Parental Bereavement (Leave and Pay) Bill

Lord Stevenson of Balmacara Excerpts

2nd reading (Hansard): House of Lords
Friday 29th June 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Stevenson of Balmacara (Lab)]

My Lords, we live in an age where we tend to assume, wrongly, that medicine has all the answers and that we will no longer be in situations where we will confront difficulties of bereavement and worse, yet, of course, every time that we think that, we are caught up by the sort of testimonies that we have heard today in this short debate and which bring it very much back into focus.

My own experience here is from my parents’ generation. I am one of a family who lost the eldest child at a relatively young age, before adolescence, and what would have been my youngest sibling—a long-wished-for and wanted daughter—was stillborn. So I am aware both of the issue and of the impact it had on our family life as my brothers and I grew up. I think that I can say with some confidence that my mother never got over the two tragedies that affected her children. As the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, made clear, the death of a child is beyond everyday life; it goes on and on and is never forgotten, and we can never underestimate its impact on those affected by it. Therefore, I support the Bill as a step forward.

This is a difficult area; it is not easy for the law to legislate in a way that will pick up all the various elements—I shall come back to some of the points made by the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton. However, we can recognise that the campaign that my noble friend Lord Knight of Weymouth and others over the last 10 or 15 years have tried to bring to Parliament is now gaining traction and has now got a way forward. Thanks to the work of Kevin Hollinrake MP, we have a real chance of getting a Bill that will give a basis and a framework by which bereavement can be dealt with in the very public space of employment in a way that will be sensitive and appropriate to the circumstances. Therefore, we support the Bill and hope very much that we can give it a fair wind and a speedy passage through your Lordships’ House.

The Bill has attracted very few people here today, but like my noble friend Lord Knight I think that there is a measure of support for it. The issues have been raised, in part, over a number of years, including in the Children and Families Act, and in a number of other Bills that came from BEIS, and BIS before it, in recent years. On each occasion we have seen the issue move forward a little bit. We should also recognise campaigners such as Lucy Herd, who I was privileged to accompany when she came to see the Minister at the time of the passage of the Children and Families Act. She so very bravely, as my noble friend Lord Knight said, went through the things that happened to her in a way that was incredibly impressive. One wonders how people can dig so deep and do what they have to do in order to keep going and survive, and yet turn that tragedy—the death of a deeply loved son—into a campaign that has been really effective, keeping it in the front of people’s minds and bringing it forward.

The Bill remedies a lacuna in our employment regulations. It is not a complete answer to all the problems involved, but it at least gives us a framework by which we can move forward. There is a lot of support for it; that has been demonstrated by the previous history but also by the way people have been addressing it in the other place. The important task here is to get it on to the statute book as quickly as possible and then perhaps, as the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, has said, we can begin to think about the way forward on some of the other issues. Like her, I think there are issues about who constitutes a bereaved parent. We live in a time when there are non-standard family models that are not covered by all the legislation that we are talking about and I think there is a case for looking at that, particularly the point about guardians.

Some who submitted evidence to us in the run-up to the Bill suggested that it would be useful to have a more flexible approach over timing, both in taking the leave and in how the pay is taken. Again, this may be something we can return to. I think there is a case for having a minimum of 26 weeks available for leave to be taken, because as my noble friend Lord Knight has said, that fits into the broad approach that has been taken under the Bill. However perhaps a longer period of time would better reflect the unexpected issues that may arise, including attendance at inquests or anything else that might be required.

On the definition of a child, another point raised earlier, there are very good reasons for sticking to 18 and I do not think we should depart from that at any stage. However, as the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, and others mentioned, there are other ways in which the statute book defines those who are still in the care of some form of parental engagement. For those, the argument here is not about the absolute age but the extent to which the parents are engaged in supporting and providing for their children. If they are, then the loss by sudden death, or even a known-about death, will be just as devastating whether it is at 18, at 21 or even at 25.

My final issue is a wider one but I think it is one the Minister will be aware of. We have had discussion very recently about the difference between an employee and a worker. The Bill has to be framed around “an employee”: all employees are workers but not all workers are employees. Are we going to think through the implications of the Bill, and others, in relation to the gig economy? It is not just the gig economy, but we will have to face up to this at some point. This is a good way into a number of issues raised by that and it will also have benefits for those who are not directly caught by that. As I have said, the key issue today is to get Bill as quickly as possible on to the statute book, but if the Minister is prepared to meet me, the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, and my noble friend Lord Knight to pick up on these and other issues that might come up in some future programme of work, that would be helpful to us all.