Parental Bereavement (Leave and Pay) Bill

Will Quince Excerpts

3rd reading: House of Commons & Report stage: House of Commons
Friday 11th May 2018 Commons Chamber

[Kevin Foster]

The amendments would widen the scope a bit. An employee aged 61, 62 or 63 might lose a relative in their early 40s but, yes, by the point children are in their 50s or 60s, their parent is almost certain to have retired, or at the very least will only be in part-time employment. Monica Bulman, a nurse who recently retired in Torbay, did nearly 60 years in the NHS, which is remarkable. She was in her 80s when she retired.

For me, it is about the principle and about how the Minister and my hon. Friend the Member for Thirsk and Malton think employers should reasonably act in circumstances where, for everyone else, an adult has passed away but for the employee it is their child. The employee will remember their child as a baby, and that will have an emotional impact. I am concerned that we do not create a cliff edge at 18.

[Will Quince (Colchester) (Con)]

My hon. Friend is making a powerful point. I do not usually disagree with my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Dorset and North Poole (Michael Tomlinson), but the amendments would change the remit quite significantly. They would increase the number of potential recipients fivefold. At the moment, as we know, there is an element of fragility in getting private Members’ Bills through the House. We have the support of the Treasury Bench, which is based on financial calculations on the existing number of potential recipients. If we were to increase that fivefold, I fear we would lose Government support because they would have to go back, redo the calculations and get Treasury support again. However well meaning, I encourage him to think about the implications of these amendments.

[Kevin Foster]

I thank my hon. Friend for his intervention, and I take on board what he says. Perhaps my hon. Friend the Member for Thirsk and Malton will cover this in his speech, but it will be interesting to hear how we would expect employers to react in this circumstance. I am particularly thinking of people aged over 18 who have particularly special needs because of, say, Down’s syndrome. In the past, those with Down’s syndrome sadly lived relatively short lives. We now have examples of those with Down’s syndrome reaching retirement age with very elderly carer parents. That presents its own challenge to local authorities in how to provide care to a parent who is absolutely devoted to caring for their child who is now perhaps in their 30s or 40s. As the parent develops their own care needs in their 70s and 80s it can be difficult to manage them without breaking the special bond the family have had for many decades.

Hearing what my hon. Friend the Member for Colchester says, I may be minded not to press the amendments if they might prevent the Bill from progressing. It would be interesting to hear from the Minister what thoughts the Government have on such cases and how we might expect employers to react. I do not want a situation in which the Bill applies if a person loses a child aged 17 years and 364 days but does not apply if they lose a child aged 18 years and one day. We must ensure there is no such cliff edge, which I do not think is the intention of the Bill.

[Will Quince]

I totally agree with the points that my hon. Friend is making. The key thing is getting the Bill on to the statute book; once that has happened, we can consider secondary legislation and amendments, but this is about our getting there. We discussed all these things in Committee. There are other issues, covering spouses and other relationships, that people would understandably wish to be included in the Bill. Unfortunately, we cannot do that; we are unlikely to get it through if we do. Everyone in this House would like us to look at the legislation in the future, with a view to amending it, but we have to get the Bill on the statute book as a starting point.

[Kevin Foster]

I take the points my hon. Friend is making. As I said at the outset, I fully support the Bill—I have no intention of giving a five-hour speech as an attempt to talk it out. When it comes to the key moment, I will not seek a decision on these amendments if that would endanger the Bill. However, it is right that we have this discussion today so that Ministers can listen to the opinions of the House. Sadly, tribunals and courts will be called on to interpret the Bill, but our discussion means they will be able to see clearly that Parliament was not setting a maximum and saying that the provision should stop there, but deciding where the floor—the minimum—should be.

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[Kevin Foster]

I take on board my hon. Friend’s point, but legislating is not just about sending a signal—we can do that by tabling a motion, making a speech or putting a question to a Minister. This is about setting down a piece of law that is not signalling what employers should do, but telling them what they must do. He is right to say that the Bill will not make much difference at all to 90% of employers. The small business that works as a team and the larger employer that values its staff will be able to sit back and think, “This is pretty much what we do already,” with the exception that the Bill provides for statutory parental bereavement leave and for the taxpayer to make certain payments. The Bill is about dealing with that 10%.

[Will Quince]

My hon. Friend the Member for Thirsk and Malton (Kevin Hollinrake) makes a good point. The Bill enshrines in law the minimums—it is about a floor, not a ceiling. The House should make it clear that on pay and time off, we are providing for statutory minimums. We know that most employers will want to offer more time—the time that their employees need. Likewise, although we are talking about amounts for statutory paternity and maternity pay, I would like to think that most employers will recompense their staff at full pay. I hope that the Government, as a good, compassionate and sensitive employer, will consider ensuring that civil servants are paid at full pay, because that would send a clear signal that the Bill sets out a minimum and there is an expectation that the provision will be greater.

[Kevin Foster]

I thank my hon. Friend for making the point that this is about the minimum rather than the maximum. I take on board what he and my hon. Friend the Member for Thirsk and Malton have said. I certainly do not want to endanger these provisions, but I will be interested to hear what the Minister says when he responds to the debate. It would be useful to hear his views about the policy that will be adopted in the civil service. If he wishes to intervene now, I would be happy to let him, but he might find it easier to cover that when makes his speech.

This is an appropriate point for me to move on to amendment 7, which relates to the pay level. It would make it clear in the schedule that the minimum pay level will be statutory parental bereavement pay, rather than contractual pay. Like my hon. Friend the Member for Colchester, I hope that most employers will be flexible, but the amendment would make it clearer in the Bill that the minimum is the statutory pay. Of course, if employers wish to pay more—if they wish to treat the period as normal paid leave—they can, but the Bill will set out the minimum.

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[Richard Harrington]

Yes. As ever, the good citizens of Havant are very well served. I make the point clearly that I meet business representative organisations, such as the Confederation of British Industry, the EEF, the Federation of Small Businesses and chambers of commerce, on a weekly basis. They are very responsible and I shall be bringing it up with them. This is a culture change, but culture changes do not happen instantaneously.

On remuneration, I really believe that the Bill again provides the minimum standard for employers. Hon. Members on both sides of the House have spoken about the level, but this is a minimum level, and bereaved parents have to know what the minimum is and what the entitlement is. However, it is not something that they should be negotiating with their employers. I am sure again that employers will be clear, and most will have a policy that is greatly in excess of that.

While I am on the subject, I turn to a point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Torbay. When we were discussing the amendment that deals with remuneration, I was asked about the civil service and whether the Government will provide leadership. I am pleased to announce today that we have decided that civil servants should receive full occupational pay for the one or two weeks that they take off under the Bill’s provisions. [Hon. Members: “Hear, hear!”] Many civil servants already take special leave when they find themselves in tragic circumstances, and we obviously want that level of support to continue when the Bill is implemented. I do not think that that makes the civil service particularly special. It should be standard, but I think we should lead by example. I have seen—not to do with child bereavement, but with sickness and other things—that the civil service is very flexible, and we as Government are very responsible employers in that way.

[Will Quince]

I thank the Minister for that very welcome announcement. It sends a very clear message to employers up and down the country that this is the gold standard and very much what we expect them to aspire to.

[Richard Harrington]

My hon. Friend is right: we must lead by example. Offering full pay to our own employees who lose a child means that we are a good employer, but it also provides a best-practice model for other employers to follow.

In relation to amendment 7, my hon. Friend raised an important point about consistency with other family-related leave entitlements. The Bill as drafted makes clear which contractual elements are applicable to parental bereavement leave or pay.

Let me now turn to amendment 8. I will begin with words that you have heard already, Madam Deputy Speaker: I agree with the comments made by many Members. It has been made clear that there is no desire to deviate from frameworks supporting existing measures in the landscape of family-related leave and pay, but that must not be at the expense of fairness and proportionality. Someone may be on family-related leave for many different reasons, and the forms of leave involved are a variety of lengths. They can be taken back to back. Sometimes it is natural for that to be the case, but sometimes it is not.

If the amendment were accepted, it might be possible for a bereaved parent who had been on leave for an extended period—perhaps consisting partly of maternity leave and partly of parental bereavement leave—to be entitled to return to the job that they had before going on leave, whereas a colleague who had been on other forms of family-related leave for the same period of time would not have quite the same right to return. We would not want a fixed “right to return” that was out of kilter with the other, existing “rights to return”.

The Government need the flexibility to set all this out through regulation after they have had time to consider all the various forms of leave and how they could interact with each other. I know that that sounds pedantic. Earlier this week, the hon. Member for Barrow and Furness (John Woodcock) accused me of being a nit-picker—there should probably be a Royal Society of Nit-pickers—but in this instance we have to nit-pick, because the detail is critically important. We should set out the rules only after we have considered the issue. That is, after all, the approach taken in the existing legislation on family-related leave and pay rights.

My hon. Friend the Member for Croydon South (Chris Philp) suggested the extension of leave to parents of premature babies. As I have said, all family leave provisions represent a floor. Employers are encouraged to go beyond the minimum when they can. Last year the Government worked with ACAS to produce new guidance on support for staff who have premature babies. The UK offers generous maternity-leave entitlements —some of the best in the world—and I think that they provide for a variety of circumstances. Parents also have access to other types of leave, such as shared parental and annual leave.

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[Will Quince]

This is indeed a great day. I did not come into politics with the thoughts of being a baby loss campaigner, or a campaigner for bereaved parents. It is tragic circumstances that has brought me, and so many others who work so passionately in this field, to this position. I remember the first journalist whom I spoke to on entering Parliament in 2015—she will know this when I reference the story. It was Isabel Hardman of The Spectator. She said, “If you could achieve one thing in Parliament, what would it be?” I said that it would be paid bereavement leave for parents who sadly lose a child. We are getting very close to that point. It has been an enormous team effort. I repeat the comments made by my friend, the hon. Member for North Ayrshire and Arran (Patricia Gibson), when I say how brilliant the cross-party working on this issue has been.

It has shown Parliament at its best. More than that, what we have seen over the course of the past two or three years is a seismic shift in the way that we approach bereavement, particularly bereavement for parents. We now have the national bereavement care pathway, which is launching nationwide at the end of this year. That is largely owing to the work of the all-party group on bereavement support. Again, we saw some brilliant cross-party working. We have seen the fantastic work of the hon. Member for Swansea East (Carolyn Harris), who I also call my friend, with her child funeral campaign. Now we have this Bill, which will give us one of the best workers’ rights in this area in the world.

I should like to say some thank-yous. The first goes to all the charities that have played such an important role through all the work that they have done in feeding into this process. This is not a new campaign—it is about something they have been calling for some time.

I pay tribute to all the bereaved parents who have contributed to all the consultations and thought processes that led to the Bill. It is really hard for bereaved parents to share their stories and talk about their own tragic loss, but they are willing to do it if they know it is going to make a difference to people who sadly find themselves in similar circumstances. I encourage the Minister, as this process continues, to continue to engage with bereaved parents. I encourage all bereaved parents who might be listening please to get involved in the consultation.

I thank the all-party parliamentary group on baby loss for all the work that has been done, again cross-party, to feed into this process. Lucy Herd, a bereaved mother who set up Jack’s Rainbow, has campaigned tirelessly on this subject. Someone who has not yet been mentioned, but who absolutely deserves it, is Tom Harris, the former Member for Glasgow South. He is another person who has passionately campaigned on this subject, first as an MP back in 2013, and since then as a journalist. I worked with him very closely behind the scenes on my incarnation of the Bill, and I know that he has continued to follow the path of this Bill very closely.

I thank parliamentary colleagues for all the work that they have done across this House to help to publicise the Bill and to get the word out there in supporting it. I also thank all the parties. After my Bill failed at the end of the last Parliament, all three major parties put this into their manifestos as a policy. That was a huge achievement. At the start of this Parliament, regardless of who ended up forming the Government, this was a manifesto commitment—a pledge—by all three major parties, and it was supported by all the smaller parties too.

I thank the Government and the Minister, because this has been, from the very beginning, like pushing against an open door. These things are never easy. We always look at it and think, “Well, of course it will be an easy thing to do”, but it never is—there are always complications and added consequences for any piece of legislation or change that we make, particularly on something as complex as employment law. But from the very beginning, the Secretary of State for the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, the then Minister of State, and Ministers subsequently have all been so supportive of pushing this agenda forward. I thank all the civil servants who supported it too.

There is one person who I have to single out for the biggest thanks, and that is my hon. Friend—my very good friend—the Member for Thirsk and Malton (Kevin Hollinrake). When the ten-minute rule Bill failed at the end of the last Parliament, my hon. Friend, who has twice been lucky in the private Member’s Bill ballot, took it up. It is easy to underestimate the number of people, charities, organisations and colleagues who would have been lobbying him to put their Bill forward—hundreds and hundreds. Yet it only took one call to him. He did not even say, “I’ll think about it and call you back”—he immediately said, “Yes, of course I’ll do it.” That is to the credit of the man. He has passionately, committedly and determinedly put forward this Bill with great steadfastness and commitment. It is a huge credit to him that we have got as far as we have, and I hope that today we will be sending the Bill up to the House of Lords.

It is important when we consider a Bill of this nature to look at where we are now. Numerous Members have said that the vast majority of employers already do the right thing, and yes, they do. The vast majority act with compassion, kindness and sensitivity, and recognise that this is the most emotionally difficult period that their member of staff has had to, and probably ever will have to, come to terms with. But we are not legislating for them. We are legislating for the tiny minority of employers that do not do the right thing—the ones that act without compassion and with complete insensitivity and carelessness.

I had lots of anecdotal evidence before, but ever since the Bill was presented, a number of people have been in touch to say how disgracefully their employers have acted—and we are not just talking about small employers; we are talking about big ones too. I even heard from one individual who was working in our NHS. That should not be happening. People are being told that they have to come back to work or take it as holiday or unpaid leave, and some are not even given time off to go to their child’s funeral. It is an absolute disgrace. If it is just one person who is affected—if just one person has to go through the huge ordeal of questioning, “Do I go back to work even though I’m not ready and my family need me and I’m going through this horrendous ordeal, or do I lose my job and get sacked and therefore not be able to provide for my family?”—this legislation is worthy and right. That is why I wholeheartedly support the Bill and we have to act.

We have discussed grief a lot today. I have had an experience of grief, and I know what my grief was like. I have a small understanding of what my wife’s grief was like, but we all grieve differently. That is why it is so important that we ensure there is flexibility in the Bill and its future incarnations, as we potentially tweak it. We have put two weeks’ leave in the Bill, but we want there to be flexibility in when that can be taken, because not everyone grieves in the same way. One person’s grief will not be the same as someone else’s. I know mine was different from my wife’s. I wanted to get back to work a lot quicker, as a coping mechanism.

It is not just about grief. It is also about the huge amount of administration and processes that you have to go through, whether it is simply going to register the death or dealing with the hospital and, in some cases, coroners and inquiries. There are other things people do not think about, like going home and having to think about the bedroom upstairs that your child used to sleep in. Who is going to do that? Who is going to go through their wardrobe? We do not necessarily think about those things when we have not gone through that tragic experience. It is important that we give parents who go through this emotional tragedy the time to grieve in peace but also to make those all-important arrangements that only they, as parents, can do. That is why the Bill is so important.

We have talked about some of the issues with the Bill. We would like it to be more than two weeks’ leave, but that is very much a floor, not a ceiling. I would like all employers to say to their staff, “You take what time you need.” I was really reassured by what the Minister said he did when he was an employer, and I hope all employers would take that approach. As other Members have rightly said, it not only builds loyalty, but we know the social and economic cost of the mental health issues and family and marital breakdown that happen when parents lose a child and are not properly supported. It is in the employer’s interest to do the right thing. Through the Bill, we will ensure that all employers that are already doing the right thing are supported and recompensed via the statutory paternity or maternity leave process. We are not rewarding employers that are already doing the right thing, but ensuring that they see a benefit from it. This is more about employers that are not doing the right thing.

This is very much meaningful change. A number of Members have talked about the fragility of private Members’ Bills; I remember mentioning it in Committee a lot. At one point, I was not sure we would get to this point, because of the number of amendments, which are all worthy in their own right. I would like to see many of them included in future incarnations of the Bill, but we have to ensure we do not make the perfect the enemy of the good—and this Bill is fundamentally good. It will do good. As I said, we are introducing one of the most advanced workers’ rights in this area in the world. This is world-leading stuff, and we should all be very proud of it. Some members of the public who have a bit of disdain for politicians say, “You MPs do nothing. What do you do for us?” Today, we are doing something for tens of thousands of bereaved parents up and down the country. We know the good that this Bill will do.

My hon. Friend the Member for Thirsk and Malton kindly and generously referred to this as Will’s Bill. It is not. All my work in this area is only as a result of my late son Robert, so if anything, it is Robert’s Bill. I cannot thank my hon. Friend enough, and I am hugely indebted to him.