Extract from The Guardian
Department of Social Services reports the 18-week scheme particularly
helps low-income women spend extra time with their babies and then
return to their jobs
Paid parental leave (PPL) is largely achieving its objectives to
allow new mothers to spend time with their babies in their infancy while
still facilitating a return to work in the long run, a government
report has said.
The report, by the Department of Social Services, relates to the existing PPL scheme which has been in place since 2011, not the Coalition’s now abandoned policy.
The current scheme allows mothers to receive 18 weeks on the minimum wage any time within the first 12 months of a child being born.
Low-income and less educated women were more likely to be impacted by the PPL scheme, as were women on contracts or who worked for themselves.
The first iteration of the scheme proposed by the prime minister, Tony Abbott, was criticised for being overly generous, offering women earning up to $150,000 26 weeks of maternity leave on full pay. The cap was subsequently reduced to $100,000, before the policy was abandoned altogether last month.
When opposition leader in 2013, Abbott said his scheme was designed to attract high income women.
“We do not educate women to higher degree level to deny them a career. If we want women of that calibre to have families, and we should, well we have to give them a fair dinkum chance to do so. That is what this scheme of paid parental leave is all about,” he said.
The DSS report found that low income mothers were more likely to take up the existing scheme because the payments represent a higher proportion of their incomes and because they were “least likely to have access to employer paid parental leave before the introduction of PPL”.
It also notes that women without tertiary educations were more likely to return to their old jobs after taking parental leave than before the payments were introduced. Rates of job retention for women with tertiary qualifications remained unchanged before and after the paid leave scheme was introduced.
The report also found that mums reported better health outcomes from PPL, as stress levels decreased because of the safety of having a steady income and a job to which to return.
All up, the report found that the policy has strong productivity outcomes for mothers.
The PPL scheme has clearly had the effect of supporting and encouraging mothers to return to work in the longer run, contributing to the policy objective of increasing women’s workforce participation and overall labour supply,” the report said. “The scheme also increased the likelihood that mothers would return to the job they held before the birth.”
“The evaluation shows that PPL is delivering benefits for families, and it is helping women to get back to work after they’ve had children,” the social services minister, Scott Morrison, said.
“The PPL is an important component of our government’s support for families, and the results of this evaluation are confirmation that the scheme is providing more opportunities and choices for families.”
But the report also showed that fathers were barely impacted by the introduction of the Dad and Partner Pay (Dapp) scheme, with only one out of three men choosing to take it.
“Uptake was significantly higher amongst casually employed and self-employed fathers (around 50% for both groups), reflecting their very limited access to employer paid leave of any kind,” the report said.
Dapp has allowed men to have leave options, however. “The proportion of fathers taking unpaid leave in the first two months after a birth increased from 15% before Dapp to 22% after its introduction, and the proportion taking annual leave declined from 47% to 38%,” the report said.
The introduction of the scheme has helped spark cultural change within organisations, the report said.
“There were indications of a small, positive shift in employers’ views of fathers and partners taking paternity or secondary carer leave following a birth,” the report said, adding that “a few employers noted that operational issues might arise when fathers took longer leave (a month or more).”
PPL has done little to help new parents achieve flexible working hours, the report notes.
The report, by the Department of Social Services, relates to the existing PPL scheme which has been in place since 2011, not the Coalition’s now abandoned policy.
The current scheme allows mothers to receive 18 weeks on the minimum wage any time within the first 12 months of a child being born.
Low-income and less educated women were more likely to be impacted by the PPL scheme, as were women on contracts or who worked for themselves.
The first iteration of the scheme proposed by the prime minister, Tony Abbott, was criticised for being overly generous, offering women earning up to $150,000 26 weeks of maternity leave on full pay. The cap was subsequently reduced to $100,000, before the policy was abandoned altogether last month.
When opposition leader in 2013, Abbott said his scheme was designed to attract high income women.
“We do not educate women to higher degree level to deny them a career. If we want women of that calibre to have families, and we should, well we have to give them a fair dinkum chance to do so. That is what this scheme of paid parental leave is all about,” he said.
The DSS report found that low income mothers were more likely to take up the existing scheme because the payments represent a higher proportion of their incomes and because they were “least likely to have access to employer paid parental leave before the introduction of PPL”.
It also notes that women without tertiary educations were more likely to return to their old jobs after taking parental leave than before the payments were introduced. Rates of job retention for women with tertiary qualifications remained unchanged before and after the paid leave scheme was introduced.
The report also found that mums reported better health outcomes from PPL, as stress levels decreased because of the safety of having a steady income and a job to which to return.
All up, the report found that the policy has strong productivity outcomes for mothers.
The PPL scheme has clearly had the effect of supporting and encouraging mothers to return to work in the longer run, contributing to the policy objective of increasing women’s workforce participation and overall labour supply,” the report said. “The scheme also increased the likelihood that mothers would return to the job they held before the birth.”
“The evaluation shows that PPL is delivering benefits for families, and it is helping women to get back to work after they’ve had children,” the social services minister, Scott Morrison, said.
“The PPL is an important component of our government’s support for families, and the results of this evaluation are confirmation that the scheme is providing more opportunities and choices for families.”
But the report also showed that fathers were barely impacted by the introduction of the Dad and Partner Pay (Dapp) scheme, with only one out of three men choosing to take it.
“Uptake was significantly higher amongst casually employed and self-employed fathers (around 50% for both groups), reflecting their very limited access to employer paid leave of any kind,” the report said.
Dapp has allowed men to have leave options, however. “The proportion of fathers taking unpaid leave in the first two months after a birth increased from 15% before Dapp to 22% after its introduction, and the proportion taking annual leave declined from 47% to 38%,” the report said.
The introduction of the scheme has helped spark cultural change within organisations, the report said.
“There were indications of a small, positive shift in employers’ views of fathers and partners taking paternity or secondary carer leave following a birth,” the report said, adding that “a few employers noted that operational issues might arise when fathers took longer leave (a month or more).”
PPL has done little to help new parents achieve flexible working hours, the report notes.
The road was one of many that had been abruptly terminated when the cash ran out. There were hopes that funding might flow again, but it hadn’t happened, so the road remained half-built.
Coming from Australia, I found this hard to understand but comforted myself it could never happen at home.
But it may be about to.
Back in 2004, the Howard government launched the national collaborative research infrastructure strategy (NCRIS). Announcing it, the then education minister Julie Bishop said it was “essential to build our national capacity to generate knowledge and use it to advance our economic, social and environmental objectives”.
She was right. Over almost a decade since, the now 27 flourishing national research facilities have done just that.
They are used by the nation’s top researchers, from all sectors, to tackle big challenges and and to address the issues that will determine how successful we are in the 21st century.
These facilities – supercomputers, fabrications facilities, ocean-monitoring programs – are the basic tools of modern science. They hold the key to the progress of a modern nation. Without them, we have no hope of competing with the rest of the world.
A tiny snapshot of recent results from NCRIS programs includes a nano-patch to deliver vaccines without the need for refrigeration, making an obvious life-saving difference for remote Australians and the health of our region; use of marine models and data to search for Malaysian Airlines flight MH370; and the weather-prediction technology that picked up the recent Northern Territory and Queensland cyclones.
I could go on, but while the NCRIS facilities may not be household names, everyone seems to agree they are a good thing: building capability, providing unique and cutting-edge services to industry, helping to improve lives, making money and creating jobs.
So why worry?
While the facilities have bedded down and flourished, government funding for operating them has been a little lumpy, the initial seven-year commitment followed by less predictable terms and amounts.
But, until now, the funding has always come in the end.
Last May, the education minister, Christopher Pyne, again found a last-minute sum – $150m to fund the facilities for 2015-16 – while initiating a review to identify long-term funding options. Scientists were pleased with the move and have been supportive of the review. The final report, which includes a decent set of recommendations, will be submitted to the government in the next few months.
The problem is that the $150m has not flowed, nor has a date been set when it will. In fact, Pyne has indicated it may not be forthcoming unless his package of university deregulation reforms are passed. Anyone who has kept half an eye on politics in recent months knows that that package may not pass at all and is unlikely to pass quickly.
This is a serious problem: the current NCRIS operations money runs out on 30 June, less than four months away. Without certainty of funding, staff are already looking for employment elsewhere, crisis meetings are being held, and some facilities are measuring their existence in terms of weeks, not months or years.
Research facilities such as these cannot be shut down quickly, a phased shut down has to be planned for and implemented before the funding runs out. Some will be expensive, if not impossible, to reopen.
If the government does not move very quickly to release the funds, there is the very real possibility that a good number of the 27 facilities will close.
It is hard to believe that the government could allow a highly successful, 11-year, multi-billion dollar capital investment to fall over for want of an operating budget.
At a showcase for all 27 NCRIS facilities late last year in the Great Hall at Parliament House, parliamentary secretary Scott Ryan spoke on behalf of Pyne. He said:
Scientists want nothing more than to get on with the job of tackling challenges and grasping opportunities – but they are facing a dead end. Uncertainty over funding is corrosive, but things are much more serious that that. If the government does not guarantee the $150m will flow, and soon, Australia’s research effort will run off the road.