Posted: Wednesday 8 December 2010
Proposal To Increase Maternity Entitlement To 20 Weeks' Full Pay Rejected
Organisations may be relieved to know that the Council of Ministers (which is the European Union organisation which represents the governments of the Member States) has rejected the European Parliament’s proposal to extend paid maternity leave to 20 weeks.
I previously blogged on the fact that this was being considered:-
Proposal To Increase Fully Paid Maternity Leave To 20 Weeks
At the present time female employees in the UK are entitled to 12 months’ maternity leave with the first 6 weeks paid at 90% of full pay (unless there is a more generous contractual entitlement). The next 33 weeks are paid at the statutory maternity pay rate which is currently £124.88.
Despite this development it is likely that discussions will continue in respect of some sort of extension of paid maternity leave entitlement. It does though look like the 20 week proposal may well be dropped. Watch this space for further developments.
