Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, if she will make it her policy to provide additional statutory maternity pay to mothers who are unable to find childcare to enable their return to work during the covid-19 outbreak.

Statutory Maternity Pay (SMP) and Maternity Allowance (MA) provide a measure of earnings replacement to help women who have worked during or close to their pregnancies to stop working towards the end of their pregnancy and in the months after childbirth, in the interests of their own and their babies' health and wellbeing.

We currently have no plans to extend maternity pay or allowance. If SMP or MA entitlement ends, Universal Credit and/or Employment and Support Allowance are available to claim for people unable to work because they are directly affected by coronavirus or self-isolating according to Government advice.