Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, with reference to the letter of 12 January 2021 from Maternity Action, the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists and the Royal College of Midwives recommending that the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme be amended to enable employers to recover the full cost of a maternity suspension on full pay of a woman who is 28 weeks pregnant or more, what estimate his Department has made of the monthly cost to the Exchequer of implementing that proposal.

The objective of the CJRS is to enable employers to keep people in employment. In order to achieve this, the grants compensate employers for the payments that they are contractually obliged to make in order to avoid the need for redundancies. Covering maternity suspension would go beyond the objectives of the scheme. It is also the case that the level of support provided through the CJRS must remain the same for all employers and employees, and that the CJRS is only one part of a wider package of support for business and individuals affected by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Since March 2020, the Government has provided support for people, businesses and public services totalling an estimated £280 billion. In particular, businesses have received billions in loans, tax deferrals, Business Rate reliefs, and general and sector-specific grants. This support can be used by businesses to top up the CJRS grant, ensuring that they can suspend pregnant employees on full pay.