Early Parenthood: Supporting Fathers

David Linden Excerpts

Wednesday 30th January 2019 Westminster Hall

[David Linden (Glasgow East) (SNP)]

It is always a great pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Davies. Like other Members, I warmly congratulate the hon. Member for Chatham and Aylesford (Tracey Crouch) on an excellent debate. I find coming to Westminster Hall like seeking refugee status in this place, having come out of the Chamber where there is an incredibly volatile and divided atmosphere. This debate has probably been the highlight of my week so far. We can have a debate with such consensus, and it would be better if we could do that more often. We have had an excellent debate so far. The hon. Lady kicked off by talking about perinatal depression and tackling loneliness; she made some points about shared parental leave, which I will come back to in due course.

The hon. Member for East Renfrewshire (Paul Masterton) gave a very thoughtful and considered speech. Some of what he said resonated with me. He and I live relatively close to each other, so we share the geography of how far the hospital is. Later in my remarks I will return to the experience of having to leave the hospital very soon after the birth of a child. He spoke about the feelings of guilt and jealousy; I was walking across Westminster bridge this morning while facetiming my wife and my four-month-old daughter. As dads we feel guilt and jealousy, and he was right to place that on the record. The hon. Member for South West Bedfordshire (Andrew Selous) cited some statistics that hammer home the point that some income groups are not part of the antenatal experience; I certainly saw that in the last round of antenatal classes we went to.

The hon. Member for Congleton (Fiona Bruce) has a very strong record of talking about family values; I know she was trying not to go down the route of single parents, but I was reflecting as she spoke, as someone brought up by a single mum. When I came home from school for the first time, my mum asked me what I had learned. I said, “I went to the toilet and there were walls that went, ‘Whoosh!’” That had made the biggest impact on me because, having been brought up by a single mum, I had never before been in a male toilet before. Perhaps others had a more formative experience on their first day of primary 1, but that was mine. The hon. Lady made a strong case for “A Manifesto to Strengthen Families”. I have not looked at that, but after the debate I certainly will.

The hon. Member for Moray (Douglas Ross) is about to join the crazy club of fatherhood. I think I speak on behalf of everyone in the Chamber in wishing him every success in the run-up to March. It is simultaneously the most chaotic and blessed time in life. I know we all send him our good wishes. Rightly, he made criticisms of where we have not done things right in Scotland. I have been through the process of having children twice over the last three and a half years; more NHS support should be given. I would be very happy to work with him on that. He was unashamedly, as a constituency MP, talking about the situation of Dr Gray’s Hospital. I will not seek to defend that, because he made a strong point, although I suspect I will get in trouble for saying that.

I absolutely agree with the hon. Member for Mansfield (Ben Bradley) about the importance of family support networks. He also spoke about the importance of early intervention. The hon. Member for Walsall North (Eddie Hughes), in his inimitable style, spoke about his employment experience. I think we are all the richer for that, and I am sure he will become a grandparent sooner rather than later.

I hate being too personal in Westminster Hall, but I will do it anyway. I spent the weekend in Northern Ireland. I mentioned that I was brought up by a single parent. My dad spend quite a significant amount of time in prison. In November, at the age of 52, he died quite suddenly. I had been estranged from him. I have had lots of feelings as the debate has gone on—I have been thinking about prison and about being a single parent. I went to Northern Ireland to go to my dad’s grave and to meet my younger sister, who is only seven years old. Since I returned on Sunday night, I have been reflecting on the difference between me and my sister. I did not have that relationship with my dad—perhaps he did not get the support he needed when I was born—but I have taken great comfort since he passed away from the fact that my sister had such a good relationship with him. To spend that weekend with her and to see that he had made amends and moved on in life was incredibly comforting.

I want also to talk about my experience of becoming a dad. I think people know from my last question at Prime Minister’s questions that both my children were born prematurely and spent several weeks on the neonatal intensive care unit. One of the things I am trying to push in this place is an extension of paternity leave, particularly when a child is born prematurely. That relates to the point by the hon. Member for East Renfrewshire that, whether their partner is in hospital with their child for a day or for two weeks, the fact that we just send dads home as if they were the cleaner or the cook has a massive impact on their mental health.

I experienced the same situation when my son was born three and a half years ago. He was born and whipped away to neonatal intensive care, and I was left like a spare part. The only difference this time around, when my daughter was born and we went through exactly the same thing, was that about 10 days in we had the opportunity to see a psychiatrist, or a psychologist, to have a bit of counselling. That struck me as a very good thing. I certainly got more out of it then my wife did; she is one of those typical Hebridean women who is very strong—much stronger than me. It struck me as a bit unusual that we were offered that experience; it is only now, after a few months have passed, that I think it was really healthy to be able to sit down and talk about my feelings as a dad. Talking about our experiences is not something we do very well.

Finally, I want to touch on shared parental leave and the paternity leave we offer fathers. I have a degree of frustration about shared parental leave. I do not like the idea that we say, “You’ve got a certain amount of time, and the dad takes time at the expense of the mum.” I would like dads to get a bit longer for paternity leave. My experience of those first two weeks was different, since both my periods of paternity leave were spent on a neonatal ward. In any case, those two weeks tend to be full of family, with the mother-in-law visiting and the house going like an absolute fair. I would like the statutory paternity leave allowance to be doubled to four weeks. I know the Labour party and the Liberal Democrats committed to doing that in their 2017 manifestos. I just have a degree of concern that we provide shared parental leave at the expense of the other parent. It is equally important that mothers, particularly those who are breastfeeding, get that time.

This has been an excellent opportunity for us to come together to look at an area of policy where I think there is a degree of consensus. I very much look forward to hearing what the Minister has to say, because I think we can move this agenda forward. For that reason, I am very grateful to the hon. Member for Chatham and Aylesford for initiating the debate.