Member

I absolutely appreciate the effort and scale of this landmark legislation and appreciate the vast-reaching scope of the measures it contains. It will improve many lives. I am a pragmatist and am hopeful that we can get an increase in paternity pay. For now, however, I simply ask for parity for paternity—for dads’ rights. Seventy-two per cent of the public support more protections for dads, but only a third of new dads take paternity leave. Something is badly wrong there and I urge the Minister to listen to the campaign group The Dad Shift, which says that an estimated 4,000 dads a year who take paternity leave lose their jobs because of it.