Family friendly rights

Only 6% of Brits work 9am-5pm

A recent survey from YouGov has found that only 6% of Brits now work 9am-5pm and nearly half of those surveyed worked flexibly through job-sharing flexitime or compressed hours. The study shows that the most preferred working hours are 8am-4pm (chosen by 37% of the respondents) with another 21% saying they would prefer to start work even earlier at 7am and finish at 3pm.

By Aggie Salt

Publicise parental leave policies

A study conducted by the Liberal Democrats has revealed that only 4 UK government departments display their parental leave and pay policies on their external websites. This is despite the fact that the government has launched a new "Share the joy" campaign, intended to encourage more parents to utilise shared parental leave, and is spending £1.5 million to increase awareness.

By Purvis Ghani

No requirement to enhance pay for shared parental leave

We blogged in June last year about the employment tribunal claim of Ali -v- Capita Customer Management Ltd where Mr Ali was successful in his claim for direct sex discrimination. Female employees at Capita were entitled to 14 weeks’ full pay on maternity leave whereas fathers were only entitled to two weeks’ full pay on paternity and shared parental leave. Mr Ali's wife was advised to return to work early from maternity leave after being diagnosed with post natal depression. Mr Ali asked Capita whether he could take leave instead and was told he could take shared parental leave on statutory pay. The Tribunal found that this was direct sex discrimination.

By Claire Maclean

Fathers and the Workplace

The Women and Equalities Committee has published a report highlighting what it sees as the difficulties that fathers face in balancing their careers with childcare responsibilities. The report makes a series of proposals which aim to put men and women on a more equal footing when it comes to maternity and paternity leave. The most headline grabbing recommendation is that fathers should receive one month's leave at 90% of their salary (capped for higher earners) when their wife or partner has a baby and a further two months of paternity leave at £141 a week, without any loss of rights for the mother.

By Mark Hamilton