jobs that need doing every single day, or several times a day? And the jobs men are 'biologically programmed' to do are the now-and-then type stuff, like cutting the grass, putting up shelves and changing plugs? We really need a 'vomit' emoticon on here, MumsnetHQ!

Childbirth isn't routine (not for the majority of us anyway) nor is breasfeeding.

I don't get your point.

rubbish

taking leave/having children damages your career most families can only afford to have 1 career damaged and need to keep the other one OK.
However it will prob result in societal pressures on women to go back earlier 'cos dh can take leave'

so it's a loose loose all round

I assume extending flexible leave to GP/friends is to create more jobs to go round

"as it seems like a choice, when actually it is biologically drive."

Now that sort of thing bothers me. 'Biological drives' can be used to justify all kinds of things that by and large we don't encourage. Rape for example, and fathers not being keen on caring for babies, and women being crap in meetings because they don't have the right sort of brain for it, poor dears .

Telling women that both parents are permitted to share a set amount of parental post-birth leave is not undermining the value of childbirth or motherhood. Its is giving a choice that does not now exist.

not1not2 - so it's better if the state decides that it should be mother's career that should be damaged? The parents should not have any say about it because... womens careers as such are less important?

again, fathers do not have to take this leave. They can, if this is the best option for their family.

"And what about fathers who want to spend time with their baby? "

Childbirth is the only time in a life a woman is generally allowed to put herself first. Frankly, I have no interest in the father's needs, but I've no doubt their "needs" will become known, and eventually prioritised over the mother's. Thus it has always been.

that statement was refering to a scenario whereby couples would have to divide up their leave. Obviously I've got no problem with paternity leave alongside the mother.

Otherwise we're going to have all manner of pressures on mothers. There will be women returning to work still bleeding lochia, because she happens to earn slighly more than her partner, or because her boss expects her to now that her partner can take the leave.
Oh, and there will be LOTS of fathers claiming their "rights" to stay with the baby at the expense of the mother.

As others suggested, both parents off for the first few weeks then the mother (to recover and establish BF). I believe this part should be only open to the mother: either the mother takes it or nobody does. Otherwise women are going to be exploited.

Isn't the proposal for the first 6 months to be for the (birth) mother only, then for the remainder to be divided between her and the other parent? So it's unlikely anyone will be 'forced' back to work while still bleeding from the birth or struggling to establish breastfeeding . Until fairly recently maternity leave was only 6 months anyway.

Or are you concerned about the 'slippery slope' and how the rules might change in the future if this precedent is set Sakura?

As said, this is not a novely concept but has been the norm in many countries for quite a while already. At least in the ones I know, the horror scenarious pictured here have not materialised (and first part of the leave is always reserved for the mother, so she can recover, nobody has to run to work straight from the hospital).

as for weakening the career options, for example women in Scandinavia have a significantly better position on job market than in UK - sure, shared parental leave is just one part of it, but still a part.

If fathers can stay at home and take care of their kids as well, then this helps to fight the stereotype that kids are only women's business and dads are unable or should not be asked to cope with a baby.

The original suggestion was the first 6 months set aside for the mother and the second 6 months could be mother or father.

The idea that women will be forced back to work before they have stopped bleeding or established BF is scaremongering IMO.

If we're going to focus on the sort of man who would force his wife back to work before she is ready / while she is ill / ruin BF etc (ie an absolutely horrible man) then I doubt that is the sort of man who would even want to be at home with a baby.

I don't think that legislation should be based on what the most absolutely horrible men in society will do, with this sort of thing, but recognise the vast majority of fathers who are kind and decent. And the somewhat lower number of fathers who will even want to do this - many men openly admit they prefer working to being at home with children - as do many women TBH. But at the moment the structure is that the man gets to work whether he likes it or not, and the woman gets to be at home with the children whether she likes it or not.

Assuming that the majority of people are reasonable, decent people, this legislation means there is more choice in how they run their families after babies. I think it's wholly positive.