From 6th April 2022 parents in Northern Ireland have finally been given the right to take time off following the death or stillbirth of their, or their partners child.
Parental Bereavement Leave was originally enacted in 2018, however this did not come into effect for Great Britain until 6th April 2020.
Now that this has been in place for a few years, lets take another look at what it is, and what it involves for employers and employees.
Prior to the right, it was up to the discretion of Organisations and companies whether employees could take time away from work due to grievance. If leave was granted, the company or organization was not bound to pay for it, putting working parents in an incredible difficult situation.
A consultation was opened by the Government in 2018 to seek public opinion on Parental Bereavement Leave, following this the Parental Bereavement (Leave and Pay) act was created later in the year.
In January 2020 it was confirmed the act would come into effect from April 6th via the Parental Bereavement Leave (General) Regulations 2022 and the Statutory Parental Bereavement Pay (General) Regulations 2020.
Employees are entitled up to two weeks leave from any point up to 56 weeks following the passing of their or their partners child.
This can be taken as either a single week leave, a single block of two weeks leave, or two separate blocks of a week. This is designed to cater to as many employees as possible, as everyone’s grieving process is individual and unique. Unfortunately, not everyone may be eligible.
You can take Statutory Bereavement Leave from the first day of employment. This includes parents whose child has passed (under the age of 18) and those whose baby is stillborn (after 24 weeks).
The term parents and parental include the child’s biological, adoptive (after the adoption order has been granted or the child has been placed) or, where a child was born to a surrogate, parents, and their parents’ partner.
The eligibility to take this leave is defined widely and based on the employee’s caring responsibilities for the child, if care was given as a ‘primary carer’, or if the relationship was ‘parental’ in nature, are eligible to take this leave.
Those who had day-to-day responsibility for the child, where the child lives with the employee, or where the employee made payments for care of the child, such as fostering, is also covered by the act.
Regarding surrogacy there are various individuals to be aware of including, including the parents who were to raise the baby and the surrogate.
Employees with 26 weeks services or more and entitled to £156.66 per week, or 90% of their pervious weekly earnings (whichever is lowest).
(To be eligible, the employee must be earning an average of £!23.00 per weekly earnings)
This Act sets out the basic rights of employees, but there is nothing stopping employers from giving more, should they feel inclined to (this would need to be consistently applied to all employees).
Even when following the act to its minimum, employers can offer grieving parents some small comfort during these difficult times.
We can provide you with Parental Bereavement Leave Policy and Templates through or HR Documentation package.
Check out our website to see how we can help you and what we provide, alternatively pop us a message.
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