Parental Leave (EU Directive) Regulations 2013

Lord Stevenson of Balmacara Excerpts

Wednesday 6th February 2013 Grand Committee

[The Earl of Listowel]

My Lords, I welcome this order and am particularly grateful that it includes adoptive parents, assuming that I have understood it correctly. Having worked in the past with children who are in the process of being adopted, I recognise that these are often children who have had very bad early life experiences and who can be very challenging for parents to care for. We know that one in five adoptive placements, unfortunately, fail and one can only try to imagine how awful that may be for the children involved. Any support that can be given to adoptive parents to make the best go of that placement is very much to be welcomed, which I do as vice-chair of the All-Party Parliamentary Group for Looked after Children and Care Leavers.

I welcome all policies which support the family. Our human capital is often overlooked. At a time when we are so concerned about the future growth of this country, it is important to think about investment in bridges, new train systems and better communications. However, we need also to bear in mind that our families and children are a vital component for future growth and that investing in human capital, and investing early in families, is an important means to seeing that we are a vital and competitive nation in future. I welcome this measure.

[Lord Stevenson of Balmacara]

My Lords, I am pleased to welcome this proposal. It is exactly what the Government should be doing and seems to do what is required. As the Minister said, it has been welcomed by those who have been consulted in the round. However, there is one caveat. The Minister explained why certain measures had to be brought forward at this point because of an EU directive requirement, but the general thrust of the approach to parental leave and to regularising the broader position is based on doing them at the last rather than the first possible moment. I do not need a response on that but I would like to record that it is obviously a matter of some regret that some of the good things that we see in this change to the regulations are going to be delayed, to the disbenefit of those who will be affected by them.

Will the Minister rehearse the timing of the extension to the age of 18? I ask that because the matter was raised when these regulations were considered in another place; there was an exchange about this of which I am sure the Minister is aware. I quote the Minister on that occasion, who said in response to a question from a Labour Member:

“The hon. Gentleman posed a fair question about why we are not raising the age to 18 at the same time”,

as the rest of the regulations which were going through with this order. The Minister said that the reason was straightforward—although it may be to the benefit of the Committee if it listens hard, because it is not at all straightforward to me—and that,

“we understand from the business community that having all the changes on shared parental leave and on pay and leave for parents in one go is easier in terms of familiarisation costs. For this small, discrete change, there is an earlier European Union deadline, and we want to make sure that massive changes do not happen at various times”.

That seems clear, and I understand its logic. She continued:

“However, I give the hon. Gentleman the firm commitment that the Government’s policy is to raise to 18 the age at which the regulations apply”.—[Official Report, Commons, First Delegated Legislation Committee, 28/1/13; col. 7.]

Although she said that it was not going to happen at this point, the guarantee which the Minister wished to give was that the Government would move this forward. This has been repeated by the Minister again today.

Why have these things not been brought together? If the Government wanted to minimise the impact of familiarisation costs on business, it would seem more sensible to do all these, and apply them, at the same time, yet they chose not do to so. Perhaps the Minister could respond on that point.

[Lord Popat]

I thank noble Lords for their comments. I thank, as always, the noble Earl for his comments on children who are being adopted. Adoptive parents will be entitled to 18 weeks, as is everybody else, with leave to be taken within five years of the date of adoption; others would be from the date of birth. If somebody adopts a child of six years, the right will expire five years thereafter or when the child is 18, whichever is sooner.

The noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, asked why we did not bring the 2015 date forward. Consultation was done on a range of time limits: five, eight, 12, 16 and 18 years were proposed. Around 30% of the respondents called for no change, whereas 31% called for the age limit to be increased to 18. There was not much support for eight, 12 or 16 years. We therefore made the age 18. In order to minimise the cost to business, this change will only be introduced alongside the other changes in the system for maternity, paternity and shared parental leave. The change will therefore not be made through these regulations. Primary legislation is required, and will be included in the Children and Families Bill. I trust that I have responded to the noble Lord’s questions.