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Parliamentary committee presses for improvements to parental leave
The Women and Equalities Committee (WEC) published a report which urges the introduction of significantly more generous parental leave. The WEC’s new report on paternity and shared parental leave begins by highlighting that the UK has the least generous paternity leave periods in the EU and among the lowest across the 38 Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development countries. Pointing to the disparity between statutory maternity leave (up to 52 weeks) and statutory paternity leave (up to two weeks), the WEC comments that, “The design of the system reflects and entrenches the norm that mothers overwhelmingly bear these responsibilities”. Recommendations include:
• raising paternity pay to the level of maternity pay in the first six weeks i.e. 90% of average earnings;
• 6 weeks of paid statutory paternity leave instead of two;
• increasing the statutory rate for parental leave to 80% or more of average earnings or the Real Living Wage (currently, £187.18 per week which is less than 50% of the statutory national living wage);
• reform shared parental leave to widen access;
• consideration of statutory paid leave for kinship carers who are people who care for the children of their family members or friends.
The WEC is an influential Parliamentary committee and media reports of its parental leave recommendations have been a feature in this week’s news. The report’s observation that the government’s own review of the parental leave system will start by early July may be of interest to employers.
Report shows how caring duties impact work
This week is Carers Week and a report has been published to highlight the disadvantages that carers experience relative to people without caring experience. The theme of Carers Week is caring about equality and the report’s analysis may be of interest to employers which includes research showing that:
• 11.9 million individuals are currently providing unpaid support to family members and friends;
• an estimated 600 people a day give up work to provide unpaid care;
• women are more likely to provide care than men;
• 43% of carers said they had a mental or physical health condition develop or become worse since caring;
• 46% of carers in employment said they face disadvantages in relation to staying in paid work and career opportunities;
• 25% of carers have reduced their working hours to care; and
• 40% of carers in paid employment said they needed more flexibility at work and 28% said they needed more carer’s leave provisions.
The report urges the government to make statutory carer’s leave a paid entitlement, facilitate longer periods of leave and make caring a protected characteristic. The government has already committed to review carer’s leave as part of its Next Steps to Make Work Pay policy paper.
ICO launches AI and biometrics strategy
The ICO launched a new AI and biometrics strategy to ensure that new technologies, including those used in recruitment, are innovating and growing in a lawful way. A research paper accompanying the ICO’s new AI strategy shows:
• job seekers want transparency in the use of AI;
• human oversight is essential;
• AI should be unbiased;
• candidate experience of AI matters; and
• there may be a more positive perception of AI use for initial filtering than for fully automated recruitment processes.
The ICO reports that in recruitment, 64% of the public believe employers will rely too heavily on AI, and 61% say it will perform worse than human decision-makers when assessing individual circumstances. The ICO’s new AI strategy will review the use of automated decision-making systems by the recruitment industry and will work towards a statutory code of practice on AI and automated decision-making. Employers using AI may want to monitor for developments, and also audit their existing AI use for compliance with employment laws and current ICO guidance on AI and automated decision-making.
This page is updated weekly with News and Views from that week’s employment weekly briefing email. For previous articles, please contact us: Employment Law Plus.
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