Mat Leave - what does your work offer?

[Miss E]

Hi Riss,

Maternity leave is changing soon in Australia. Your employer has to give you 12 months of unpaid leave and offer you the same or equivalent position back upon your return. Currently we have the baby bonus at the moment put it is paid in 13 fortnightly installments of just under $400. There are also offer family benefits available which are means tested, but I'm not all that familiar with them. If you have a look at the centrelink website you'll probably be able to get a good idea of what you may be eligible for.

In 2010 (I think) the government baby bonus will be changed to be a maternity payment which will be equivalent to the minimum wage and paid for 16 weeks I think. Your employer will also have to make super contributions on your behalf, and may offer you paid maternity leave on top of the government one.

Currently not many employers offer paid maternity leave, it's mainly employees in government services that get it. But there is a big push here now and more and more private companies are starting to develop policies.

I was able to negotiate a package with my employer for my leave, but it was done on an individual basis and I really had to push for it. To answer your questions:

*what your work offers
I was given 8 weeks at full maternity pay. I had annual leave and long service leave owing to me. So all up I got about 20 weeks of full pay which I have elected to be spread over 52 weeks. Being in a lower tax bracket I get a little under half of what my take home pay was.

*how long you have to be with you company to qualify
I've been there 10 years, it's a smaller company and my long service allowed me to negotiate this, I don't think that they have ever done more than a week or two of paid leave before. I really had to push and lobby for it though.

*what kind on industry you work in
Advertising

*how many days holiday you get per year
4 weeks (20 days). This is standard in Australia and protected by law.

*Government - what financial support do they provide
See above

Hope this helps. I think overall the situation is improving here in Australia, but we still have a long way to go. By the sound of things you've got a pretty good option there in the UK. Like Poppyfairy said, the cost of living here is really high these days, but if you're living in London you're probably used to that.

[ss_storm]

I work in local government and am eligible for 16 weeks paid leave on half pay or 8 weeks full pay, conditional on having worked for them for at least 12 months. Unfortunately for me (and I am still so upset about this!) I have worked for them for about 16 months, but the first 12 months I was on a traineeship with them which apparently 'doesn't count'...so I don't get any paid leave at all. I can get up to 2 years unpaid leave and can go back to work part time until my kids reach school age.

At the moment I think leave really depends on who you are working for. Hopefully one day (it has been promised...but who knows when it will actually happen) there will be a nation-wide maternity leave scheme. mum's are one of the most important things in a baby/child's life and I don't think we should be forced to go back to work due to our financial situations.

[~Kim~]

Miss Excited the government's paid maternity leave is not set in concrete - they're still talking about it unfrotunately.

*what your work offers - I get 14 weeks full or 28weeks at half pay
*how long you have to be with you company to qualify - 12 months
*what kind on industry you work in - I'm with the cops
*how many days holiday you get per year - 6 weeks usually but we work out west so get an extra week
*Government - what financial support do they provide - baby bonus as PP said, but I had to fight tooth and nail to get mine. We don't get any other governemnt subsidy either.

Having your baby in a public hospital doesn't cost you a thing, but if you want private anything or a doula or a homebirth the $$ really start to add up.

[NaeNae]

I work for local government also and am entitled to 13 weeks paid Mat leave which I can take at a half pay over 26 weeks. I am also eligible for the full 12 months leave including the paid portion, the remaining time is unpaid.

I can also be paid out any accured Annual leave but cannot take the time for it (so if I had 4 weeks annual leave I couldn't take 12 months mat followed by 4 weeks annual)

There is also an additional 12 months unpaid leave for parents which is not widely publicized.

We will also be recieving the Governments Baby Bonus - not sure how much that is but I think that is also paid either in a lump sum or in instalments - last year it was a lump sum butits changed so I will let you know in a few months time

Miss Excitied - I was under the impression that the governments paid Mat leave scheme was not replacing the current baby bonus but was instead of the baby bonus for people who's employers do not offer the paid mat leave. Its more than the baby bonus but then the mother is not eligible for the FTB ?? or something like that. I am sure someone with more of an idea will be able to go into more details about that


Nae x

[NaeNae]

For some reason I cannot edit my post.

Poppyfairy - thats right for casual employees, as casuals get paid a higher rate of pay to compensate for the no annual etc. BUT its not just full time employees, permanent part time employees are entitled to the same rights as full time employees pro-rata.

[Leah28]

I know this post was last active in October, but wow... I can't believe the rough deal some people get! I work in a male dominated industry/company and I get much better entitlements than some...

*what your work offers - 14 weeks @ full pay, with 4 weeks pay return to work bonus.
*how long you have to be with you company to qualify - Only 3 months!
*what kind on industry you work in Mining
*how many days holiday you get per year 5 Weeks
*Government - what financial support do they provide Everyone else has pretty well covered this, but I'll add that the baby bonus is now means tested. If the household earns over $75k in the six months after the baby is born, you're ineligible. I'll probably just scrape in, but no biggie if we don't get it

[UntoldAngel]

Leah28 - I didn't realise, or maybe I just hadn't bothered to look into it properly, that there was a cut-off for the baby bonus... I am self employed so although I can take as much time off as I want, I won't be paid for it. We were hoping that the baby bonus would help offset the loss of my monthly income, but it may not as DP works in the mining industry and should be earning a substantial amount of money although a wedding and a baby in the one year is going to hurt the hip pocket!!

[sloane]

*what your work offers - i get the statutory minimum, so i am entitled to take up to 12 months of unpaid leave.
*how long you have to be with you company to qualify - 12 months
*what kind on industry you work in - i work for a software company
*how many days holiday you get per year - 4 weeks

the govt entitlements have been covered already.

i have worked for a university previously and their entitlements were fantastic so it does depend on the employer.

[Loveinamist]

I work in local government and am eligible for 16 weeks paid leave on half pay or 8 weeks full pay, conditional on having worked for them for at least 12 months. Unfortunately for me (and I am still so upset about this!) I have worked for them for about 16 months, but the first 12 months I was on a traineeship with them which apparently 'doesn't count'...so I don't get any paid leave at all. I can get up to 2 years unpaid leave and can go back to work part time until my kids reach school age.

At the moment I think leave really depends on who you are working for. Hopefully one day (it has been promised...but who knows when it will actually happen) there will be a nation-wide maternity leave scheme. mum's are one of the most important things in a baby/child's life and I don't think we should be forced to go back to work due to our financial situations.

Storm, You just reminded me with your story of your really unfair treatment re the traineeship (that really sucks!!!) one of the BIG differences we found with work conditions in Australia and the UK is there are so many ways employers get out of doing their statutory obligations in the different ways they employ people. My DH and I found that it was really hard to get permanent full time work in Australia and alot of the maternity benefits and leave etc are dependent on being perm full time. Lots of people are employed on a casual basis and this disqualifies them from so many benefits although the higher pay is always sold as a sweetener. I worked for a govt dept in Australia for about a year before they would employ me as permanent. So when they finally did employ me I would have had to wait another year to qualify for mat pay. I know this can happen in the UK as well but we found it more prevalent in Australia. The job situation for us got pretty bad. I was trained in Australia as a teacher but even so had to move outback to get work and even that only came up after a 6 month job search (and in that time it was impossible to get supply work). DH had a job at one point working about only 5 hours a week. We ended up spending all our savings we had brought with us from our UK house sale just paying for rent and food while we tried to find jobs.