New Paternity Leave rights confirmed

The need to know points are:

• The two-week paternity leave entitlement can be taken as two separate one-week blocks. This is a change from the current situation where employees can only take one continuous block of paternity leave of one or two weeks. So, from 6 April, an employee could take one week of paternity leave when the baby is born and a second week after, say, 9 months when their partner returns to work. Alternatively, they might choose to take no paternity leave at all immediately after the birth but 2 weeks’ consecutive leave several months after the birth.
• Paternity leave must still be taken in blocks of one week so it still can’t be taken as individual days.
• Employees will be able to take paternity leave at any time in the 52 weeks after birth or adoption. Currently, employees can only take leave within the first 8 weeks after birth or adoption.
• Employees will only need to give 28 days’ notice of their intention to take paternity leave. This will significantly reduce the current requirement to give notice 15 weeks before the Expected Week of Childbirth (EWC)).
• Dates specified for leave may be changed as long as the employer is given at least 28 days’ notice.
• It will remain the case that there is no right to postpone statutory paternity leave or request it be taken at a different time even if it is inconvenient. This applies equally to paternity leave taken in the weeks immediately after the birth/adoption and to paternity leave taken much later on within the 52-week window after birth/adoption.
• The purpose of the paternity leave must still be for the employee to care for the child or support their partner. It cannot be used, for example, for self-care or to go on holiday without the baby.
• Statutory paternity pay is due to increase slightly in April 2024 to £184.03 per week.

The Labour Party has indicated that it may remove the 6 months’ service currently required to qualify for statutory paternity leave so a change of government may bring further change on this front.

What do we need to do to prepare?

These changes to paternity entitlements reflect a shifting attitude towards shared parenting responsibilities and gender equality. The changes take effect in April 2024 and at the same time as other family-friendly changes including the introduction of carer’s leave, changes to flexible working rights, the extension of redundancy protection to cover pregnant employees and those recently returned from maternity, adoption and shared parental leave.

Increasingly, some employers are choosing to offer enhanced paternity pay (up to full pay for the two weeks).

Employers will need to review and update their family leave policies prior to these changes taking effect in April.  Line managers and HR staff will need to be up to speed with the changes so they are ready and prepared to handle queries appropriately.

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