Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what progress his Department is making on its consultation on parental leave and pay which closed on 29 November 2019.

In 2019, the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy consulted on high-level options for reforming parental leave and pay and is currently analysing the responses it received. We separately commissioned large scale, representative, surveys of parents and employers to gather further information on the barriers and enablers to employees taking parental leave, including Paternity Leave, and data on how parental entitlements are used in practice.

Information gathered through the consultation and the evaluation of Shared Parental Leave and Pay will inform Government policy on parental leave and pay going forward – including the Manifesto commitment to make it easier for fathers to take Paternity Leave.

The findings of the evaluation and Government Response to the consultation will be published in due course.