What is parental leave?

Parental leave is a right for parents who are employees to take time off work to look after a child or make arrangements for the child’s welfare. Parents can use it to spend more time with children and strike a better balance between their work and family commitments.

Parental leave is unpaid and available for each child born or adopted.

Who can take parental leave?

Parental leave is available to employees who have, or expect to have, parental responsibility for a child. To be eligible, employees generally have to have one year’s continuous service with their current employer.

How long does parental leave last?

Employees get 13 weeks in total for each child. Parents of disabled children get 18 weeks in total.

What happens if an employee has twins?

Parental leave is for each child, so if twins are born/adopted each parent will get 13 weeks leave for each child (18 weeks for parents of each disabled child).

When can parental leave be taken?

As long as they give the correct notice to their employer, parents are able to take parental leave at any time from the birth (or adoption) up to the child’s fifth birthday (or fifth year of adoption placement).  Parents of disabled children can take up to 18 weeks up to their child’s 18th birthday.

Please note your employer has the right to postpone your requested parental leave dates for up to 6 months, if their business would be significantly affected by your leave.

Will employees be able to return to the same job after parental leave?

At the end of parental leave, an employee is guaranteed the right to return to the same job as before if the leave was for a period of four weeks or less; if it was for a longer period the employee is entitled to return to the same job, or, if that is not reasonably practicable, a similar job which has the same or better status, terms and conditions as the old job if one is available.

When parental leave follows maternity/adoption leave, the general rule is that a woman is entitled to return to the same job she had before the leave. If at the end of additional maternity/adoption leave, this would not have been reasonably practicable, and it is still not reasonably practicable at the end of parental leave, she is entitled to return to a similar job which has the same or better status, terms and conditions as the old job if one is available.

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Please note that the advice given on this website and by our Advisors is guidance only and cannot be taken as an authoritative interpretation of the law. It can also not be seen as specific advice for individual cases. Please also note that there are differences in legislation in Northern Ireland.