Working during pregnancy - Rest Breaks Question please

[Birdiegirl]

I'm 25 weeks pregnant and work in an office. I thought I read somewhere - Mumsnet maybe - that when you're pregnant your employer has to provide you with a darkened room with somewhere to lie down so you can have a rest break while working, if needed.

I could really do with this as I am totally knackered and find if I can take even a 20 minute nap at lunch I am much the better for it. (Do this on my days off or when working from home)

Does anyone know where I could find something 'official' on this so I can show my employers / or did I just dream this up - wishful thinking on my part perhaps! Links to a website would be much appreciated.

TIA.

No direct entitlement as far as I am aware, but your employer has to conduct a risk assessment - see here. That may identify the need for additional rest breaks, somewhere to lie down, etc.

They have a duty of care to you but I'm not sure getting tired counts as something they have to protect you from?

Maybe have a chat with them and see what they say, if they don't agree offer to make the time up before/after work?

A darkened room? Really? Someone seriously thought providing that was an employer's obligation? I'm gobsmacked, my employer didn't even provide a sodding chair during my 13 hour standing-up shifts!

not sure, but does your office have any kind of facility for this anyway (e.g. sick bay etc. - admittedly would prob only have in a large company etc.)

www.businesslink.gov.uk/bdotg/action/detail?itemId=1080898378&r.l1=1073858787&r.l2=1080898061&r.l3=1080898065&r.s=sc&type=RESOURCES

See on link above: "Rest facilities
You're required by law to provide somewhere for pregnant and breastfeeding mothers to rest."

I also had a feeling there was a law on this somewhere .. but I'm not sure where..

my workplace does, in fact, provide such a darkened room - no-one really knows about it, but pregnant women are allowed to use it to rest.

see also www.direct.gov.uk/en/Employment/HealthAndSafetyAtWork/DG_4016686

"So that the work premises provide a safe and healthy place to work, your employer should [...] set aside areas for rest breaks and to eat meals, including suitable facilities for pregnant women and nursing mothers"

Also here: www.yourlegalrights.co.uk/employment/health-and-safety-for-pregnant-and-breastfeeding-women

"Your employer must provide a rest place at work for you if you are pregnant or breastfeeding."

and here: www.hse.gov.uk/mothers/faqs.htm

"Am I entitled to more frequent rest breaks if I am pregnant?
Yes. You should agree the necessary timing and frequency of rest breaks with your employer."

sorry if links don't work, but you should be able to cut and past them into your browser.

Also sorry, have to go to sleep so haven't looked up the actual source of the law - it may well just be best-practice recommendations, but most of these sources are government websites so should be a pretty good basis for you to make a case.

Heehee, sorry - had a vision of a door with a little sign on it saying 'Darkened Room', with loads of pregnant women lying around on sofas!

feather - we had exactly that (called the 'rest' room). It had two beds, a chair and a fridge for expressed milk. Every day you'd find the same preggers/mums using it. You used to have to collect key from the MD's PA. It was like a whole little NCT group at lunchtime

OP. Unfortunately reality is that many companies will ignore requirement until someone kicks up a fuss, and will then clear out a cupboard and put a chair in it. There's no obligation for beds or anything, just an obligation to let mums have 'somewhere' for resting

Wow, I'm impressed! I honestly had to fight for use of the communal wheelie-stool, and even that was never for more than 2 minutes as a time. Saying that, the nature of my job made it impossible to just go and rest when I needed to, that's how I ended up on the sick at 30 weeks (and possibly contributed to delivering at 32). Mine isn't a job where the team can afford for one member to not be fully functioning!

aha - found the source:

The Workplace (Health, Safety and Welfare) Regulations 1992
Regulation 25
Facilities for rest and to eat meals

25.?(1) Suitable and sufficient rest facilities shall be provided at readily accessible places.

(2) Rest facilities provided by virtue of paragraph (1) shall?

(a)where necessary for reasons of health or safety include, in the case of a new workplace, an extension or a conversion, rest facilities provided in one or more rest rooms, or, in other cases, in rest rooms or rest areas;
(b)include suitable facilities to eat meals where food eaten in the workplace would otherwise be likely to become contaminated.
(3) Rest rooms and rest areas shall include suitable arrangements to protect non-smokers from discomfort caused by tobacco smoke.

(4) Suitable facilities shall be provided for any person at work who is a pregnant woman or nursing mother to rest.

(5) Suitable and sufficient facilities shall be provided for persons at work to eat meals where meals are regularly eaten in the workplace.

featherbag, they should have conducted a risk assessment and adjusted your working conditions. Make sure you push for it (politely!) if you are in the same situation again - maybe they'll even provide a dark room!

(I won't even begin to tell you the places where I've slept under extreme pregnancy exhaustion!)

Surely a staff room/kitchen type place covers the requirements, it doesnt say anything about needing to let pregnant women sleep or anything? When I was pregnant I was allowed to go and sit in the staff room if I needed a break, I used to sometimes go for a doze in my car!