Bereavement Leave: Loss of a Child

Will Quince Excerpts

Tuesday 12th September 2017 Westminster Hall

[Will Quince (Colchester) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Brady. First, I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for East Renfrewshire (Paul Masterton) on securing this debate on one of the most important topics as we approach the private Member’s Bill season.

There is no question but that losing a child is one of the most traumatic experiences that any parent has to go through. Having gone through that experience myself at the end of 2014, I know that when you become a Member of Parliament, you feel, like any parent who has been bereaved, that you want to do something to try to make a difference. You want to try to do something to ensure that as few people as possible go through the same experience that you did, of losing a child, and where they do, you want to ensure that they have the best bereavement care possible. Some parents do that by raising lots of money for their local bereavement suites and for the fantastic charities that have been mentioned. As Members of Parliament, we have a unique position and a unique voice—when we speak, the nation’s media listen—but we also have an amazing platform in this House to actually change legislation and change Government policy.

There were two things that I wanted to do on entering the House in this specific regard. The first was the formation of an all-party parliamentary group on baby loss, which we did on a cross-party basis with a number of colleagues, in particular with my co-chair, my hon. Friend the Member for Eddisbury (Antoinette Sandbach). We are doing a huge amount of work to try to reduce baby loss and to change Government policy in that regard, and we are having a lot of support from the Government.

This is also about bereavement care, and that is where the parental bereavement leave idea came up. If someone suffers a stillbirth, which we did, they have two weeks as a parent—as a father or, in regular maternity leave, as a mother—in order to grieve and to come to terms with what has just happened, but if you lose a child after six months, you do not have that right. You do not have any right to paid leave.

Although the vast majority of employers up and down this country are excellent employers that act with compassion, kindness and understanding when one of their employees loses a child, sadly there are employers out there that do not act with compassion and act with huge insensitivity. The examples are all out there. Sadly, it is not even just small employers; it is often large employers and, I am sorry to say, even some Government agencies and large public sector bodies. Although people are entitled under law at the moment to some immediate time off and a reasonable amount of time, that is wholly subjective, and sadly there are employers that put huge pressure on their employees to go back to work too soon. That creates huge social and emotional problems for the individual. The leave is really important, because you need that time to grieve and to come to terms with what has just happened, but you also need the time to make some really important arrangements.

I am delighted that my hon. Friend the Member for Thirsk and Malton (Kevin Hollinrake) has taken the baton and run with it, with his private Member’s Bill, and that the Government have been so supportive. I would particularly like to praise the Minister and the Secretary of State, who have both been hugely supportive, and indeed the Prime Minister, for ensuring that this went in the Conservative party manifesto. As we all know, private Members’ Bills are very difficult to get through and are nearly always destined to fail without Government support.

This is a common right across Europe. Indeed, it is a relatively common right across the world, to varying degrees. We have an opportunity here, with this private Member’s Bill, to have world-leading rights in this area, by having two weeks’ paid leave for any parent who loses a child. That is an incredible ambition. It is a real statement of intent, not only for the Government but for the House, that we take so seriously the trauma of losing a child. It is not in the natural order. It is not right, and people do need time to come to terms with what has happened and to grieve.

I would like to thank my hon. Friend the Member for East Renfrewshire for securing today’s important debate, my hon. Friend the Member for Thirsk and Malton for taking the baton and running with it, and the Government for supporting the private Member’s Bill.