Terms and Conditions of Employment

Patricia Gibson Excerpts

Tuesday 3rd March 2020 Commons Chamber

[Patricia Gibson (North Ayrshire and Arran) (SNP)]

It is no surprise that these parental bereavement pay and leave measures are warmly welcomed across the House and across the United Kingdom. Several of us in the House have had the tragic and life-changing experience of having to bury our own child. We talked much about this during the Committee stage of the Parental Bereavement (Leave and Pay) Act 2018 in the previous Session of Parliament. We all understood not only the importance of the measures but that they were not for us—they were for all those men and women who in the future will have to undergo this agony. We in public life who have gone through this terrible experience have a duty—I believe it is a sacred and moral duty—to improve the situation for those who, in time to come, will suffer the same terrible fate of losing a child. I also pay tribute to the former Member for Eddisbury, Antoinette Sandbach; although she is no longer a Member of this House, she did much work on parental bereavement and baby loss, and it is important to remember that.

The legislation is non-partisan and that is exactly as it should be. It is no secret that, while I wholeheartedly support these measures, as far as they go—I hear what the hon. Member for Thirsk and Malton (Kevin Hollinrake) said about this being an opening salvo in perhaps more comprehensive protection for bereaved parents—I do not think that they go far enough. But they are a start. The measures started life as that most fragile thing—a private Member’s Bill—and it is down in no small part to the hard work led by the hon. Member who sponsored the original Bill that they have come this far.

These measures right a wrong; they correct the injustice that bereaved parents who bury their son or daughter are, under the law, not entitled to any paid or unpaid time off work. That means that any leave taken in such circumstances was entirely at the discretion of employers. We know that most employers would be hugely sympathetic to a member of staff facing such a loss, not just as an employer but as a fellow human being. We also know that others may not be and we heard anecdotal evidence of such cases, particularly in the Bill Committee.

I was delighted that the amendment I tabled in the Bill Committee to cover parents who suffered a stillbirth was accepted—a clear sign of the careful and considered cross-party working that took the Bill as far as it got. To face the death of a son or daughter with no entitlement to paid leave under the law has been for too long a terrible, terrible injustice that generations of people before us have suffered. I am proud that that has now been addressed.

These measures set out a minimum leave period of two weeks. That is not very long, but given that up to this point there was no entitlement at all, it is a start. Importantly, it provides legal recognition that the response to a life-changing event can and should no longer be a matter of discretion for employers. This is one of those days when we can feel that we are making a real, practical difference to the lives of our constituents as they face perhaps the worst experience that they can ever face.

People cope with the devastation of losing their child in a variety of ways, as we know—there is no right or wrong way to grieve or cope with loss. That is why I had hoped, through the passage of the legislation, for more flexibility on when the paid leave could be taken, but I take on board and very much welcome the Minister’s comments a wee while back about flexibility, because it is very important. Parents need to grieve in their own way and in their own time as far as possible. The circumstances of the loss of a child will matter, and bereaved parents must have the full protection of the law. I hope that at some point the Government will revisit this to develop it into a more sensitive package than it currently is.

I also wanted these measures to cover offspring beyond the age limit of 18 years, as set out in the provisions. The measures are, after all, about bereaved parents and not the child who has been lost. This really ought not to be about the circumstances or the age at which the child is lost; it is about protecting the parents following the loss of a son or daughter—something that goes against the natural order of events.

These provisions are extremely welcome, but I look forward to the day—I hope the Minister is listening—when their scope is expanded in the ways I have set out. I will continue to work towards that end with anybody who is willing to work with me, for the sake of my own son who was stillborn at full term, baby Kenneth.