‘Not just broken but elitist’: UK’s top earners benefit most from shared parental leave

The UK's top earners are benefitting the most from shared parental leave as campaigners have criticised the policy as "elitist" and "broken" and Keir Starmer faces an internal push to overhaul the scheme.

New data obtained by campaign group The Dad Shift under freedom of information (FOI) laws found that 60 per cent of those claiming shared parental leave are in the top 20 per cent of earners in the UK and the bottom half of earners made just five per cent of the claims.

Another of the group’s FOI requests to HMRC found just 10,600 new fathers took shared parental leave in the tax year 2023-24, compared with 623,100 women taking up paid maternity leave over the same period.

The group said this figure suggested less than two per cent of new fathers were taking up the scheme, which enables parents to divide up to 37 weeks of paid leave and up to 50 weeks of leave between them. For fathers this equates to £184.3 per week.

Alex Lloyd Hunter, co-founder of The Dad Shift, said, “this is a failed policy; British families and British fathers deserve better”, and warned “our current system is not just broken but elitist too”.

“Whether they’re well off or not, British dads want and deserve a meaningful chunk of properly paid time off so they can bond with their babies, be there for their partners, and get started on being decent fathers,” he said.

The government has promised to review parental leave in its first year in power, calling for employees to be entitled to statutory paternity leave from their first day in the job. Current rules mean fathers can only claim the leave when they been employed for 26 weeks or more.

A spokesperson for the Department for Business and Trade said they are “making paternity leave and unpaid parental leave day one rights as part of our Employment Rights Bill, which will play a key role in delivering our plan to make work pay.”

The representative added: “We will also carry out a review of wider statutory parental leave to ensure it offers the best possible support to working families around the country and boost economic growth.”

It comes after 30 Labour MPs have signed a letter to the prime minister - spearheaded by The Dad Shift - calling for “parental leave that is affordable for people to take, gives a substantial allowance of time, and supports equality among parents.”

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Labour MP Kirith Entwistle said she massively benefitted from her husband being home when their son was born.

“I remember the fear and dread, and lack of confidence in leaving the house or being on my own with him the night before my husband went back to work,” she said.

“There are so many mothers out there right now who desperately need that support, and dads who have no choice but to go back to work. Shared parental leave is a farce and only an option for those who can afford it.”

Answers to a parliamentary question tabled by Labour MP Josh Simons showed £40.8 million was spent by the government in shared parental leave payments in London since the policy was rolled out in 2014, which is more than the total paid in Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland, the North West, and the North East combined.

Mr Lloyd Hunter said the UK had the worst statutory paternity leave in Europe. “Just two weeks on less than half the minimum wage,” he said.

“Shared parental leave was meant to help change things, but guess what - a policy that pays virtually no money, is ridiculously complex to administer, and requires men to take leave away from the mothers of their children didn't work all that well.”