7. Parental leave

Parental leave is a right to take unpaid time off work to look after a child or make arrangements for the child’s welfare. This right should not be confused with shared parental leave which is discussed in Chapter 2.

Parental leave currently (October 2014) gives working parents the right to take up to 18 weeks of unpaid time off work until their child reaches the age of five. For those adopting, 18 weeks of unpaid paternity leave is available until the fifth anniversary of the adoption or until the child’s 18th birthday, whichever comes earlier. Where a child qualifies for Disability Living Allowance, 18 weeks of unpaid parental leave is available until the child’s 18th birthday.

Parents can use parental leave to spend more time with children in the early years and strike a better balance between their work and family commitments.

Examples of the way in which parental leave might be used include accompanying a child during a stay in hospital.

Despite the limitations of the rights to parental leave, which is unpaid, it does provide working parents with another option for taking time off during the first few years of their child’s life. In some cases, trade unions have negotiated improvements to the minimum provision giving parents’ greater flexibility, for example, by allowing it to be taken for older children. In a small number of cases paid leave has also been negotiated.