Paid maternity leave - when and how much?
Today at 12.30 the Productivity Commission releases their draft report on Paid Maternity, Paternity and Parental Leave. It is hard to believe that we still don't have paid maternity leave (PML)in Australia. Is this another example of our political masters being under the influence of the USA, the only country in the OECD - other than Australia - without a nationally supported paid maternity leave scheme? The strongest political support for PML in Australia was from Natasha Stott Despoja, and she's gone. Sadly, no other politicians seemed to have picked up on PML with the same enthusiasm. Even the unions appear to have gone limp on the subject. They obviously don't believe it is possible to get a reasonable scheme going, so have joined with the employers' represented by the Australian Industries Group to argue that 14 weeks is all we need. This is despite a lot of evidence collected by NFAW and others that (a) the majority of Australians support the introduction of a paid maternity leave scheme, and (b) the experts believe that a minimum of six to twelve months leave is needed to give babies a good start in life. So let's get this campaign moving - GetUp have a petition going to support PML for 6-12 months. I believe 6 months is possible now, extending to 12 months in the future. The UK initially introduced a 24 week PML scheme, and are now moving to 52 weeks, so why can't Australia do the same? I can't wait to see how the Productivity Commission handles this.
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