The Additional Paternity Leave Regulations 2010

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The Additional Paternity Leave Regulations 2010

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The Additional Paternity Leave Regulations 2010 recognise that mothers can often be the main earner for the family and aims to promote shared parenting. The regulations enable eligible employees to have the right to take additional paternity leave and pay. However the right only affects parents of children that are due to be born on or after the 3^rd April 2011 or where one or both of the parents have received adoptive notification on or after the 3^rd April 2011 that they have been matched with a child for adoption.

Additional Paternity Leave (APL) will allow a father to take up to 26 weeks leave to care for a child and also allows mothers to ‘transfer’ up to 6 months of maternity leave to their partner.

APL will only be able to start 20 weeks after the birth of the child and must end no later then the child’s first birthday. In the case of adoption, the earliest APL can start is 20 weeks after the child was placed for adoption and must end no later than one year after the placement began. There is no requirement for the father’s leave to begin directly after the mother has returned from statutory maternity Leave or statutory adoption leave and have/or ended their entitlement to statutory maternity or adoption pay, or maternity allowance.

In addition, in order to be eligible for Additional Paternity Leave and Pay (APLP), a father must be continuously employed by the same employer for at least 26 weeks, ending with the relevant week and also remain in the same employment until he starts his leave. In the case of a birth, the relevant week is 15 weeks before the baby is due and in the case of adoption it is the week the adopter is matched with a child for adoption.

Fathers seeking to take APLP must provide a declaration to their employers at least 8 weeks before they wish to start their leave, confirmation of when they intend the leave to start and finish, a declaration stating that they wish to take the leave to care for a child and that the eligibility requirements have been satisfied.

Fathers must also provide a declaration from the mother that provides her employers with her name, address, National Insurance Number and the date she intends to return from maternity leave. The mother must also consent to her employers processing the information and she must confirm that the father has the status he has detailed on his declaration and confirm that he is the only person seeking the leave in respect of the child.

Clearly the new regulations are, to say the least, somewhat complicated and it would be all too easy to fall foul of the required procedures in order to have the potential benefits available. However, the evidence shows that at present many fathers do not use the parental leave that is available to them and it remains to be seen to what extent the Additional Paternity Leave regulations will be used.

If you would like to discuss any of your employment matters then please call our employment solicitor, Hugh Reid, on 0800 0271452 to arrange a free consultation.