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42% of new dads are not eligible for shared parental leave

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Two in five (40 per cent) new fathers won’t qualify for new rights to shared parental leave, according to analysis published by the TUC.

From April mothers will be allowed to share up to 50 weeks of their maternity leave and 37 weeks of their pay with their partners.

However, analysis carried out by the TUC shows that two-fifths of working dads with a child under one would be ineligible, mainly because their partner is not in paid work. Mothers who don’t have a job (whether employed or self-employed) don’t have a right to maternity leave or pay that they can share.

The TUC says that it welcomes shared parental leave, but is concerned the new scheme will have a very limited impact because of the rules around eligibility and low statutory pay.

Dads’ rights dependent on mothers’

According to the government’s own projections as few as 5,700 men are expected to apply for shared parental leave over the next year.

The TUC estimates that shared parental leave would be open to around 200,000 more fathers each year if their rights to take leave weren’t dependent on the mother being in work and it was a day one right.

The UK is still decades behind other countries when it comes to rights and financial support for new dads, says the TUC.

In countries like Denmark, Norway and Portugal fathers can take paternity leave at 100 per cent of their normal earnings. And in countries like Sweden and Germany families are given extra money if fathers share parental leave more equally with their partner.

75% of poorest dads don’t take full leave

By contrast, statutory paternity pay in the UK is just a quarter of the median weekly wage for full-time male employees and just over half the weekly wage for a worker earning the national minimum wage for a 40-hour week.

Half (50 per cent) of new dads don’t take their full entitlement to two weeks statutory paternity leave – a rate that rises to three in four (75 per cent) for dads on the lowest incomes.

The TUC says that without better rights to leave and pay, many fathers will continue to miss out on playing an active role in the first year of a child’s life.

The TUC wants all new dads to have access to some parental leave that is not tied to their partner’s employment status and is well-paid.

Getting dads involved 

TUC General Secretary Frances O’Grady said: “Shared parental leave is a welcome move but just a small step towards getting dads more involved in their children’s upbringing.

“The UK is still decades behind other European countries when it comes to rights and financial support for new fathers.

“If politicians are serious about men playing a more active role after their child is born they must increase statutory paternity pay and look at introducing some father-only leave that isn’t dependant on their partner being in work.

“Employers must also work more closely with unions who often secure better paternity rights for dads.”

Mums and dads want more 

Mumsnet CEO, Justine Roberts, said: “In a recent survey of Mumsnet users, eight out of ten couples said they would have liked the father to take more paternity leave, and seven out of ten said that financial considerations stopped them from doing so.

“Everyone seems to agree that dads need to be able to spend time with their children, but we don’t yet have the policies that will encourage a real cultural shift.”

Jeremy Davies, from The Fatherhood Institute said:  “International research shows that when fathers take parental leave in addition to their two weeks’ paternity leave, they remain more involved with their children, are happier in their relationships and actually live longer.

“And mothers’ annual earnings increase by seven per cent for every month of parental leave their partner takes.  We need a policy framework that facilitates this for all families.”

The TUC wants the following changes to be implemented:

  • Make fathers’ leave a day one right, as maternity leave is – The TUC estimates that at least one in eleven working fathers are excluded from shared parental leave and paternity leave because they lack the necessary qualifying service with their employer.
  • Introduce an additional month of parental leave and reserve it for fathers only to use – Having some parental leave that is not contingent on a mother’s eligibility to maternity rights would open up paid parental leave to about 200,000 more fathers if the rights were made day one rights as well. It should be paid at 90 per cent of earnings so that most fathers, rather than a tiny minority, use it.
  • Improve statutory pay rates for all leave takers – Relying on employers to top up statutory pay means many families, especially those on low incomes, miss out, says the TUC. Only one in five low-paid fathers gets fully paid paternity leave from their employer and only a quarter of low-paid fathers take their full entitlement to two weeks paternity leave after the birth of their child. Statutory pay for paternity leave and the additional month of father only parental leave, which the TUC proposes, should be increased to 90 per cent of earnings, mirroring the first six weeks of statutory maternity pay.
  • Introduce a paternal/parental allowance for those who don’t qualify for statutory pay – The TUC believes this would benefit over 90,000 self-employed fathers who get no support for taking time off work after they have a child; over 9,000 agency workers who don’t qualify for statutory pay because they’re not employees; and at least 44,000 fathers who are employees but don’t have the necessary length of service to qualify for statutory pay. Such a benefit would mirror the Maternity Allowance which mothers who don’t qualify for Statutory maternity pay can claim.

—Photo: Flickr/TenSafeFrogs

To mark the launch of the film Down Dog, insideMAN is running a series of articles about fatherhood throughout February and we’d love you to get involved. You can join the conversation on twitter by using the hashtag #MenBehavingDADly; leave a comment in the section below or email us with your thoughts and ideas for articles to insideMANeditor@gmail.com.

For more information about the film see www.downdogfilm.com

Five tips on fatherhood for my teenage son

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What lessons should dads pass on to their children about fatherhood? Jeremy Davies of the Fatherhood Institute shares his top five tips for his teenage son.

—This is article #4 in our series of #100Voices4Men and boys 

As far as I know, my 15 year old son has no immediate plans to become a father. But he’s talked in terms of wanting children when he’s older, as most of us probably do when we’re that age.

So as his dad, and after a decade of studying and advocating for involved fatherhood through my work with the Fatherhood Institute, I thought perhaps I ought to get my pipe and slippers out and share some wisdom on the subject, before he makes me a granddad.

Here are my five top tips:

  1. Don’t work too hard

Modern life is expensive and you’re going to feel the pressure, probably even more than I did, to spend a lot of time and energy on paid work so you can afford it all. Add kids into the mix and life certainly isn’t going to get any cheaper.

But do try to resist the temptation to become a workaholic. If you decide you want to be a dad, you really need to be available and accessible to your children – even if sometimes you’ll wish you could escape and run back to the grown-ups.

Nobody ever lay on their death bed wishing they’d spent more time at work, and plenty of us, men especially, regret not spending more time with our families.

  1. Yes, the washing up too

People often talk about fathers as if they matter because of their distance from the ‘real’ parenting work. We’re cast as the fun ones who pop up with presents and take the kids out to play, who step in to impose discipline, or act as a ‘role model’.

Anyone who peddles this kind of nonsense generally believes that men should be breadwinners, and women are the ‘natural’ caregivers. Please don’t buy into this view.

Earning money is important, but that shouldn’t be all down to you, any more than the other stuff should be all down to your child’s mother (contrary to popular belief, you’re designed to be just as capable of that)

So steer clear of anyone who wants you for your pay packet, and set your stall out from the start as a hands-on dad. It’s the day-to-day involvement that will set you on the road towards a really close relationship with your children. And yes, I’m afraid that does include doing the washing up.

  1. Earn a seat at the ‘top table’

If you were to set up a business with a friend, you’d want both of you to be ‘on top of it all’, so you could make joint decisions and, when necessary, leave the other to get on with it and not mess things up.

There’s no single best way to approach the ‘business’ of parenting. So it’s not necessarily the case that you and your child’s mother have to do literally equal amounts of earning and care-giving (the technical term for ‘the other stuff…including washing up’) at any given time. But after decades of progress towards gender equality, you might want to think about that as your benchmark.

My own view, for what it’s worth, is that parents tend to work best together when each of them plays a significant role in earning the money that makes the business viable, and in doing the dirty work required to develop the end-product (a happy, well-adjusted child who keeps his feet off the seats on public transport).

That’s just an opinion…but even if you disagree (damn that independent streak of yours) the evidence is there that by spending time early on becoming a sensitive parent, you’ll put yourself in a better position to help your child thrive.

And if you both get good at the care-giving, successful co-parenting – sharing the decision-making and coordination of the ‘parenting business’ (so both of you are ‘bosses’ at home) – is more likely to follow. And that’s good too.

So chuck out the gender stereotypes and get stuck in. Trust me, you’re a testament to how well this stuff works.

  1. Stand up and be counted

As a hands-on dad, a lot of the time you’ll feel like a square peg in a very round hole. The world’s still set up as if parenting is a game for girls. Things are changing, but sloooooowly.

So expect to have to stand your ground at work – or if necessary jump off the career ladder altogether – to achieve the balance you want.

As things stand, our highly gendered parenting leave system does little to encourage employers to support you as involved dad

Don’t be surprised if midwives and health visitors ignore or talk over you, if schools address everything to mum, and if people stare at you or make stupid comments that suggest you’re a slacker and second-class parent.

Be brave, little man. Enjoy and stay proud of your role as an involved father, and whenever you get the chance, do what you can to change others’ attitudes. The more dads kick against the system, the more balanced the world will be by the time your children become parents.

  1. You don’t have to do any of this

Finally, once you’ve thought about all that, please remember the following…

Lots of us have it in us to be great parents, but there’s a big wide world out there, full of wonderful things to see and do.

So find what makes you happy.

The planet’s pretty full already, and lots of people find fulfilment without reproducing. Hell, there’s even some evidence that they have happier relationships as a result.

So if happiness for you includes having kids, that’s great – but if you’re going to do it, do it right. Or just don’t have them. Either is fine.

Now finish your homework. Oh and your room needs tidying, by the way…

—Picture Credit: Flickr/Stephan Hochhaus

Jeremy Davies is head of communications at the Fatherhood Institute, you can follow their work on facebook and @fatherhoodinst. 

You can find all of the #100Voices4Men articles that will be published in the run up to International Men’s Day 2014 by clicking on this link—#100Voices4Men—and follow the discussion on twitter by searching for #100Voices4Men.

The views expressed in these articles are not the views of insideMAN editorial team. Whether you agree with the views expressed in this article or not we invite you to take take part in this important discussion, our only request is that you express yourself in a way that ensures everyone’s voice can be heard.

You can join the #100Voices4Men discussion by commenting below; by following us on Twitter @insideMANmag and Facebook or by emailing insideMANeditor@gmail.com.