My colleagues are entitled to 1 week of parental leave following the birth or adoption of a child which they are a parent of if they are NOT the primary care-giver of the child. In the case of a same sex couple the parent who is not the primary care-giver is entitled to this week of paid leave. Parental leave comes out of holiday entitlements, if you don't have any holiday leave owing then the parental leave is unpaid. The primary care-giver is entitled to 10 weeks paid leave at full pay (this 'maternity' leave is paid by my employer and is separate to all other entitlements). Only ONE parent can claim to be the primary caregiver and my employer requires a statutory declaration to state that this is the parent claiming paid maternity leave. I work with many same-sex couples, some of whom have become parents. The system of leave entitlements seems to work quite well.
My DH has negotiated the same arrangement from his employer and after the birth of our next child he will take one week of leave, paid from his holiday leave entitlement. He works for a small company, I work for a large organisation. At this point, I believe that 'paternity' leave ('parental' leave at my work!) is very much determined by each individual employer.
Raupe, 'carer's leave' at my work (other's might be different?) is used when the employee is required to care for a member of their immediate family who is ill ie. children. The leave is paid/deducted from sick leave entitlements and is separate from parental leave.
a lot of people will have accrued six leave and will take carers (sick) leave if their partner has to have a c/s to extend their leave entitlements while still receiving payments.
there are soooo many terms out there. for permanent employees, there is a government legislation (i believe) that allows for either parent to have up to 52 weeks of parental leave and still have their job available at the end of it. it is generally unpaid, and it is set up so that only one person can claim this status at a time. in the case where the birth mother decides to return to work early (six months post partum for instance) the other parent has the optino of taking unpaid leave for the balance of the first 12 months of the baby's life, and the employer is obligated to keep their position open for them after that period of time. there is no guarantee for employment for casual employees though
the whole system is complicated - my suggestion to anyone who's partner is ttc or pregnant is to find out in advance what your entitlements through your employer are - and if it turns out that you're not entitled to any time off under your agreement, but you can acrue leave, try and save up your rec leave to take!
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