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Response to the Department for Trade and Industry's consultation into extending maternity leave and flexible working
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Introduction
May 2005 One Parent Families welcomes the opportunity to respond to this consultation, and congratulates the Government on its plans to extend rights to parents. Ensuring that the workplace is family friendly will be a vital part of meeting the Government’s target to have 70% of lone parents in work by 2010. We know that not only do lone parents see a lack of employer understanding of their childcare responsibilities as a reason not to enter work,[1] but that many parents who are employed feel forced to leave work at the time of becoming a lone parent.[2]
Lone Parents moreover are disproportionately poor, with 47% living in poverty compared to 20% of couples with children.[3] We are therefore particularly concerned that the rights of low-income women in the workplace are protected. We also think that it is likely that fathers who are more involved in a child’s life before parental separation are more likely to remain involved. We therefore want to encourage an active role in child rearing for fathers, as well as protecting those parents who are alone at the time of the birth of their child.
To enable parents to have real and meaningful choices about how to balance their work and families, we believe that a more ambitious vision is required than that set out in the consultation document. This should include 12 months paid maternity leave, alongside an extension of paid paternity leave. We believe that dedicated, and better paid, paternity leave, will be a more effective means of encouraging fathers to take leave than allowing mothers to transfer their own leave to fathers. We know that low pay has acted as a barrier to male take up of paternity leave to date, with fewer than 20% of fathers taking up paternity leave since it was introduced in 2003.[4] We also believe that Britain’s long hours culture acts as a continual barrier to male participation in child rearing. If the Government are serious about allowing parents more choice in how they balance work and family life, an end to the opt out from the Working Time Directive is essential and steps are needed to make it possible for more men to work flexible hours. For example, the Government could take the initiative by advocating more flexible working patterns for men.
Most importantly leave directly after the birth of the child must be augmented by a period of paid parental leave. As a first step we believe that the existing 13 weeks of parental leave available to each parent should be paid. While this right remains unpaid, for many lone parents working in low paid employment it will remain a right on paper only. Without the cushion provided by a second earner many lone parents simply cannot afford to take time off without pay. The introduction of paid parental leave would demonstrate that the Government was truly serious about creating a family friendly workplace.
We also believe that there is a strong case for extending flexible working not only to carers but to parents of older children, as part of a wider strategy to extend the right to request flexibility to all employees. Flexible working has been a notable success with the second flexible working employee survey reporting that 65% of employees are aware of the request, and that over four-fifths of employee requests have been either fully or partly accepted by employers. We very much congratulate the Department for this achievement, and feel that it demonstrates that flexible working can be both manageable and beneficial for both employers and employees.
Finally, a test of good legislation is that it is simple and accessible for all parties. We hope that this will be adhered to when the new provisions are framed.
In the following sections of our response we focus on the questions within the consultation paper where we feel we can usefully comment.
[1] Lessof C et al (2001) New Deal for Lone Parents Evaluation: A Quantitative Survey of Lone Parents on Income Support ESR101. [2] MORI (2004) Single Parents and Employment: Research Study Conducted for One Parent Families. MORI. [3] DWP (2005) Households Below Average Income: 1994/95 – 2003/04 www.dwp.gov.uk/asd/hbai [4] See for example, ‘Fathers failing to take up paid paternity leave’ The Guardian July 27 th 2004.
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