Cervelló: Maternity rights damage women's job prospects - Instituto de Empresa Business School

Julio 21, 2008

Maternity rights damage women's job prospects

Nicola Brewer (chief executive of the UK Equalities and Human Rights Commission): "The huge extension in maternity rights are actually holding women back in the workplace.".

Employers have it very clear that hiring young women is problematic. Yes, of course, they know that many are talented and highly motivated and they are keen to hire them. And many are also supportive of women taking time off for maternity leave. On the whole, they are not grasping ogres but employers who wish to be fair to their employees. But for many employers, especially small ones, maternity leave can be an absolute minefield and, in some extreme cases, almost bring a small business down.

Just consider the practicalities of hiring a woman of child-bearing age and please bear with the technicalities. If she is pregnant, then she is entitled around four months of Ordinary Maternity Leave. In any case, irrespective of length of service.
In an extreme situation, if a woman becomes pregnant soon after taking employment (I'm not suggesting any malice here) and works for six months. she accrues the right of a year's maternity leave. So she can, after one more month, start her maternity leave. She's worked for just just seven months and may be gone for twelve. But it is worse than this.
The employee is under no obligation to return to work but, such is the asymmetry of rights and responsibilities between the employee and the employer, the employer has to leave her job open in case she does return.
In the meantime the employer has to employ temporary staff or re-jig the responsibilities of his other staff, which can lead to all sorts of resentments, in order to keep the business going. Just what are employers expected to do?
Yes, Nicola Brewer, you are right. Maternity rights are damaging women's employment prospects.
And if any of New Labour's obsessive feminist architects of the current system had had even the most modest experience of running, say, a corner shop, surely even they would have hesitated in pushing through a huge extension to maternity rights. The consequences for anybody connected with business were only too painfully obvious right from the start.

Now, my dear female colleagues, before jumping over me in order to have my head cut off, let me admitt some unappropriate behaviour here. The above lines -regardless you find them wise or a mere expression of the worst macho spirit- were not written by me. I would have liked to be so talented, but it was Ruth Lea, Director of Global Vision and Economic Advisor to Arbuthnot Banking Group, the one who put the matter in the centre of the debate at the Telegraph on Thursday, July 17, 2008. Time for discussion?

Posted on 21 Julio 2008

Comments

Of course, it's a very tipical old male comment. If all the parents (women or men) were proud of bring up, care, feed therir children, in the same conditions, with some justice in the skills, abilities and responsabilities, this article will be about PERSONS, not WOMEN. The author could think about this: who support his own pregnancy? and the pregnancy of his children? yes, I agree, it's impossible he has any children, no women in the worl could suffer a man like this !!

Posted by: Ana BG at Julio 22, 2008 02:41 PM

Dear Ana,
Many thanks for your opinion. I don't know if the post contains a tipical old male comment, but it was actually made by a woman, Ruth Lea, as menmtioned at the bottom. I don't know either if Ms. Lea has any children and whether it is easy or not for a man or a woman to suffer HER, but she's pretty much respected among her colleagues in the UK as far as her professional opinion is concerned. Not offence taken.

Posted by: Juan Carlos Olarra at Julio 23, 2008 10:34 AM

Dear Juan Carlos,

First of all please apologize my english, its been a little bit of time since I don´t deal with it.

In my opinion, the main problem starts in the difference itself. Let my explain myself. If we create a scope of maternity rights for the sake of employers rights, we are al ready creating the difference. Lets think an equilibrate scenario in which we all perfectly assume what maternity implies in life matters. The employer would be in a manner "compensated" or "helped" to carry on his bussines in those cases, so it would not be worth for him to hire women, nor so if he knows that at any time maternity rights would be huge than his own rights as an employer.

So, finally its a question of how we regulate those human matters. To recognize rights to the detriment of others, is what helps to create the
differences. But identifying the interests that are at stake, both woman who works as the businessman who hired her would help us to weigh those interests, and to recognize in a a better way the rights and obligations of both.

Many Thanks,
alberto.

Posted by: Alberto Vicente-Gella. at Julio 29, 2008 12:35 PM

Dear Alberto,

I think you identified the key underlying issue. Your comment is sharp and wise.

Posted by: Juan Carlos at Agosto 1, 2008 03:21 PM

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