Parents of children born – or put up for adoption – from 5 April 2015 will be able to share up to 50 weeks of parental leave and 37 weeks of parental pay, shifting the focus from mothers as primary carers to shared care between parents. The new scheme is designed to give parents the choice to share the care of their child, potentially in discontinuous periods. This means that a return to work may not, as currently, end maternity leave.
We recommend that employers should:
- Develop a policy on SPL and circulate widely
- Review contracts with SPL in mind, e.g. do you want to offer enhanced SPL pay equivalent to contractual maternity pay?
- Be clear on which type of leave employees are taking as different rules may apply, e.g. SPL is paid at a lower rate than maternity pay for the first 6 weeks
- Engage with employees over requests for discontinuous leave to identify more suitable arrangements for all
Take care to avoid detriment or dismissal related to SPL when employees return to work, and even if redundancy related. Claims, including for automatically unfair dismissal, could result.
Employees wishing to take advantage of the new scheme should note the following key features:
- Both parents must be economically active to qualify, meeting continuous employment requirements and/or earnings tests.
- Notification requirements must be met and employers given:
- A non-binding notice of entitlement and intention to take SPL
- A period of leave notice confirming periods requested at least 8 weeks before leave starts
- Periods of leave should be requested in blocks of one week and requests for one continuous period of leave must be accepted by the employer. Discontinuous requests may be rejected but we recommend negotiating to reach agreement.
- Up to three notices may be served, but a refused request can be withdrawn by 15 days after it was made without affecting the limit.
- SPL may be taken concurrently but each week taken by each parent will count towards the 50 week limit.
- Each parent will also be able to take up to 20 keeping in touch days which will not end SPL.
- SPL will be paid for up to 37 weeks at £138.18 or 90% of earnings whichever is the lower, provided minimum earnings requirements are met.
- Parents are protected against detriment or dismissal for taking SPL and are entitled to return to the same job or to a suitable and appropriate alternative job.
The SPL scheme adds to increased flexibility introduced by the extension of the right to claim flexible working to all, opening the possibility for grandparents to request flexible working arrangements to care for grandchildren.
In both contexts we recommend employers engage in early and open discussions with their employees to identify arrangements suitable for both. If you would like advice, please contact a member of our employment team.
