Maternity Leave - fixed term contract.

[thatstoast]

I'm on a fixed term contract which ends in July. My full maternity leave entitlement is due to end after that date. I've always been led to believe the position would be made permanent if budget allowed. No decisions have been made about this as far as I'm aware but I'm concerned about two issues:

Firstly, I've been told that if the role is made permanent I need to attend an interview to secure the position. Is this in line with current employment law?

Secondly, my manager wants me to come into the office to discuss my plans for returning to work. My baby is ten weeks old, I have no definite plans about my return to work although I'm thinking I might as well stay on leave until my SMP stops which means my contract will end. I don't want to discuss this with my employers as I'm worried it'll be used against me if I do have to interview. Any thoughts about how to manage this conversation?

Thanks in advance.

Interview would be fairly standard when going from fixed term contract to permanent. Not something they have to do, but many places do choose to.

Re mat leave and interview - how are they currently managing your maternity leave? Do they have cover in place or are they just trying to allocate your work out to existing colleagues? At interview I would personally try to promote how well you already know and do the job, how although you've still got X months until you return to work, following that then they have got the best person for the job etc. I think you also need to consider what would be preferable to you - would you sooner get the job and return to work sooner than planned, or would you sooner sacrifice the job?

I suppose it depends on how they go about adding the new permanent role to the structure. If it's before the end of your fixed term so they need two people doing the work you do for a period and subsequently they will only need one, then an interview situation might arise. If your role is expected to finish and then some time later there might be a permanent role doing the same thing but after a break where no one does it, again there might be an interview in that scenario. Or if it's a slightly different job and the purpose of the "interview" is just to check that it's a suitable alternative. But if it's just your role turning permanent, then why would they interview? You'd just go back to your old job surely - because they still need you.

Thanks both. At the moment my work is being divided amongst other members of the team. This has been the case when others have been on maternity leave, we always manage without bringing in temp cover.

As I understand it, they want me to interview for my own job, exactly the same role, to be made permanent. I was always led to believe there was a strong chance of being made permanent but since I've been on maternity leave I feel they've moved the goal posts a bit and have been bringing up interviews etc. Initially they said if I wanted to come back earlier from leave they could arrange it quickly and then they changed their minds and said I needed to give them two month's notice. Ie, if I wanted to return before my contract ended, I'd have to tell them now.

I feel like the only reason they want to interview is so they have the option if getting rid of me if I don't commit to coming back sooner and on working hours that suit them.

Do they usually interview at your workplace when a post changes from temp to permanent? A lot of places do, but if yours doesn't then that would be an indication that you're being treated differently due to your pregnancy.

I don't think it happens a lot, people are usually taken on perm to start off. I know one person went temp to perm without interview but it hasn't actually happened when I've been with the company.

Turns outs I'm just paranoid. I went into the office and it was more about them telling me what the company goals were for the year and how my role fits into that. Looks like they will extend but just waiting on confirmation