100 Days of New Government: Working Families’ hopes for working parents and carers
Published: 11 Jul 2024
By Kyle Green, Parliamentary & Stakeholder Engagement Manager, Working Families
With the leaflets now recycled, the polls firmly closed, and a new government in place, Working Families are looking ahead to what we would like to see the new government deliver in its first 100 days.
During the election campaign, Working Families outlined its hopes for the next government in our manifesto. These proposals focused on real, deliverable change to remove the barriers that working parents and carers face in the workplace.
While not all of these proposals were included in the Labour Party manifesto or in the New Deal for Working People, the Labour Party did promote its intention to introduce wide-ranging employment rights reforms. Now in government, Labour must demonstrate its commitment to translating these promises from written documents into reality.
To illustrate the risk of inaction, it is worth recalling that the Conservative Party, upon being re-elected in 2019, promised to introduce an Employment Bill. However, they concluded their term without introducing this legislation, although several aspects of the proposed bill were brought forward as Private Members’ Bills . This included the Employment Rights (Flexible Working) Act and Neo-natal Care Leave and Pay Act, which Working Families helped to initiate with Yasmin Qureshi MP and Stuart McDonald MP.
There are areas where the new government can deliver quickly, using the post-election summer recess to prepare for implementation.
Day One Rights
They could begin working with the civil service and other groups to start developing the groundwork to introduce initial legislation to Parliament to establish “basic individual rights from day one for all workers.”. This would include an entitlement for those classified as workers to take up to 18 weeks of unpaid parental leave for a child up to the age of 18, and for fathers to have access to paternity leave from day one in a new job, rather than having to have been employed for 26 weeks.
Access to Childcare
The introduction of 15 hours of funded childcare for nine-month to three-year olds in September will be another key test for the new Government. The Early Education and Childcare Coalition, of which Working Families are a founding member, have expressed concerns about the ability of providers to deliver this expansion. We hope to see the government take heed of these concerns and ensure that parents can access the new funded entitlement.
Improvements to Parental Leave System
Signalling that the proposed consultation on reforming the “parental leave system so that it best supports working families” within the first year would give us confidence of a genuine commitment to this issue. A swift consultation could lead to substantial and meaningful changes, particularly in boosting the uptake of parental leave among lower earners and encouraging more fathers to take paternity leave. The cost of living crisis has significantly impacted these groups, and Working Families’ research, highlighted in the Working Families Index 2023, reveals the extent of these challenges. The report found that “working mothers on lower incomes take four months less maternity leave than the UK average” and that “eight out of ten fathers without access to enhanced leave or pay reported taking less leave than they needed due to financial concerns.”
Furthermore, Rachel Reeves, the UK’s first female Chancellor, could ensure that enhanced parental leave becomes the norm rather than the exception. This could be achieved by mandating that larger companies (with over 250 employees, for example) publish their parental leave pay policies on their websites.
While the first 100 days may not define this government’s legacy, early delivery on reforms will quickly benefit ordinary people facing financial pressures. Working Families remains committed to removing the barriers that people with caring responsibilities face in the workplace and hopes to see politicians of all parties support this objective.