Terms and Conditions of Employment

Nigel Evans Excerpts

Tuesday 3rd March 2020 Commons Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (Paul Scully)]

I beg to move,

That the draft Statutory Parental Bereavement Pay (General) Regulations 2020, which were laid before this House on 23 January, be approved.

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)]

With this it will be convenient to consider the draft Parental Bereavement Leave Regulations 2020.

[Paul Scully]

The statutory instruments implement a new entitlement to paid leave for employees who lose a child under the age of 18, or whose baby is stillborn. There is currently no specific statutory right to take time off work to grieve following the loss of a child, and although there are many excellent and supportive employers, some sadly do not extend the same compassion to their employees when these tragic circumstances occur. The SIs will ensure a statutory minimum provision on which all working parents can rely in the event of a child death or stillbirth. They will also establish a clear baseline of support for employers when managing bereavement in the workplace. Fortunately, the number of child deaths is relatively small—every year, there are around 7,500 child deaths in Great Britain, including stillbirths—but behind each individual death of a baby or child, there are parents, and a wider family, for whom the sadness and pain of that loss are unquantifiable.