Statutory Maternity and Paternity Pay

Stella Creasy Excerpts

Monday 27th October 2025 Westminster Hall

[Ms Stella Creasy (Walthamstow) (Lab/Co-op)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mrs Hobhouse. I thank Grace and my hon. Friend the Member for Burton and Uttoxeter (Jacob Collier).

I want to make a speech on behalf of every parent who is right now checking their bank balance, sitting in the back of a dingy soft-play centre, weeping silently. They are looking at us and wondering—screaming—“When will Parliament get it?” They will understand the irony that we are having this debate during half term. It sounds impossible when said out loud, but we in this country appear to think that when someone has a baby, they should live on less than the national minimum wage.

Of course this petition has merit—it speaks to the problems that begin at birth and lock in inequality throughout people’s lives. If someone is on universal credit, working and pregnant, we will claw back some money just to make their life even more complicated. Meanwhile, those who are entrepreneurs or self-employed have no help at all. Little wonder that Maternity Action shows that motherhood is often associated with debt—and it does not stop there. Let us be clear: this is not about taking time off, but about taking on another job with a very expensive clientele. It is estimated that it costs £406 a week to look after a newborn baby, and what if parents have another one? Do the maths, and realise why this place has to up its game.

This is not about counterproductive measures; it is about families. People attack breakfast clubs, but breakfast clubs are not about the state looking after people’s kids; they help parents who would otherwise find it impossible to hold down a job where they are expected to be in a meeting at 9 o’clock.

Affordable childcare is not yet affordable. A constituent who is just about to have a second child wrote to me to say that even with the 30 hours and the tax-free allowance his family still has to find £3,000 a month. It does not stack up, and that is before we get to the cost of the half-term clubs. Parents are trying to find an extra 200 quid this week, while still dealing with the credit card bill from the summer holidays.

Above all, the way we do maternity leave locks in inequality for mums, who get written off by the motherhood penalty and get lumbered with the childcare, and locks out dads from the role of second parent. We do not have time to talk about issues affecting single parents, children with special educational needs and disabled parents.

The review is great, but we have the evidence. We do not need to wait to do something now to help all those people screaming in the soft play centre. We could bring in statutory pay changes or an equal six-week right at 90%. We had a chance to do that in the Lords in the Employment Rights Bill, and we lost it by seven votes. There are interim measures that we could take. I hope the Minister will hear this cry of pain, because this week of all weeks, parents are begging for pay day, worried that they are letting down their kid. Above all, they are asking us in politics to help them.

[Wera Hobhouse (in the Chair)]

Jim Shannon will still have two minutes, and then I will impose a formal time limit of 90 seconds.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Andrew Western)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Mrs Hobhouse, and to speak on an issue that is close to so many people’s hearts, as the response to the petition shows. I am speaking for the Government this afternoon, but after the previous contribution I think it is important that I set out that this is a matter of importance to all Ministers. I thank all the Members who have taken part in this hugely important debate, particularly my hon. Friend the Member for Burton and Uttoxeter (Jacob Collier), who so eloquently set out on behalf of the Petitions Committee the various issues facing new parents.

We heard a number of excellent and thoughtful contributions. I had intended to attempt to run through all of them and respond individually, but what was most striking about the debate—until the closing contributions —was the significant unity in the room. Members have come together from across parties to speak with one voice. That shows why the Government’s review is so important. The myriad issues that new parents face—with health, finances, spending time with their children and so on—are so complex and the need for change is not lost either on me or on the Government more widely.

I will respond to a handful of the contributions—and how could I not begin with my hon. Friend the Member for Gloucester (Alex McIntyre)? I am afraid I am not going to give his son a birthday present today, but I send my very best wishes and congratulations. I know that my hon. Friend is a loving and caring parent and I am sure that he has something lovely planned once we get away from the votes this evening. He and several other hon. Members asked whether certain aspects of the complex web of parental pay are in scope of the review, so let me clarify the eight areas that are in scope: maternity leave and pay; paternity leave and pay; shared parental leave and pay; unpaid parental leave; adoption leave and pay; parental bereavement leave and pay; neonatal care leave and pay; and maternity allowance.

The point about discretionary payments by the hon. Member for York Central (Rachael Maskell) was well made. I have responded to a Westminster Hall debate before on that specific issue. I undertook then to take it away and feed it into the review, which is being led predominantly by the Department for Business and Trade. I did that then, and I will do so again now.

I want to recognise the contribution of my hon. Friend the Member for Sherwood Forest (Michelle Welsh), who is a champion on maternity and maternity rights. She is entirely right to set out the importance of the first few weeks, months and years—the first 1,001 days. I also recognise the challenge set down by my hon. Friend the Member for Walthamstow (Ms Creasy).

Let me say at the outset that I will be disappointing hon. Members, because I will be pointing to the importance of allowing the review to run its course. I do so because an incredibly complex web of support has evolved since 1948, with significant changes since then—the Opposition spokesperson, the hon. Member for South West Devon (Rebecca Smith), set out the many changes made just by her Government. We have one chance to get this right. We have waited a long time for this review. We want to take the time not only to undertake the call for evidence, which we have already done, but to consult trade unions, employers, and parents and families before we have a public consultation.

[Ms Creasy]

I agree that there is complexity that we must deal with. Will the Minister update us on his Department’s view of the Women and Equalities Committee inquiry, which specifically took evidence about parental leave and six weeks at 90% of pay. Nobody is suggesting we can do everything overnight, but there are things that we could do now as a holding measure to start the change that everybody wants. Labour Members and those from other parties recognise the possible benefits to the economy and the country, so perhaps the Women and Equalities Committee offers an interim way forward.

[Andrew Western]

That is indeed one of a number of important pieces of work that we are feeding into the review. My hon. Friend tempts me to promise that we will go further immediately, but I am not able to do so today for the reason that I have set out: we want to get the review right and to take the time to bring forward changes and recommendations, and the pathway to change, in a measured way.