Parental Bereavement (Leave and Pay) Regulation Business Secretary Andrea Leadsom has confirmed that Statutory Parental Bereavement Leave will be introduced on 6 April 2020. MPs have said it will make the UK the only country to have such a law
Government Consults On Parental Leave Rights. The consultation document “Good Work Plan: Proposals to support families” has potentially far-reaching implications for employers and employees.
Plans to Boost Protections For Pregnant Women And New Parents Returning To Work. Pregnant women and new parents returning to work after having children are to be further protected from unfairly losing their jobs under new proposals set out by the Government on 24 January 2019.
Employee Fails To Return From Maternity Leave When an employee, who has taken a period of maternity leave, fails to return to work at the end of that period and the employer moved straight to terminating the employee’s employment it
The Parental Bereavement Pay and Leave Bill 2017 has now been made publicly available and is scheduled to receive its Second Reading on 20 October 2017. The Bill seeks to introduce two weeks’ paid leave (paid equivalent to the statutory entitlement to maternity or paternity pay) for any employee who suffers the loss of a child.
On 7 November 2017, the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy confirmed that there are no imminent plans to extend shared parental leave and pay to working grandparents.
The employment rights of an employee who has a miscarriage or stillbirth, or whose baby is born normally but subsequently dies, will depend on when the event occurs. An employee who is the partner of a woman who suffers one of the above events may also have certain rights to time off, but such rights will depend on length of service and at what stage the tragedy occurs. Read my tips to dealing with these unfortunate circumstances compassionately.
A new package of support for people who want to adopt, which includes a new right for adoptive parents to take time off work to meet the child they are set to adopt before the child moves in with them, and improvements to statutory adoption leave and pay will become a legal right from April 2015.
Anyone whose child is due on or after 5 April 2015 will be eligible for the new benefit, which means parents are able to split 52 weeks of parental leave evenly if they wish. The leave can be taken in up to three separate blocks.
Read my overview of the key elements of the new regime.
From 1 October 2014 fathers and a pregnant woman’s partner will have a new right to attend ante-natal appointments with the pregnant woman.
Read my overview of the new right.