Parental Leave Policy

  1. Statement of principles

    1. Parental leave is a right to take unpaid time off work to look after a child or make arrangements for the child’s welfare. Parents can use it to spend more time with children and strike a better balance between their work and family commitments.

  2. Leave entitlement

    1. Each parent can take a total of 13 weeks unpaid parental leave for each child, over a period of 5 years from the date that the child is born. This means that both mothers and fathers if they have twins or adopt more than 1 child at a time, can take 13 weeks’ leave for each child (18 weeks for parents of each disabled child).
    2. This leave must be taken in blocks of 1 week or more, with a maximum of 4 weeks in any one year for each child.
    3. 1 year is calculated from the date that the child is born. In the case of adopted children, this is calculated from the date of placement (i.e. the date when a child is placed by an external agency into a family home prior to formal adoption), up until the fifth anniversary of the date when the placement for adoption began.
    4. There may be occasions when there is no date of placement; for example, if the child is already in a family when a step-parent formally adopts the child in the place of a parent. In such cases, the period in which leave can be taken starts when the step-parent acquires a reasonable expectation of gaining parental responsibility and ends on the child’s fifth birthday, and is calculated on a pro rata basis.
    5. Parents of disabled children can take 18 weeks parental leave for each disabled child up to the child’s 18th birthday, and may take the leave in days or periods shorter than a week. For the purposes of parental leave, a "disabled child" is a child for whom an award of Disability Living Allowance has been made.
    6. ‘1 weeks’ parental leave is equal to the length of time that an employee is normally required to work in a week. This means that a week’s leave for an employee who usually works from Monday to Friday is equal to 5 days, while for an employee who works Mondays and Tuesdays only, a week’s leave is equal to 2 days.
    7. If an employee who takes parental leave in blocks of 1 week, changes his or her hours of work, then a week’s parental leave would be equal to what would be a normal working week under the new contract of employment.

  3. Eligibility

    1. In order to be eligible for Parental Leave, the employee must either be named on the child’s birth certificate or they must have, or expect to have, parental responsibility under the law for the child. The parents of a child do not have to be living with the child in order to qualify for parental leave.
    2. Employees who are adopting a child will be entitled to take parental leave as they will have parental responsibility when they adopt.
    3. In some cases legal responsibility for looking after a child will have been given to someone other than a natural or adoptive parent, such as a guardian. If an individual has acquired parental responsibility for the child, he or she will be entitled to parental leave if the qualifying conditions set out in this document are met.

  4. Qualifying periods

    1. In order to be eligible for parental leave, employees must have worked for Aberystwyth University continuously for a year by the time they want to take the leave.
    2. Mothers can take parental leave immediately after a period of maternity leave.

  5. Notice provisions

    1. An employee needs to give at least 21 days notice to Aberystwyth University, giving the dates when the leave is to start and finish.
    2. Where an employee wishes to take parental leave immediately after the birth of a child, the employee needs to give 21 days’ notice before the beginning of the expected week of childbirth (this date is confirmed by the MATb1).
    3. Where parental leave is required immediately after the placement of a child for adoption the employee needs to give 21 days’ notice of the expected week of placement. In rare cases where this is not possible, an adoptive parent should give the notice as soon as is reasonably practicable.
    4. Provided that the employee has given the notice set out above, parental leave will start on the day on which the child is born, regardless of whether the child is born early or late, or the day on which the child is placed for adoption.

  6. Postponement provisions

    1. If the Head of Department / Line Manager considers that an employee’s absence would unduly disrupt the business, then Aberystwyth University can postpone the leave for no longer than six months after the beginning of the period that the employee originally wanted to start his or her parental leave.
    2. The employer should discuss the postponement with the employee and give notice of the postponement in writing no later than seven days after the employee’s notice to take leave was given to him.
    3. The employer’s notice should state the reason for the postponement and set out the new dates of parental leave. The length of the leave should be equivalent to that in the employee’s original request.
    4. Leave may only be postponed where the Head of Department / Line Manager considers that the business would be unduly disrupted if the employee took leave at the time he or she has chosen. Aberystwyth University may be justified in postponing leave when, for example, the work is at a seasonal peak; where a significant proportion of the workforce applies for parental leave at the same time; or when the employee’s role is such that his or her absence at a particular time would unduly harm the business.
    5. However, when an employee applies to take parental leave immediately after the birth or adoption of a child, then the employer cannot postpone the leave.
    6. An employee should not lose the entitlement to parental leave because leave is postponed by the employer.
    7. An employer may only postpone a period of parental leave for a period of six months and not after the child's 18th birthday.

  7. Evidence of entitlement

    1. Aberystwyth University may ask to see evidence that the employee is the parent of a child or has parental responsibility for the child, that the child is below the age at which the right to parental leave ceases and, where relevant, that the child is entitled to disability living allowance. Evidence might take the form of the child’s birth certificate, papers confirming a child’s adoption or the date of placement for adoption, or in the case of a disabled child, a record of disability living allowance payments for the child. Aberystwyth University may also request records from a previous employer, where the qualifying period overlaps both employments.

  8. Terms and conditions during parental leave

    1. The employment contract continues during an absence on parental leave, unless it is terminated by the employer or employee. This means that an employee continues to benefit from his or her statutory employment rights during parental leave. He or she will continue to accrue contractual holiday entitlement, and the employee’s pension rights are unaffected and will remain the same as they would have been if the employee had not been absent.
    2. At the end of parental leave, an employee is guaranteed the right to return to the same job as before, if the leave was for a period of 4 weeks or less. If it was for a longer period, the employee is entitled to return to the same job, or, if that is not reasonably practicable, a similar job which has the same or better status, terms and conditions as the old job.
    3. When parental leave follows maternity leave, the general rule is that a woman is entitled to return to the same job she had before the leave. If at the end of additional maternity leave, this would not have been reasonably practicable, and it is still not reasonably practicable at the end of parental leave, she is entitled to return to a similar job which has the same or better status, terms and conditions as the old job.
    4. An employee taking parental leave will be treated in the same as any other employee when a redundancy situation arises. This includes treatment relating to consultation about the redundancy and consideration for any other job vacancies.

Policy Review

This policy will be reviewed not less than every two years, unless to comply with statutory changes or important case-law. All reviews will include the recognised trades unions in the widest possible consultation.

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