Articles by McGrigors
28 April 2005
Parties looking for ways to boost Family
Fortunes
by Murray McCall
(Published Evening News)
As the election campaign moves into its last week, expect to hear more about hard-working families as the issue of "family-friendly" employment rights comes to the fore.
The main parties are vying for the key votes of working families and while they may also try to court the business vote, employers’ interests and concerns are likely to be overshadowed. A number of key changes in employment rights have been proposed by the main parties.
Expectant mothers are currently entitled to 26 weeks’ maternity leave regardless of how long they have worked for their employer.
This can be followed by a further six months of unpaid maternity leave if they have worked for their employer for more than 26 weeks. Pay during this initial period is set at 90 per cent of full salary for the first six weeks, reducing to the flat rate of £106 per week for the next 20 weeks.
Labour has promised to extend the period of paid leave to nine months in 2007 and ultimately to 12 months by 2010, but no indication has been given of a rise in the rate of statutory maternity pay.
The Liberal Democrats want to preserve the length of maternity leave, but are promising to increase the flat rate payment to £170 a week for six months. This, however, will only apply to a mother expecting her first child.
The Conservatives are proposing to let mothers have more flexibility in choosing their length of paid leave, either taking six months at a flat rate of £170, as proposed by the Liberal Democrats, or nine months at the current rate proposed by Labour.
The SNP has stated in its manifesto that it will increase support for parents to help them combine work with family, but they do not outline their detailed proposals.
Labour has also outlined a potentially far-reaching proposal to allow fathers to take some of the mother’s maternity leave, so making it transferable between the parents. The details on this are as yet unclear and the other political parties remain non-committal on this topic. If enacted, this would increase fathers’ current statutory entitlement from two weeks’ paternity leave which is paid at £106 per week.
As a result of European law, all parties (with the exception of those who advocate withdrawal from the European Union) will be compelled to bring in legislation aimed at outlawing age discrimination at work.
The Government announced that, from October 2006, employers will be barred from imposing arbitrary retirement ages below the age of 65.
Employees would not be forced to work beyond their normal retirement age, but if they wanted to work longer, their employers would not be able to refuse their request unless it could be proved they were incompetent, redundant, etc.
The Conservatives have recently stated that they would like to consider gradually extending the age at which retirement would be made compulsory to 70.
The SNP is committed to tackling age discrimination by increasing flexible working and flexible retirement.
In 1999, Labour introduced the National Minimum Wage (NMW) at a rate of £3 per hour for those aged 18-21 (the development rate) and at £3.60 per hour for those aged 22 and over (the adult rate).
This has increased annually and currently stands at £4.10 for 18-21 year olds and £4.85 for over 22s. In its manifesto, Labour has pledged to raise the adult rate to £5.05 from October 2005 and to £5.35 from October 2006.
The Conservatives have matched this pledge, while the Liberal Democrats propose to scrap the development rate so that all employees aged 16 and over would be entitled to receive the full adult rate. In stark contrast, the Scottish Socialist Party has proposed a NMW of £8 per hour.
The cynics might say that promises made at election time will not be kept. However, there seems to be a large measure of consensus among the parties who realistically expect to govern when it comes to improving employment rights for millions of employees, including working parents.
Employers may not be quite as enthusiastic about
the extension of rights currently being promoted.
Murray McCall, associate in the People Services team
at UK law firm McGrigors.
For further information please contact:
peopleservices@mcgrigors.com
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