§ Ms Margaret Hodge (Barking)This debate is about the rights of one small group of people in our society. They are people who deserve our full support but who suffer gross injustice and against whom we currently discriminate. I am talking about women who cannot, for a variety of reasons, have their own children, and who therefore choose to adopt a child. At present, mothers who adopt a child are not entitled to statutory maternity leave or statutory maternity pay. Rights that are universal for women who are lucky enough to be able to bear their own children are denied to those who cannot have children and therefore adopt.
As the Minister knows, I and others, including my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield, Hillsborough (Helen Jackson), have been waging a long campaign on behalf of adoptive parents. In the dying days of the previous Government, I introduced a ten-minute Bill designed to end that unfair discrimination. Sadly but unsurprisingly, our coherent and overwhelming argument fell on deaf ears. There were few votes in support of that cause.
One of the first actions taken by the new Government— indeed, by the Minister who will reply to the debate—has been to start the process of righting the wrongs that these women suffer. When Britain adopts and incorporates the social chapter, we shall end part of the discrimination that currently confronts adoptive parents. I warmly welcome that move and congratulate the Minister on that action.
When the social chapter comes into force in two years" time, adoptive parents will be entitled to adoptive leave, but it will remain unpaid. That simply is not right, and I hope that the Minister will listen carefully to the case that I and my hon. Friends put to him today. I hope that we convince him and his colleagues in government to go the whole way, and I hope that he will act swiftly to put an end to that dreadful and unjust discrimination.
Each year, 3,500 children are adopted into new families. Fewer than 400 are babies under a year old. Most are children who have come through the care system. They may have been shunted from children's homes to foster homes and back to children's homes. For them, the only alternative to a childhood in institutional care is adoption. For them, adoption is their only lifeline chance of experiencing a happy childhood in a loving family. For the parents who adopt, adoption represents their final opportunity of enjoying the fulfilling role of bringing up a child and creating a family.
We all know that adoption is the best option for those children. We know that it is good for the parents, for society and indeed for Government, for by promoting adoption we shall save the state the massive alternative expense of keeping children in institutional care. All of us are therefore beholden especially those who have the onerous task of governing on our behalf, to remove unnecessary barriers to adoption. However, in discriminating against mothers who adopt by denying them the right to maternity pay, we are not only perpetuating injustice but retaining a deeply unjust barrier to adoption.
Not all the 3,500 mothers of children adopted into a new family will continue to work, but some will want to and others will have to. We should work on the principle 914 that they have the right to choose. At present, discrimination means that they have lesser rights than natural mothers.
§ Mr. Alan Simpson (Nottingham, South)I congratulate my hon. Friend on the points that she is making. Does she accept that we should also be talking about parental leave that includes fathers' rights? I make that point because I suspect that I am one of the few people in the House, or perhaps the country, who has had parental leave for all my children, including my son, whom we adopted.
I was very conscious that the initial period of parental leave helped to dispel some of my fears about whether it would be possible to love a child who was not my own, and made it possible to establish routines of bonding that were to serve us throughout the entirety of the lives that followed. I am profoundly grateful to my son for the lessons that he has taught me about loving. We should include fathers in those rights as well as mothers.
§ Ms HodgeI accept the point that my hon. Friend makes. I am taking things a step at a time. However, fathers' rights are recognised in the social chapter.
Since I and others have taken up this cause on behalf of adoptive parents, we have been inundated with heart-rending letters, telephone calls and visits from people who feel deeply bitter and angry at the treatment that they received from their employers when they adopted children.
I spoke to an occupational therapist from Birmingham who had adopted a two-and-a-half-year-old girl after a series of miscarriages. When she asked for leave, her manager said that it was impossible because she could not give a precise date when she would bring the child home. He also could not understand why she needed time off, because she was not going through a pregnancy and a birth.
Another mother, from Nottingham, had to go through the humiliating experience of telling a panel all about her gynaecological problems when she was pleading for maternity leave and maternity pay to look after the 10-week-old baby whom she had adopted. Some mothers have been forced to leave their job because they could not secure maternity leave. Others were sacked when they even dared to ask for it.
A civil servant, an employee of the Government, working in Norfolk, adopted a 16-month-old child. When she asked for leave, even she found that she was entitled to only 20 days' paid leave compared with a natural mother, who is entitled to paid leave for 18 weeks. When she collected signatures for a petition among her colleagues at work, they could not believe that she was not entitled to equal treatment. That is the case everywhere. No one can believe that, in the latter days of the 20th century, we in Britain practise such inhumane and unjust discrimination against mothers who are unfortunate enough to be unable to have their own children.
The argument goes—Ministers have written to me and to my hon. Friend the Member for Hillsborough repeating this view—that maternity benefits are paid simply to allow the mother to take time off work physically to recover from childbirth and to protect the health of mother and child. That is an outdated, Victorian view of pregnancy and parenting. Gone are the days when pregnancy and childbirth were regarded as an illness.
915 Of course there are exceptions, but most mothers— having had four children, I should think that I know what I am talking about—need maternity leave primarily, not physically to recover from birth, but to allow time to bond with the new baby, time to get to know one another, and time to adjust to the new relationships and the changed circumstances that a new arrival in the family brings.
That is as true for those who adopt as it is for natural mothers. Arguably, maternity leave is even more important for those who adopt. Often the children come from families where they have been subject to abuse or neglect and it is vital that mothers have time to settle the new child, who may well be traumatised by previous experiences. We want adoptions to work and we should help adoptive mothers by stamping out the discrimination that they face.
Ministers may say that they cannot afford to extend maternity benefits to that group. As it costs less than £2,000 per adoption to pay maternity benefit and £50,000 for every year that a child is kept in institutional care, it makes financial sense for the Government to fund the maternity benefit and save expenditure on keeping children in care. Ministers may also say that they do not want to saddle employers with another statutory benefit right. That is simply unfair to adoptive parents and it exaggerates the impact of our proposals, for we are talking about some 1,500 women who adopt each year and continue to work, and who will therefore receive the entitlement, alongside the 260,000 natural mothers who currently exercise their rights each year—that is just over half of 1 per cent, of the current total.
A strong business case can also be made for ending the discrimination. That is recognised by companies such as the Body Shop and Boots and a number of local authorities, which have an adoption policy for their employees. First, if adoptive mothers are entitled to maternity leave and pay, they are more likely to stay in their jobs, thus saving employers recruitment and training costs and helping them to keep skilled and experienced staff. Secondly, small employers can at present insure for statutory maternity leave and pay. Employers cannot insure for those circumstances for which there is no statutory basis. For small employers, footing the bill by exercising discretion in favour of adoptive mothers then becomes a financial burden that they have difficulty in affording.
Our case is simple and just: end the inhumanity of this discrimination against mothers who adopt a child and grasp the opportunity of a new Government to put right an obvious wrong. By ending discrimination against adoptive parents, we in Parliament can remove just one obstacle that lies between a child who desperately needs a mother and a woman who wants to provide a loving home for that child. I urge Ministers to act now.
§ Helen Jackson (Sheffield, Hillsborough)I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Barking (Ms Hodge) on the work and effort that she has put into this issue and on gaining this debate this morning. I am grateful to her for allowing me to make a few comments.
I first took up this issue in March 1995 on a cross-party basis with the support of the hon. Member for Chesham and Amersham (Mrs. Gillan), who raised it in 1993 in the 916 House and who, free from her ministerial responsibility, remains supportive and may now be able to join the campaign again. The problem was brought to me by a constituent who had asked for unpaid leave from her employer during the settling-in period when she and her partner adopted a small baby. She had a responsible job as company secretary of a small manufacturing firm. She was refused time off, but, as she was determined to make the adoption work, she took time off and was summarily sacked. She had no right of redress as the law stands.
Shortly afterwards, the then Secretary of State for Health made a statement on adoption to the House, stressing the importance of a bonding period to ensure that adoption worked and developed. She was, however, unable to justify or even comment on the lack of an adoptive parent's right to leave, because that was the remit of the Employment Minister, or on paternity allowance, because that was the remit of the Social Security Minister. The issue therefore crosses departmental responsibilities.
The basic fairness of giving adoptive parents equivalent time and space to adjust to the arrival of a new child or baby seems plain to all. Between 6,000 and 7,000 adoptions take place each year and a small proportion of those are of children under the age of five.
It is as well to distinguish between the elements that we are discussing. First, adoptive parents should have the right of leave from work at the time of adoption. I am aware that not all employers take the attitude of the firm in my constituency, but no employer should have the right to take that attitude. An adoptive parent's right to leave involves minimal costs to an employer, none to the Exchequer, and can hardly be said to threaten Britain's competitiveness.
The European directive on parental leave now encompasses that right and it is to the new Government's credit that their determination to sign up to the social chapter to incorporate European employment directives should now ensure that no one can be sacked on those grounds in the future. We shall now join France, Germany, Spain and Sweden, among others, in having a statutory right to parental leave. However, we should go further and offer paid leave on the grounds of both principle and practicality.
We now know much more than we used to about the importance of strong parental love and family ties, and their fundamental link to a growing youngster's future emotional, educational and social development. Paid leave for parents at the time of adoption strengthens those family ties. A strong family unit is of the same importance to families that adopt as it is for all other families. To deny the rights enjoyed by natural parents to adoptive parents is simply discrimination.
Naturally, some costs are involved in introducing paid adoption leave, but the number of people involved is small. My hon. Friend spelt out the figures and, as I discovered back in 1995, they amount to less than half of 1 per cent, of the total budget for maternity pay for those who adopt a child under school age. In the overall run of things, that is minuscule, given that encouraging adoption, as the measure will, saves the state the cost of keeping children in care—it costs more than £48,000 to maintain a child in residential care—and given that the measure will save money by reducing unnecessary staff turnover and the £12 billion cost of absenteeism.
917 As my hon. Friend said, some employers say that the lack of statutory entitlement to adoption leave is a hindrance to their business as they cannot insure for adoption leave as they can for maternity leave. The previous Administration used to label such costs as burdens—burdens on business or on the Government— but we now live under a new regime with a new approach and, I hope, a new language. Such expenditure is justified, not only because it is fair but because it represents sound value for money.
It is not possible to put a price on a safe and secure society, but where we can identify small contributions that will make a real difference to people's lives, the Government should go for them enthusiastically.
§ The Minister of State, Department of Trade and Industry (Mr. Ian McCartney)I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Barking (Ms Hodge) on securing this debate. I am well aware of her sustained interest in leave rights for adoptive parents. I have recently been in correspondence with her and with my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield, Hillsborough (Helen Jackson) on this subject. I recognise the contribution made by my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham, South (Mr. Simpson) in his intervention earlier in the debate.
May I say from the outset that we recognise the invaluable role that adoptive parents play in society. Parents who adopt children do so for the most compelling reasons. There is no higher calling in society than to provide a home and affection to children who would otherwise be deprived of family care. The benefits to the children are immeasurable. Some children may experience emotional or other difficulties as a result of not being brought up with their natural parents. That point was well made by my hon. Friend in the debate on this issue earlier this year.
Before commenting further, may I say that I would be more than happy to meet my hon. Friends to discuss their views, and I hope that they will take up my offer.
There are also benefits to the adoptive parents, particularly those who do not already have children of their own. Such a role can be immensely fulfilling. Society benefits, too. Children brought up in a loving family environment will be able to make a positive contribution to society.
I believe that I am the youngest grandfather in the House. My grandparenting responsibilities have somewhat gone by the wayside since I became a Minister of State in the Department of Trade and Industry. Perhaps my grandchildren will be looking for an adoptive granddad, unless I waken my ideas up over the summer recess.
I recognise the well-intentioned motives of my hon. Friend in focusing on the position of adoptive parents. She argued convincingly that the position of adoptive parents requires special attention. I do not have an easy task in responding to the many persuasive points made by my hon. Friends during the debate, but I shall do my best to deal with the strong arguments that were put forward.
One of the Government's key aims is to promote measures that will help people to balance the demands of work and family life. That includes the implementation of the parental leave directive, which will provide three months' unpaid leave to natural and adoptive parents. That is a welcome development, and one that explicitly recognises the needs of adoptive parents.
918 We aim to encourage employers to provide flexible working arrangements in the workplace. That includes part-time or flexible hours, job sharing and term-time working, working from home and career breaks. We will ensure proper protection for homeworkers and an enhancement of their role.
We are committed to producing a national child care strategy, which will help parents, especially women, to balance family and working life. We also have in hand a new initiative to help to integrate education and child care. That will provide early-education places for four-year-olds whose parents want one for their child.
All those measures are designed to underpin family life and to encourage a more flexible approach to working life. This family of initiatives reflects the Government's passionate commitment to balancing the needs of family and work. It also reflects our more positive approach to the social chapter, enabling us to benefit from European social policy initiatives. Opting in ensures that we will play an active part in developing such initiatives, rather than being left on the side-lines, carping and being ignored.
The Labour Government will do all that they can to encourage improvements in the workplace generally. We will aim to ensure that fair minimum standards are available to all employees, including adoptive parents. Part of our longer-term task is to create a fresh approach—a cultural change—based on partnership, rather than conflict.
Maternity health and safety issues are fundamental to the current maternity rights regime. The maternity leave provisions apply to all pregnant employees and are based on the pregnant workers directive. In addition, the directive requires employers to carry out a risk assessment, which is intended to assess the health and safety risks to the pregnant employee. Employers are required to offer alternative work if a risk exists. If necessary, they are required to suspend the employee for her own good and that of her unborn child.
The absence and return to work of an employee in those circumstances should not be compared with the circumstances of an adoptive parent. If there is a case for adoptive leave, it must be based on a different premise, as it does not contain the same element of health and safety for the new parent or the child.
The Government provide various forms of support to pregnant employees. Statutory maternity pay—SMP—is based on average earnings for the first six weeks of maternity leave, and after that on a flat rate of £55.70 per week for the remaining 12 weeks.
Maternity allowance is provided for employees who do not qualify for SMP, but who have paid sufficient national insurance contributions. It is also paid to the self-employed. The current rate is £55.70 for employees, and £48.35 for the self-employed.
The social fund maternity payments scheme is available for adoptive parents. It is available to families on low incomes or in receipt of disability working allowance. There were 216,000 such payments in 1995–96. The sums set aside for this fund are considerable: £22 million for 1996–97 and for 1997–98; and £23 million for 1998–99.
There is scope for local authorities to make discretionary payments in the form of an allowance related to the needs of the adopted child.
919 The idea of providing similar benefits to adoptive parents, especially those who adopt babies, is at first glance attractive. I understand the value of allowing time off work for adoptive parents to establish bonds of affection with young adopted children. Personally, I have much sympathy for the views expressed by my hon. Friends.
However, it is worth making a general point. The benefits paid to natural mothers are not intended to facilitate bonding, or even to provide financial support for the additional costs of looking after children. Benefits are intended to encourage pregnant employees to take up their maternity rights, so that they are not under pressure to stay on or to return to work too soon. Such pressures could lead to health and safety risks.
We can make much progress on the issue, but it will require a different approach which could usefully include a number of the points mentioned earlier. We need to recognise that existing maternity provisions are based on health and safety considerations, and that those considerations do not apply to adoptive mothers. Maternity benefits are intended to encourage pregnant employees to avail themselves of their leave entitlements. Again, that is linked to health and safety considerations. It is right that state benefits should be provided to pregnant employees who will inevitably have their earnings interrupted by giving birth.
We should take a fresh look at the issue and consider the position of adoptive parents on their own merits, not by comparison with birth mothers. That should enable us to consider the matter more favourably, and more in line with the views expressed by my hon. Friends who have been so eloquent in their passionate discourse. We should see adoptive parents as having their own distinctive requirements.
More generally, the Government are committed to family-friendly policies, designed to meet the needs of those with family and work responsibilities. That is why we will implement the parental leave directive. Our policies will develop in the years ahead, and there will be opportunities to consider how we can best achieve greater flexibility in the workplace.
§ Helen JacksonMy hon. Friend the Minister has emphasised the health and safety element in maternity 920 leave. Does he accept that that is only one, fairly minor element in the existing arrangements? Our arguments about equal treatment cover all the rest, which is a much larger part of the reasoning behind maternity allowances and maternity pay.
§ Mr. McCartneyI have tried to set out a range of concepts applying to the workplace and the role and rights of adoptive parents. I have invited my hon. Friends to join us for further discussion. As a Government, we are in power for five years and, we hope, for a generation if we get such policies correct. We do not want to take a bull-in-a-china-shop approach—a big bang solution to everything. There are issues of principle, some of which have practical implications for other issues. Much of our strategy dovetails with other initiatives that the Government are preparing and are likely to adopt during this Parliament.
I offer my hon. Friends a genuine partnership to see where we can fit in their proposals and to examine the merits of the case, in line with the Government's general aim to provide employees in the workplace with basic minimum standards, and to ensure that those standards are non-discriminatory.
I have tried to respond positively to my hon. Friends. It is important that we co-ordinate policy across Departments, and my hon. Friends' arguments have implications for several Departments. The best way forward for this Government is through co-operation and co-ordination. We must reach agreement on our objectives and set out our plans for implementing our policies.
I am sure that my hon. Friends will have listened carefully to what I said. I hope that we can pursue the matter constructively through discussion and in partnership with other Departments, with employers, with employee representatives through trade unions and in other forums. I look forward to meeting my hon. Friends, in a spirit of partnership, to advance our dialogue on this issue. It is interesting to note, not for the first time, that no official Opposition spokesperson is present even to listen to the debate. We know that the Conservatives gave up in government, but it now appears that they have given up in opposition.