Maternity, Paternity and other family rights

It is often a daunting task for an employer when considering the obligations you have in respect of your employees and their rights on starting and caring for their family and other dependents.

Pregnant employees involves extra health and safety responsibilities together with the management of their time away from the workplace on maternity leave.

Being subjected to any form of detriment on the grounds of pregnancy, childbirth or because they tried to take maternity leave, could result in a claim against you, but again is avoided with planning and clear procedure.

Its not just pregnancy which you should prepare to manage as an employer, but also parents of young children are afforded protections and given rights to care for their children and are entitled to take up to 13 weeks of unpaid leave to care for them during the first five years of their life.

Employees also have the right to make a request for flexible working if they have (or expect to have) responsibility for the upbringing of a child under 17 (or a child with a disability who is under 18), or are (or expect to be) caring for another adult who falls into one of various defined categories, you are able to reject application but you must ensure that this is done in the correct way so as to avoid any form of dispute.