Parental Leave

If you have completed 1 year of employment with your employer you have parental responsibility for a child, you are entitled to 13 weeks unpaid parental leave for each of your children.

The leave must be taken before your child's 5th birthday and is in addition to a mothers maternity leave.

Unless your child is disabled the leave must be taken in weekly blocks.

You can take a maximum of four weeks parental leave per year for each child.

Adoption Leave

If you have completed 26 weeks of employment with your employer at the point at which you adopt your child either you or your spouse are entitled to take up to 52 weeks adoption leave.

Adoption leave can be taken at any time before the 5th anniversary of the date when the placement adoption began, or the childs 18th birthday, if earlier.

Your employer can’t discriminate against you for taking or seeking to take adoption leave and if they do or if you lose your job because of your adoption or your employer refuses to let you return from adoption leave then you will be entitled to bring a discrimination claim to an employment tribunal and to be awarded compensation.

If you have been the victim of discrimination as a result of your taking adoption leave then call one of our expert advisers now. We’ll take care of your claim so that you can concentrate on taking care of your new family.

Emergency Family Leave

All employees are a short period of unpaid leave to make arrangements to deal with specific circumstances involving a dependent such as their child, spouse or an elderly relative who they care for.

The amount of time should be reasonable and sufficient to deal with the immediate problem and make longer term arrangements.

Paternity Leave

If you are a father and have completed 26 weeks of employment with your employer 15 weeks before the birth of your baby or the adoption of your child then subject to giving your employer proper notice you are entitled to take either one or two consecutive weeks as paternity leave.

Most employees will be entitled to statutory paternity pay from their employers during their paternity leave.