well, we were planning to TTC by the end of this year, and fingers crossed we have our first child before the end of 2010! BUT, does anyone think this seems rather abrupt bringing it in straight like that? For me it would make more sense to stagger it, for instance bringing in 4 weeks paid every six months etc etc....
I'm just imagining this sudden massive increase in pregnancies in march/april 2010 and then a swamping of the public hospitals for january 2011! It's going to be ridiculously busy at that time....i for one don't want to be in a busy hospital giving birth at this time...18 weeks pay or not.
I guess because i work for a public hospital i am thinking about what a huge workload this is going to cause!
nikkers: im not sure if itll make much difference in the amt of births, depends what type of work people have done before getting pg (i assume ppl will have to have workd for thier employer for at least 12 months to qualify, just as at the moment to get unpaid maternity leave u have to have been there for at least 12 months) and it will be instead of baby bonus/ftbb so ppl will weigh up whats a better option for them at the time.
hey tattoo_mama, i'm not sure of the exact details, but i remember reading somewhere that you only had to work the equivalent of 1 day a week for 12 months before the birth, or something similar...maybe it was 330 hours? don't quote me!!!
also, the $5000 baby bonus will be incorporated in to the approx $9500 package, so people who give birth in jan 2011 rather than dec 2010 will be better off by about $4500.
thats my understanding...?
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