Maternity leave being undermined by Shared Parental Leave?

[Sunkisses]

I'm concerned that recent legal cases show that women's rights via maternity leave and pay are being undermined and devalued by Shared Parental Leave, a possible unfortunate and very dangerous outcome for women. The legal cases ultimately (and thankfully) failed, but I want to draw women's attention to this. For me, this goes hand in hand with the denial of women's biological reality that trans activism does.

Two men bought cases against their employers arguing 'discrimination' as their employers paid more money (maternity pay) to mothers than they did to fathers who took Shared Parental Leave and just got the statutory amount. This is tone deaf to the massive toll pregnancy and childbirth has on women, recovery time, PND, the importance of breastfeeding, and the critical importance for bonding between mother and newborn in the first year. Worryingly it looks like their cases initially won at the Employment Tribunals, but thankfully were overturned at the Court of Appeal.

Our foremothers fought long and hard for maternity leave and pay. Our generation must make sure it is never undermined on our watch.

More info about the cases here: www.personneltoday.com/hr/hextall-v-leicestershire-ali-v-capita-enhanced-maternity-pay-shared-parental-pay-court-of-appeal/

“It's in the baby's interest to form a strong bond with the main caregiver”

The evidence is that children thrive with a single primary or multiple caregivers as long as all are loving and such. Takes a village and all that.

in USA, outside of Silicon Valley we have gender equal family and medical leave - but it is unpaid and for 10 weeks apiece. So, yeah, not a lot of men take more than a couple weeks vacation, often right at the start.

I personally think women as a whole are benefitted most from equal and unshared paid childcare leave, with additional leave for serious medical issues that is accounted separately. So if someone is recovering from birth related surgery, the medical leave is used first, then the childcare leave can start later.

Same result If dad or an adoptive parent happens to have his appendix removed during the post birth period. He can take both medical and childcare leave.

Anyone decides they’d rather work thru then they lose the benefit.

If someone is unable to work after 6 mo surely that moves into the realm of long term disability rather than maternity as it’s far outside the norm?

Senseless it’s not at women’s expense because it’s up to the individual family to decide how the leave is split. And a big reason why men don’t do their share is that the whole of society seems to think that only women can care for babies and children. If women are meant to do all of it for the first few years, of course it will impact on career prospects. Also it sets a pattern where men just don’t think caregiving is their job.

Saying that it’s just the natural order for women to stay at home with the kids really does no favours for women. If that is your personal view, fine, but don’t try to prevent other mothers from having more options and from wanting a more equal life and future. Nobody holds a gun to your head forcing you to share parental leave and giving dads equal rights to do caregiving doesn’t take anything away from the mums who decide to take the whole leave period for themselves.

"I think it's a bit sad and short sighted that you therefore want to take the option away from people like me, for whom it worked well, and instead dictate centrally exactly how men and women should split their leave"

@NewAccount270219 I don't think you're reading my posts correctly.

Nobody is talking about taking leave away from anyone. I'm pro men taking leave but I'm saying that the current system isn't good enough and men should have a seperate allowance of leave that they should be able to take without the mother having to cut her mat leave short.

Just because giving up your leave entitlement to allow your partner time off worked out for you doesn't mean it works for everyone. The low uptake of SPL speaks for itself.

But of course it is at women’s expense - if you take the position that (not familiar with the policy so this is just my broad understanding) that mothers are entitled to up to a year of maternity leave and shared parental leave means that year is split, the mother loses her entitlement to up to a year of leave.

If fathers were entitled to up to a year of leave irrespective of whether the mother still exercised her right, that would not be at her expense - it would be recognising that men as new fathers can contribute to raising a child (but not only if their partner goes back to work).

I think that in an ideal world, men would support women who bear their children to take as much or as little time as they need (which shared leave may facilitate), but if the mother wishes to have the full year, that should be her entitlement and the fact that she does should not mean that she is then the de facto main carer for ever after.

I mean pota equality only works if there is a level playing field to start with - not if the quid pro quo is ‘give up some maternity leave and then your bloke might help out’ and if you want to take it all, then no wonder he doesn’t.

I was thinking about this earlier and I do not think you (generally speaking) can argue on one hand that maternal bonding, biology etc does not matter (in the case of shared parental leave) and on the other, that it does (in case of surrogacy). Surely it then just becomes a case of where you draw the line? Women are either distinct and deserve protections because they have children or they are not and do not.

But mothers can take a year. Men can’t force them to give up their leave. Many mums might not want to take a full year out of work due to implications for career, income and for other reasons. Being at home with a baby is hardly like having a holiday and also involves working so it may suit a lot of mothers to have the option to share the leave with the father.

It will never work if both parties are entitled to a year off at the same time. The economic impact on employers would be massive and two people are not required to look after one child and would probably often mean that the mum was the primary carer anyway while the dad played computer games. The countries that have these systems usually give more than a year anyway with a specified period that is just for the mother, so many mums can still take a year or 9 months or whatever.

As others have said, the year long period is not ‘time off’, or compensation or a time for physical recovery. It’s provided so that someone can provide care for the child. A father could provide that care and denying people to even have that option (or suggesting that neither parent should work for a year, which is not affordable) is basically endorsing the view that only mums should do childcare.

stuck and solo I absolutely think that where possible the birth mother should be the primary care giver for “the fourth trimester” for the baby’s sake. I think that our societal structure should support this. Our society could also support fathers (and others) having an active role in caring for children (and becoming primary care giver) and allow for those who need and want to do it differently to do it differently. I don’t think we should undervalue the importance of the relationship between the woman who gives birth and the child she gives birth to. For the baby it is by far the most important relationship in these early months. We shouldn’t have to deny that in order to create parity later on.

One thing I’ve been surprised by, is parental leave for teachers. My DD gave birth exactly two weeks ago and her mat leave started on that date, even though it is the holidays, so in effect she has lost two weeks fully paid leave.

Her partners’s ex-wife has also recently given birth and her new partner is also a teacher, he is able to tack four weeks paid parental leave onto the holidays, which while being great for him, seems really unfair for my DD as she will be going back to work 2 weeks earlier due to her pay ending.

”One thing I’ve been surprised by, is parental leave for teachers. My DD gave birth exactly two weeks ago and her mat leave started on that date, even though it is the holidays, so in effect she has lost two weeks fully paid leave.”

That’s nothing to do with her being a teacher. The law says maternity leave has to start when baby is born (in fact the day after) at the latest.

Shared parental leave is important for women’s equality

Iceland brought in six-months statutory paternity leave to equal maternity leave, to avoid employers discriminating against women because of our maternity. It also had the spin-off effect of making men much better fathers.

I think parental leave should be redesigned.

There should be a period of leave on equal terms available to any new parent, which is a personal right and not transferable.

And there should be a separate period of medical leave for women related to carrying a baby, giving birth and the first months of a new baby.

I can see both sides of the argument, I do think that men should be able to access more parental leave.

However, it does absolutely forget, ignore, side step the biological truth that it can take women even 2 years to recover from a pregnancy, let alone a few months.

And yes it does from my perspective eat into breastfeeding although I do know three couples where the woman was the main breadwinner and went back to work under a year but continued to bf and also express with a very supportive husband.

All bf beyond a year, one tandem fed with the next and one is still feeding her now 2 year old.

All have had too class bf support both in social circles and professionally; two from the same excellent lactation consultant.

What about the baby though? It's in the baby's interest to form a strong bond with the main caregiver...

Children can have strong bonds to up to 3 people in the first year according to research (later that can increase). Me and partner split parental leave 50:50 (which means 7 months plus 7 months in my country, 80% of one's salary for the one staying home, irrespective of gender) plus my mother was present to share the care during that time. DS bonded strongly to the 3 of us, no problem.

I find it quite absurd that anyone describing themselves as a feminist would advocate a model where Mom staying home while Dad goes to work is incentivized.

And there should be a separate period of medical leave for women related to carrying a baby, giving birth and the first months of a new baby.

Isn't that the norm in every European country?

My babies wouldn't settle for dh (wanted bfing in the night) and I would have hated being up so much at night and then going to work in the day. However he took time off work (career break) when dd was one and that worked well for us (well except for financially as he obviously had zero pay). I would not like to have less than a year with a baby, though I obviously realise that used to be the norm for working mothers. I would have to have stopped the breastfeeding and sleep trained I think, just to cope.

You’re not really saying that a business should compensate a woman for all her body goes through during pregnancy....right?

I think it is perfectly reasonable as a feminist to say that the workplace should recognise the physical stress which having a baby puts a woman under and that it is in her and her baby’s interests to have a period to recover and for her to look after her baby, including breastfeeding.

That is a perfectly feminist position as is the position that women should not be discriminated against for taking time out of work to have children or indeed not being in the workplace whilst having children.

Of course men can be care-givers but they do not bear children. I do not see how it is feminist to pretend that difference does not exist.

Isn’t that what maternity leave is for though? Time to heal, bond, feed baby,

That a business should pay a woman more to take maternity than a man to take paternity leave....it doesn’t make sense to me.

Catte that's really interesting re. how it all works in Germany. That does sound a lot better than what we have. I gave birth before SPL was introduced but tbh, I can't imagine that I would have wanted to give any of my mat leave to DP if I'd had the option. I found it really hard going back to work and wouldn't have wanted to go back any sooner than I did.
I have mixed feelings about it all. There's a logical part of me that thinks SPL should be a good thing and men should be more involved in caring for babies and that sharing the care in the first year would make it easier for women to stay in work. BUT there's part of me that also knows how intense my bond was with DD and how much I would have hated going back to work and leaving her with DP. Maybe that's selfish and irrational. I don't know.