Parents to be allowed to have up to 20 days at work per parent whilst on shared parental leave. The days that will be available to parents on shared parental leave will be renamed to distinguish them from KIT days for use during the maternity leave period. The KIT-type days on shared parental leave will be additional to the 10 KIT days which will continue to be available to a woman whilst she is on maternity leave. Employees who take shared parental leave will have the right to return to the same job when returning from periods of statutory leave comprising of maternity, paternity, adoption or shared parental leave that totals 26 weeks or less in aggregate; even if the leave is taken in discontinuous blocks.
Adoption
Statutory Adoption Leave to become a day 1 right, abolishing the requirement for 26 weeks’ continuous employment.
The current notification arrangements for adoption leave and pay will apply to employees who qualify for adoption leave and pay under the new fostering-for- adoption placement process.
Eligible adopters will also be able to take Shared Parental Leave. Statutory Adoption Pay enhanced to mirror Statutory Maternity Pay, i.e. first 6 weeks at 90% of AWE. New right to time off for adopters to attend adoption meetings: paid time off to attend 5 meetings for the primary adopter and unpaid time off for the secondary adopter to attend 2 meetings.
General
The age limit for unpaid parental leave will increase from children under 5 to children under 18. Parents in Surrogacy cases who qualify for a Parental Order (i.e. there is a genetic link to the baby between one or both of the intended parents) will be eligible for unpaid time off to attend up to 2 ante-natal appointments as well as Statutory Adoption Pay and Leave and, if eligible, shared parental leave.
The Process
At any point once a mother has completed her period of mandatory maternity leave she can decide to end her maternity leave and enter a period of SPL. The mother and her partner must both meet the basic eligibility criteria in order to take SPL. The criteria are: both must have worked for any 26 weeks out of 66 weeks preceding the baby's due date and have earned at least £30 gross salary per week for any 13 of those 66 weeks. SPL is not available if one or both parent does not fulfil these criteria. Once the mother has declared that she wants to end her maternity leave, she must decide with her partner how they want to divide the remaining leave and pay. Both parents complete form ShPL1 advising how much leave and pay remains from the initial entitlement and the dates they wish to take leave. They will need to give 8
CIPP Policy News Journal
16/04/2014, Page 227 of 519
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