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supported in their role

0:55

as fathers because traditional gender

0:57

norms still often place

0:59

in primary caregiving focuses on

1:01

mothers. This week I'm

1:04

joined by Alex Lloyd Hunter,

1:06

a UK -based advocate. but

1:08

improved paternity leave and

1:10

co -founder of the dad

1:12

ship. We are the worst in Europe when

1:14

it comes to paternity leave. We are really

1:16

out of step with how I think we see

1:18

ourselves as a country and our values around

1:20

gender equality and it's well past time we changed.

1:22

For most of our children's life we know them as

1:24

adults. It's a very short amount of time that we

1:27

know them as children and I guess it plays into

1:29

that good old phrase if you kind of don't know

1:31

what you've got till it's gone. Most police

1:33

officers get the first week at full pay

1:35

but the second week is at statutory pay

1:37

and they just Most of them just can't

1:39

afford it, so 60 % are going back

1:41

up to just one week. Hello, I'm Pip,

1:43

and welcome to the Midwife Pip

1:45

Podcast, the home of expert information

1:47

and real chats on all things

1:49

pregnancy, birth, and

1:51

beyond. Many dads

1:53

feel undersupported in their

1:56

role as fathers because

1:58

traditional gender norms still

2:00

often place in primary

2:02

caregiving focuses on mothers.

2:05

While times are slowly changing,

2:07

many workplaces still offer

2:10

limited paternity leave, making

2:12

it difficult for dads to bond

2:14

with their newborns in those crucial

2:16

early weeks. Even when

2:18

paternity leave is available, there

2:20

can be pressure, either social

2:22

or professional, to return to

2:24

work quickly, reinforcing the outdated

2:26

idea that a father's primary

2:28

role is financial rather than

2:31

emotional. Without strong support

2:33

systems from employers to

2:35

parenting communities, many

2:37

dads struggle to feel included and

2:39

confident in their role, missing

2:41

out on key bonding opportunities that

2:43

are so important for them

2:46

both and also for their children.

2:49

This week, I'm joined by

2:51

Alex Lloyd Hunter, a

2:53

UK -based advocate for improved

2:55

paternity leave and co -founder

2:57

of the Dad Shift, an

2:59

organisation dedicated to campaigning

3:01

for better paternity leave policies

3:04

in the UK. After

3:06

becoming a dad, he recognised

3:08

the significant barriers that limited father's

3:10

involvement in bonding and caring

3:13

for their family. the

3:15

UK statutory paternity leave

3:17

offers just two weeks at a

3:19

rate of £184 a week, one

3:22

of the least supportive

3:24

systems in Europe. So

3:26

welcome Alex and thank you

3:28

for the important work you're

3:30

doing to raise the fact that this just

3:32

isn't good enough is it? No well

3:34

thank you for having me. No it's not good

3:36

enough at all. As you say we are the

3:38

worst in Europe. When it comes to paternity leave

3:40

we are really out of step with

3:42

how I think we see ourselves as a

3:44

country and our values around gender equality and

3:46

and it's well past time we changed so

3:48

that's what we're trying to do. Yes

3:51

literally shout that from the rooftops

3:53

this is what we need. Now

3:55

I mean perhaps it sounds it

3:57

sounds obvious to me why Alex

3:59

but tell us what led to the

4:01

dad shift being born because this is

4:03

clearly a massive passion project of yours. Yes,

4:07

it is. So I have a son. He's

4:09

just turned three. I'm going to have another

4:11

one on the way too. Oh,

4:13

congratulations. I didn't know that. No,

4:15

it's due in August. So

4:17

we're just about 21 weeks. So

4:20

that's exciting. And my

4:22

co -founder George has had a baby

4:24

three days ago. So we're very on

4:26

brand. We're all in the baby

4:28

moon. Yeah. Yeah,

4:30

I have a son who's

4:33

three and I was always very clear

4:37

when I when I became a parent I wanted to

4:39

be really active dad and I wanted to try and

4:41

do things as equally as possible with my wife

4:43

both so that she can carry on in her career

4:45

she does awesome stuff and we wanted to make sure

4:47

she could keep doing that but also

4:49

so that I got that joy

4:52

of being a big part of my son's life

4:54

and he had that bond with me and that

4:56

was particularly important to me because my dad really

4:58

didn't get that with us when we were younger

5:00

he I see men of his generation there was

5:02

no paternity leave at all So my brother

5:04

was born nine o 'clock Sunday night, he was back

5:06

at work 9am the next day. And he worked

5:09

in a really stressful job, really long hours, didn't

5:11

really see us five days a week, wasn't involved

5:13

in our care. And as a result, he ended

5:15

up, we didn't really bond with him as we

5:17

did with our mum, he ended up kind of

5:19

the outside of the family unit. And

5:21

it contributed to the breakdown of his

5:23

marriage ultimately. And he's now,

5:26

we have a good relationship as adults

5:28

and he's a very devoted soppy. grandparent

5:30

to my son in some ways to

5:32

my surprise and it's given us a

5:34

lens to start talking about his own

5:36

experience and he deeply regrets that he

5:38

wasn't more there and more able to

5:40

be there but he said you know

5:42

I didn't know anything different I didn't

5:44

know you could be different and I

5:46

think our attitudes of a society have

5:48

changed but a lot of the systems and

5:50

the barriers that make it hard for men to

5:52

be there are still in place and that

5:54

is still too often the experience of men

5:57

And so in trying to do things as equally

5:59

as possible and trying to be involved as I could, we've

6:02

been lucky that we've made it work.

6:04

But there are so many jigsaw places

6:06

that have to fall in place to

6:08

make it possible in this country because

6:10

we have all these things pushing against

6:12

more equal parenting. So really expensive childcare,

6:14

lack of flexible working. And then obviously

6:16

a big one is our rubbish

6:18

paternity leave that ends up pushing

6:20

the responsibility to look after children pretty

6:22

much solely onto mothers. Yeah

6:25

100 % how powerful of your dad

6:27

how brave because like we say today's

6:29

generation I feel like and I

6:31

don't want to speak for men but

6:33

I feel like we are more

6:35

open to talking about mental health and

6:37

gendered roles in a more dynamic

6:39

flexible way I know there's work to

6:41

be done but when I think

6:43

back to sort of my my father's

6:45

generation versus my husband I know

6:47

that for my dad actually those conversations

6:50

are really hard and for your

6:52

dad to say actually he regrets not

6:54

having more of a caring responsibility. I think

6:56

it's really brave. I agree and

6:58

you know we've talked before I launched this

7:00

campaign we started talking about it explicitly

7:02

because know people are gonna ask why am I

7:04

doing this and I can say something else if

7:06

you want but like this is the real reason

7:08

he was like yeah fine say it like talk

7:10

about it you know I really respect him for that

7:13

but he's willing to be open about it and willing

7:15

for me to be open about it. Definitely,

7:17

I think if we can have like, I

7:19

don't know how many grandparents listen to

7:21

my podcast Alex, but I want them to

7:23

listen to this one because I feel

7:25

like if they can have these conversations with

7:27

their adult sons, that actually this was

7:29

their journey and this is what they then

7:31

regret, we can start planting that seed,

7:33

can't we have changed really early? Yeah,

7:36

for sure. And I

7:38

mean, interestingly I've had... isn't

7:40

the only, the conversation with him isn't the only

7:42

one I've had with men of his generation and other

7:44

elements I've seen and I think there is a, I

7:47

mean I'd be loved to maybe have listened

7:50

to your show or write in or call

7:52

in and tell you about it but I

7:54

suspect that as men get older they realise

7:56

that the thing that really mattered in their

7:58

life was their kids and their relationship with

8:00

their kids and

8:02

they, I suspect it's

8:04

probably more common than we recognise for people

8:06

to regret that they didn't have that. Completely

8:09

agree it must be and I saw something

8:11

on social media a few weeks ago that

8:13

said that we we only have For most

8:15

of our children's life. We know them as

8:18

adults It's a very short amount of time

8:20

that we know them as children And I

8:22

guess it plays into that good old phrase

8:24

if you kind of don't know what you've

8:26

got till it's gone Yeah, so for you

8:28

know now now as your dad is a

8:30

grandparent actually seeing that kind of that almost

8:32

polar view of actually I missed these days

8:34

with you know my young family and almost

8:36

I guess trying to perhaps relive them as

8:38

a grandchild as a grandparent. yeah

8:40

I think that's exactly it and he's you

8:42

know he's lucky he's got my my son

8:44

and then his wife has got a few

8:46

grandkids as well and they're they're devoted to

8:48

him as well you know they and so

8:50

he has I see him having that bond

8:52

with these young kids that I think he

8:54

didn't have so that's really nice yeah he's he's

8:56

getting it in now how bad

8:58

is it Alex how bad is the

9:01

UK paternity system compared to maybe

9:03

other countries where it's being done better

9:06

It's very bad. So again, it's two weeks,

9:08

184 pounds a week. In fact, in

9:10

a couple of days, it's going up to

9:12

187 pounds a week. Oh, pay rise.

9:14

Yeah, we're cashing in. We're cashing I don't

9:16

think you can even get a coffee

9:18

for three pounds. Exactly. Exactly.

9:21

That's true, you can't. So

9:23

yeah, 184 pounds a week, that is

9:26

187. That's less than half a minimum

9:28

wage, technically below the level of poverty

9:30

pay. Wow. And

9:32

by comparison, the average

9:34

across Europe is the equivalent

9:36

of eight weeks at full pay. So

9:39

if you take our two weeks at £184 a week

9:41

and compare it to the average salary, it

9:43

works out two days of full pay

9:45

on an average salary compared to eight weeks

9:47

average across Europe. And then the

9:49

countries who are doing it best, you look

9:51

at, for example, Spain. To Spain where we

9:53

were seven years ago, they had two weeks

9:55

and they have gradually increased it a year,

9:57

a week or two at a time over

10:00

a course of a few years. It's

10:02

now 16 weeks at 100 % pay. And

10:04

they're looking to, it's been such a success, they're looking

10:06

to increase it to 20 weeks, 100 % pay. In

10:09

Sweden, you have 90 days for each parent that

10:11

it's ring fence for that parent so that only

10:13

they can use it. And then

10:15

on top 300 days that you can share

10:18

between each parent, all at a good

10:20

level of pay. You can go on

10:22

and on that there are, we

10:24

are miles and miles behind wherever countries

10:26

are. And finally, the other thing

10:28

that we do badly when it comes

10:30

to paternity leave is self -employed people

10:32

are entitled to absolutely nothing. which

10:34

again is unusual. Most European countries give

10:36

self -employed people the same entitlement as

10:38

employed people. And I've spoken

10:40

to, for example, a self -employed

10:42

tradesman, a lot of builders, plumbers and so

10:44

on, who are self -employed. And one

10:46

guy in particular who had two emergency

10:48

C -sections, where his wife did for

10:50

his two kids, both were

10:52

born premature and ended up in C -sections. Each

10:55

time he took six weeks off to look after

10:57

and he did the right thing, stepped up. And

11:00

the financial pressure that's put on them

11:02

has almost destroyed him. And still, he

11:04

said six years on, I've not recovered

11:06

financially. It's destroyed his mental health, his

11:08

wife's mental health. He attempted suicide at

11:10

one point, it got so bad. And

11:13

then this is all for the sake

11:15

of properly supporting new parents with a few

11:17

thousand pounds in the first weeks of their life.

11:19

And the cost of not doing that is

11:21

enormous. My

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experience that you deserve. below

12:19

the line of poverty. It's just, and this

12:21

is families, this is children that we're really trying

12:23

to work to protect and we're actually failing

12:25

them before we sometimes even get out of hospital.

12:28

And I think what I was

12:30

thinking when you were talking there,

12:32

Alex, was we're in this awful

12:34

duo because I know that, you

12:36

know, as a midwife and as

12:38

a mum, the support for mums,

12:40

for example, that dad whose partner

12:42

had had an emergency cesarean section,

12:44

we're in a place now where

12:46

women are expected the day

12:49

after major surgery or having birth their

12:51

baby with who knows what physical and

12:53

psychological trauma to get to clinic appointments.

12:55

They once come into their house very

12:57

often now, they're expected to attend appointments.

12:59

The support is much, much less in

13:01

the community. Therefore, we need to be

13:03

able to rely on the partner and

13:06

we can't when there isn't that shift

13:08

either. So we've kind of taken away

13:10

social support in every single way for

13:12

families, both from a healthcare point of

13:14

view, but also from a family unit

13:16

point of view. And it is no

13:18

wonder we're in this place where actually

13:21

families are struggling so much. Yeah, absolutely.

13:23

I mean, you know, I don't need

13:25

to tell you this, you'll know it's

13:27

far better than me or anyone, but

13:29

we've collected, we have a survey where

13:31

people can share their experiences and some

13:33

6 ,000 people are filled it in now.

13:36

And so many of the stories are

13:38

from mothers who had a caesarean section and were

13:40

told this is going to take you six

13:42

weeks to recover and some were lucky and it

13:44

healed very quickly some were unlucky and it

13:46

took six weeks or longer yeah and they said

13:49

I was just left they were told you

13:51

you can't lift your baby it's too heavy and

13:53

I was just left and one person who

13:55

said uh you know the day my husband went

13:57

back from paternity leave was just the worst

13:59

day of my life because I was in agony

14:01

and eventually her stitches ripped on the caesarean

14:03

because you know it wasn't healing properly and she

14:05

was doing all this stuff she wasn't meant

14:07

to do and it's it's bad

14:09

is one part of the puzzle

14:11

where the support that we're offering families

14:13

through paternity leave and of course

14:15

this applies not just to dads but

14:17

it applies to non birthing parents

14:19

of all kinds in mums and same

14:22

-sex relationships non binary parents one half

14:24

from an adoptive couple but the

14:26

support we are providing just doesn't match

14:28

the physical reality of birthing and

14:30

looking after a small child and let's

14:32

be honest we're talking about like

14:34

just allowing parents to survive

14:36

you know if we want parents to

14:38

actually be able to thrive like that's

14:40

like a whole other conversation like the

14:43

the current the current sort of situation

14:45

is at the point where people just

14:47

physically can't meet the day -to -day needs

14:49

it's not even this beautiful glamourized idea

14:51

of having lots of time right yeah

14:53

absolutely and the mental health aspect of

14:55

it is the other obviously enormous issue

14:58

with our current system in the

15:00

immediate term, before you get into stuff

15:02

around how it determines how people

15:04

parent long term, which I'm sure we

15:06

can come on to, but in

15:09

the immediate term, there is very clear

15:11

evidence that better paternity leave improves

15:13

mental health outcomes for mothers as well

15:15

as for fathers. And

15:17

what we find is that two

15:19

thirds of men say they weren't

15:21

mentally ready to go back after

15:23

two weeks. And

15:25

you enter into this sort of as a man, you

15:28

enter into this pressure cooker where you've got having

15:30

a baby is very expensive. I think we all know

15:32

that, you know, the pram is like buying a

15:34

car these days, some of them are so expensive. So

15:37

your financial pressure is going up at the

15:39

same time as your earnings are massively plummeting

15:41

at your paternity leave. On an average salary,

15:43

it costs you a grand to take that

15:45

paternity leave and lost earnings. Your

15:47

partner is on maternity leave, which is also really

15:49

poorly paid. And

15:52

then you've got that pressure on top of the

15:54

pressure of work. It hasn't changed. They expect you to

15:56

be there 100 % doing your job. And then you're

15:58

trying to be a good parent. You're trying to

16:00

be there for your partner and your baby, and you're

16:02

probably stressed that they're struggling as well. And

16:04

so you see a lot of dads

16:06

more than I think we recognize really suffering.

16:09

And then of course, for mothers, they

16:11

are often left on their own without sleep,

16:13

without support. And so it has a

16:15

massive impact on maternal mental health as well.

16:18

And again, that's just one of

16:20

the... from the the kind of

16:22

moral element of this, there is

16:24

a very pragmatic case for the

16:26

government to improve this because it

16:28

will reduce the pressure on mental

16:31

health services. PW PricewaterhouseCoopers did some

16:33

modeling that better paternity leave would

16:35

save something like £1 .5 billion in

16:37

mental health costs to the NHS

16:39

over 20 years and stop half

16:41

a million cases of depression and

16:43

new parents just from better paternity

16:46

leave. Yeah. I can see

16:48

it. I totally get it. And

16:50

I think also like if we

16:52

zoom out, we know like there's

16:54

so much out there about maternal

16:56

and paternal mental health and anxiety

16:59

disorders and how that impacts child

17:01

mental wellbeing and emotional intelligence and

17:03

attachment. So actually we are going

17:05

to have even more saving on

17:07

that child and breastfeeding rates. You

17:09

know, we know breastfeeding rates are.

17:12

their initiation rates are great and

17:14

then they plummet because there's no support.

17:17

We're spending so much time and energy telling

17:19

people how great it is for babies

17:21

and how great it is for mums but

17:23

there's actually no support for people to

17:25

do it and then when you are left

17:27

on your own recovering partners gone back

17:29

to work it feels like an absolutely impossible

17:31

task but we know if we improve

17:33

that we would also save so much money

17:36

in childhood illnesses and hospital admissions so

17:38

it seems I mean it seems like a

17:40

no -brainer but it's just not happening. right?

17:42

Yes, absolutely. And the other point to this

17:44

is there's a really good economic argument

17:47

as well. So this is the only advantage

17:49

really of being absolutely bottom of the

17:51

table as you can see how this has

17:53

panned out in every other country that

17:55

has improved things. And

17:57

the Joseph Roundtree Foundation recently did a

17:59

model that showed that if you

18:01

move paternity leave up to six weeks

18:03

of 90 % pay, which really is

18:05

an absolute bare minimum for what

18:07

we should be having in the short

18:09

term, you Because

18:12

it helps the evidence of other countries is

18:14

that it helps mothers who want to go back

18:16

to work when they want to so they

18:18

might take on more days of work or they

18:20

might go back to work when actually where

18:22

they would have left Yeah, you end up growing

18:24

the economy by 2 .6 billion pounds But the

18:26

cost to the Treasury is is a absolute

18:28

fraction of that sort of 200 million So it's

18:30

for every pound you put in you get

18:32

13 pounds back and obviously you get better outcomes

18:34

for kids And it

18:36

improves gender equality over the long term. It

18:38

brings down the gender pay gap. There's

18:40

very clear evidence of that as well. And

18:43

on your point around breastfeeding, that's something

18:45

that people sort of say, you see

18:47

on social media, some people say, well,

18:50

dad's can't do anything to help with breastfeeding. What's the

18:52

point in them being there with breastfeeding? And

18:55

I sort of say to people, our experiences are

18:57

some really struggled to establish feeding and you had a

18:59

tongue tie. He lost a huge amount of weight

19:01

after he was born. and

19:03

my wife was really determined to do it

19:05

and push through and she spent six

19:07

months pumping and we did top -up for

19:09

feeding and stuff and eventually she got there

19:11

and she ended up breastfeeding Infinity two

19:14

years in total but the fact that I

19:16

was there when it was really difficult

19:18

early on and could help her get some

19:20

sleep when she needed it between the

19:22

feeding and could do all the sterilizing and

19:24

the washing up and everything all the

19:26

other stuff and just like make sure she

19:29

didn't have to worry about it like

19:31

we've talked about it since she said if

19:33

that support wasn't there she just would

19:35

have given up straight away there would be

19:37

no choice to have carried on. So

19:39

there is a huge amount that a supportive

19:41

partner can do even when it comes

19:43

to things like breastfeeding obviously you can't physically

19:46

do. 100 % oh my goodness

19:48

Alex I've breastfed both our boys I'm

19:50

still on still breastfeeding Alfie who's 10 months

19:52

and I remember saying with our first

19:54

son who's also three to my husband on

19:56

day three if I didn't have the

19:58

support from him at that stage. I wouldn't

20:00

have carried on breastfeeding him. It was,

20:03

we've had difficult breastfeeding journeys with both and

20:05

I'm a midwife. Like I understand this

20:07

stuff, but the reality is it's hard and

20:09

it's such a big adjustment and you're

20:11

tired and you're recovering. And we

20:13

know that like the hormonal shift in women

20:15

when you've just given birth is the

20:17

biggest you'll ever go through in your entire

20:19

life. So your mood is super low

20:21

and you feel really vulnerable. And actually that

20:24

is a time where family units need

20:26

to be tight, not, you know, pulled apart.

20:29

Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. And

20:31

I think the other part

20:33

of this then that's crucial is

20:35

how it establishes the way

20:37

you parent longer term, you know,

20:39

there's those kind of crucial

20:41

few weeks. So what you see,

20:44

we have, we have a really unusual paternity and

20:46

maternity leave system in this country and that

20:48

paternity leave is very short and poorly paid, obviously.

20:51

Our maternity leave is unusually long, but also

20:53

really poorly paid, right? It's still one of

20:55

the worst in Europe when it comes to

20:57

maternity pay. So that really

20:59

pushes families, whether or not they

21:01

want to, into a stay

21:03

at home homemaker mum, breadwinner dad

21:05

dynamic, where the father often

21:07

gets only a couple of weeks

21:09

to learn how to be

21:11

a parent and to bond with

21:13

their child. And often that's

21:15

just not enough. And so you

21:17

might, even if it is, you know, you're there for those two

21:19

weeks, your hands on, you feel like you're getting the hang

21:22

of it, and then you're gone. And your partner is the one

21:24

who's taking everything on. and then they're

21:26

the one who learns or this is what this

21:28

particular crime means or this is what they

21:30

like to eat or this is how you cut

21:32

this piece of food so they don't throw

21:34

it away and then the father tries to get

21:36

involved and says they don't want me, they're

21:38

not bonded with me, they want their mum and

21:41

that slowly builds in and then you get

21:43

to a point a year in where the mother

21:45

is coming back off maternity leave and you

21:47

look at the cost of childcare and

21:49

you realize it's basically the same as one

21:51

of your salaries and you can't work flexibly around

21:53

school pickup and stuff because your employer won't

21:55

work so you say okay who's going to take

21:57

a step back and at that point it's

21:59

it's almost default it's some other and I've spoken

22:01

to people with someone who used the phrase

22:03

you know we wanted to do everything equally and

22:05

then we work up one day and found

22:07

ourselves in the 1950s and like this isn't necessarily

22:10

what most people want and if it is

22:12

what they want that's great that's fine like what

22:14

we want is more choice but

22:16

at the moment that choice is taken

22:18

away from a lot of people and so

22:20

this is why you see the motherhood

22:22

penalty as a lot of people call it

22:24

where the gender pay gap is something

22:26

like 75 % driven by motherhood and the

22:28

fact that women often whether or not they

22:31

want to take a step back from

22:33

work they get discriminated at work because they

22:35

are seen as more like to go

22:37

off and have a baby so they're overlooked

22:39

for promotions they lose their jobs and

22:41

there's really really clear evidence from other countries

22:43

that better paternity leave means that men

22:45

taking on make take on much more childcare

22:47

longer term it improves gender equality and

22:49

it improves outcomes for kids they end up

22:52

happier they do better at school and

22:54

it's really good for fathers themselves who have

22:56

happier longer lives i've read some study

22:58

that you know you're more productive at work

23:00

you're less likely to abuse drugs even

23:02

like always benefits you get from being closer

23:04

to your kids and paternity leave is

23:06

really the kind of the sort of root

23:09

the roots in the ground you need

23:11

for that and if you don't give

23:13

people that time then it just never

23:15

happens for a lot of people 100 %

23:17

and I think you know like that

23:19

first two weeks Alex especially in a

23:21

way with your first child you overnight

23:23

change who you are like your life

23:25

completely changes doesn't it and nothing can

23:27

quite prepare you for being a duo

23:29

and then all of a sudden having

23:32

this small person that is dependent on

23:34

you 24 seven and I think you

23:36

definitely to start with run on this

23:38

like almost shell shock adrenaline and also

23:40

what I see so much in dads

23:42

or in birth partners is the impact

23:44

of birth trauma and actually if we

23:46

are back to work after two weeks

23:48

of just running on adrenaline and what

23:50

on earth happened and what have we

23:52

done and I've no idea you know

23:54

what I should or shouldn't be doing

23:56

and are we getting this right and

23:58

all of that second guessing and sleep

24:00

deprivation we don't even consider trauma until

24:02

much later down the line and I

24:04

think you know in terms of mental

24:06

health we need we need that space

24:09

because I know there's so many dads

24:11

that then get you know pregnant again

24:13

and haven't addressed trauma from their last birth because

24:15

they just then had to get on with

24:17

that treadmill of life and that's just not acceptable

24:19

either. Yes, totally. Yeah,

24:22

I've heard from people who,

24:24

you know, won't feel traumatic bore

24:26

birth experiences and have struggled,

24:29

like really struggled even really sadly

24:31

from people who, you

24:33

know, lost their baby during the birth

24:35

and then back to work, you

24:37

know. basically straight away and they just

24:39

never had, you know, the mother

24:41

was left at home alone on maternity

24:43

leave without the baby, struggling with

24:45

that grief. The part was straight back

24:47

to work, didn't have space to

24:50

grieve. I mean, really awful. And

24:52

even beyond that, I mean, actually, we

24:55

had a story out yesterday about paternity

24:57

leave in the police. There's a lot

24:59

of problems with the way paternity leave

25:01

is happening in the police. And one

25:03

of them is that most police officers

25:06

get the first week at four pay, but the

25:08

second week is a statutory pay. And they

25:10

just most of them just can't afford it. So

25:12

60 % are going back after just one week.

25:14

We've had stories and people are saying, you

25:16

know, the day I was back a week or

25:18

two after my child was born, I'm not

25:20

sleeping or anything. I'm driving with the

25:23

blue lights on high speed through town centers.

25:25

Someone said, you know, my mate's an NHS surgeon,

25:27

he was back to work after two weeks

25:29

doing operations on no sleep. I mean, it's just

25:31

a there's a safety, there's a

25:33

basic safety issue in a lot of jobs.

25:35

Again, going back to tradesmen, we did some

25:37

research with tradesmen who a third of them

25:39

don't take a single day, they just can't

25:41

afford to take one day because they're self -employed,

25:43

they go straight back. And

25:45

you know, again, over half said I

25:47

just felt unsafe, like I'm operating power

25:49

tools on a building site on zero

25:51

sleep and I didn't feel safe being

25:54

there. And I think

25:56

in a world where the expectation

25:58

was fathers would sit in

26:00

the waiting room reading the FT whilst

26:02

the birth happened and have nothing really

26:04

to do with the baby then there

26:06

may be but now that's just not

26:08

what we want or how things work

26:10

and men expected to want to and

26:12

should play an active role in supporting

26:14

the partner looking after the baby and

26:16

in that world you need to create

26:18

the space to to care for just

26:20

their basic needs around that time. We're

26:26

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26:28

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baby forward slash baby tools

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forward slash poo tracker. Yeah,

27:16

well Alex the work you're honestly

27:18

doing is just so important. How

27:20

far away are we from any

27:22

change? Is there any light

27:24

at the end of the tunnel? Yeah, we're

27:26

optimistic. So the government has recognised it's

27:28

not very good. a

27:31

good first step, right? So that's one of

27:33

the reasons we started the campaign is the

27:35

government committed in their manifesto in the election last

27:37

summer to reviewing parental leave. They said, you

27:39

know, it's not working at the moment. We're

27:41

going to review it as a whole. And

27:44

they've now committed to starting that

27:46

in June this year. And

27:48

it's going to run for a year. And

27:50

so our job as a campaign and

27:52

all the MPs who are supporting the campaign

27:54

are a ton of MPs who are supporting this

27:56

issue. Huge grounds swell of

27:58

support in the as well. All

28:01

of our jobs is to feed into that

28:03

review and say, this is what's not working. This

28:05

is what we need. We need longer, better

28:07

paid paternity leave. So our hope

28:09

is that that review will recommend better

28:11

paternity leave and the government will take

28:13

action. So there's a good case scenario

28:16

here where we've got change in a

28:18

couple of years, you know, a new

28:20

paternity leave. law on the statute books.

28:23

The challenge is that we

28:25

need to overcome is the

28:27

government's very worried about the

28:29

economy of economic pictures. The

28:31

movie is never great and so

28:33

that's why it's so important to illustrate

28:35

there's a really strong economic argument

28:38

for this as well. It's something that

28:40

basically should pay for itself and

28:42

some and it's a really good longer

28:44

-term investment in our kids, their development

28:46

and but also just in the

28:48

basic workforce of the economy. Yeah.

28:50

Oh, I'm, I can't wait to, to see

28:52

kind of what unfolds because yeah, we just,

28:54

I feel like it just is not sustainable,

28:56

is it? Where we, we kind of currently

28:58

are. Where, where are we really currently? What

29:00

are, what options do dads have at the

29:02

moment? We've talked about that kind of two

29:04

week that you said the police have where

29:06

they have that one week and then a

29:08

week of statutory. What kind of options are

29:10

you seeing from the dads you speak to?

29:14

So most companies now offer some kind

29:16

of top -up on paternity leave, but most

29:18

commonly that's just two weeks at full

29:20

pay. So the pay really does matter,

29:22

like a crucial point. We get longer

29:24

paternity leave, but it's still poorly paid.

29:26

Then just exclude a bunch of people

29:29

who can't afford it so that you

29:31

need both. So the pay

29:33

does really matter, but two weeks is just not

29:35

long enough. So the vast majority of people

29:37

are still just getting two weeks. At the top

29:39

end, you see people getting sort of six

29:41

months or more at full pay. Actually, one of

29:43

my co -founders, George, came into this because he

29:45

is really lucky to work for a company

29:48

where he had months at full pay and it

29:50

was just, he found it a transformational experience

29:52

and he knows if he hadn't had that time,

29:54

he wouldn't be an active parent because he

29:56

really struggled early on and it took time to

29:58

push through that barrier. So

30:00

that's at the top end. And

30:03

then obviously self -employed people get nothing.

30:05

So there is a real range and

30:07

that's part of the problem is increasingly

30:09

becoming a two -tier system. If you work

30:11

for a big, wealthy company who recognizes

30:13

the benefits to them for staff productivity,

30:15

morale, recruitment, and they offer you enhanced

30:17

percentage leave, that's great. But if you

30:20

work a smaller company that can't afford

30:22

it, then you don't. So that's why

30:24

we need government action to bring it

30:26

up for everyone. The

30:28

other option on the table is

30:30

shared parental leave. So that

30:32

allows you to transfer up to

30:34

48 weeks from the birthing

30:36

parent to the non birthing parent,

30:38

of which 37 are at

30:40

the statutory rate of pay. So

30:42

180 pounds a week. So

30:44

in theory, that sounds good. The problem is that

30:46

absolutely no one uses it. Almost no one uses

30:49

it. It's less than 2 % of families use

30:51

it. And the reason for

30:53

that is one, it's so poorly paid that

30:55

most people were just excluded. But

30:57

the other is that we, without having

30:59

proper designated paternity, the ring fence paternity

31:01

leave, there's still the sense that you're

31:03

taking away maternity leave from the mother

31:05

and maternity leave really matters too, right?

31:07

Mother understandably want that time. And so

31:10

a lot of people are reluctant to

31:12

give that up just so that the

31:14

father gets some time themselves. And that's

31:16

why other countries have tried exactly the

31:18

same thing and it hasn't worked and

31:20

it's only worked when they brought in

31:22

better ring fence paternity leave. So There

31:24

is shared parental leave, if you can

31:27

use it, that's amazing. We've heard really

31:29

positive stories from people who have, but

31:31

it's just out of reach for most people and it's

31:34

not the solution the longer term. What

31:36

do you want to see, Alex? What's

31:38

the dad shifts like gold

31:40

standard? Gold standard, I

31:42

think, is something like Sweden, where the boxes

31:45

it ticks are, there's a good amount

31:47

of ring fence time for each parent, so

31:49

it's use it or lose it. If

31:51

dads don't take that time, they can't transfer

31:53

it over and that's really... it's a

31:55

lot of evidence that you need that. It's

31:58

a good level of pay, but then on

32:00

top it also has that flexibility. Over 300

32:02

days that you can share, which

32:04

allows each couple to decide what works best

32:06

for them, rather than having it dictated to

32:09

them by their gender. So

32:11

that's absolutely best standard. Sweden has been

32:13

working on this for about 50 years,

32:15

so they are quite far down the

32:17

road from where we are. and we're

32:19

really realistic that bats we're not going

32:22

to jump to that kind of system

32:24

overnight you know that costs a lot

32:26

more it would require higher taxes and

32:28

so on so the absolute bare minimum

32:30

needs to be six weeks and ninety

32:32

percent we would like to see more

32:34

and we'd like to push for more

32:36

but that's the absolute bare minimum that

32:39

we need and you're envisaging that almost

32:41

as like a path to something better

32:43

over time but actually let's get let's

32:45

start shifting it a bit Yes, that

32:47

shouldn't be the end of the road.

32:49

I mean, that still brings us below

32:51

the European average for context. So that

32:53

needs to be a stepping point. And

32:56

again, we're going to push

32:58

for something better. And coming

33:00

back to Spain's model, we think the way

33:02

they've done it, a phasing increase over a number

33:04

of years, so you don't just jump

33:06

to 16 weeks, but you went there in

33:08

five weeks, seven weeks, eight weeks, so on. That's

33:11

a potentially a model where we could follow as

33:13

well. So you could end up with with more

33:15

than six weeks. But the level of pay is

33:17

really important. There's no good giving people 20 weeks

33:19

and then paying it all at 184 pounds a

33:21

week. Yeah, exactly. It's completely unsustainable. And

33:23

Alex, you said like, you know, MPs

33:25

are getting behind there. She needs members of

33:28

the public behind it. What can people

33:30

listening do to support this change if they

33:32

are really passionate about it? Which I'm

33:34

sure everyone's going to be because it seems

33:36

completely nonsensical to not support it. But

33:38

what can people do to help? So

33:40

the best thing to do is you go

33:42

on to our website, which is dadshift .org .uk

33:44

And there's a button at the top to add

33:46

your name for better paternity leave. And if

33:48

you do that... We can then send you emails.

33:50

We have actions that people to take all

33:53

the time. So for example, yesterday we were asking

33:55

people to get in touch with their local

33:57

police and crime commissioner and ask them to sort

33:59

out paternity leave in the police because obviously

34:01

police officers deserve that support. But if we can

34:03

get the police to do something, then it

34:05

puts pressure on the government to take action nationally.

34:07

So that's the first thing to do. Go

34:10

go to our website and sign up and we'll

34:12

then give you actions. If you're on social

34:14

media. We're on Instagram and

34:16

TikTok at Dadshift UK. And

34:18

to be honest, just liking, engaging, sharing stuff

34:20

is really important as well. It means that we

34:23

reach more people, more people get involved and

34:25

it has that snowball effect. Yeah, build

34:27

that momentum. So guys, please, please do that

34:29

now. It sounds like it's a super quick

34:31

and easy thing to do just to go

34:33

onto the Dadshift website. I'm going to be

34:35

doing it too because it doesn't just benefit

34:37

dads. They're really important. This is going to

34:39

benefit our children. It benefits us selfishly as

34:41

well. Like this only benefits absolutely everybody. So.

34:44

Thank you, Alex. Now, everyone that comes on

34:46

the podcast, I always ask for three

34:48

top tips. I feel like one of them

34:50

should definitely be get behind the dad

34:52

shift and support a change. But what would

34:54

your three top tips be when you're

34:56

listening? Oh, I

34:59

well, once one potentially themed top

35:01

tip is there are some banks,

35:03

if you've got a mortgage, who

35:05

will give you a mortgage holiday

35:07

when you're on parental leave. So

35:09

they'll say you don't have to

35:11

pay your mortgage for a few

35:13

months. And then that can obviously

35:15

be a massive help with the financial side. So that

35:17

if you're about to go on parental leave, have

35:19

a look into that, your bank might be able to

35:21

do that for you. So that's one one. That's

35:24

a great initiative, isn't it? Yeah, it's

35:26

something that we found out for a

35:28

Scandinavian bank is doing it. And I

35:30

looked into it and actually like very

35:32

few banks here, they don't make a

35:34

big deal out of it, but you

35:37

can do it a few of them.

35:39

So that's one tip. And

35:42

then another tip. We

35:45

recently got into,

35:49

obviously everyone loves the Julia Donaldson books, but I

35:51

recently found that she's done a bunch of

35:53

audio book recordings with her husband. They like read

35:55

them all out and they're all on Spotify. And

35:58

so they are keeping my son

36:00

very happy during happy changes when

36:02

he's otherwise. Yeah, I that.

36:04

So reluctant. So

36:06

yeah, the Julia Donaldson audiobooks and

36:08

Spotify are where we're at at the

36:11

moment. Julia Donaldson is

36:13

just a hero, isn't she? Absolutely

36:15

incredible. As are you and all

36:17

the work you're doing. So thank you so

36:19

much, Alex. And make sure you do, if you're

36:21

listening, go and make sure you give the

36:23

dad shift some support because we have got to

36:25

create a big old change in the UK

36:27

when it comes to this. Thank you so much,

36:29

Alex. My pleasure. If

36:42

you have listened to

36:44

this fair story, enjoy

36:46

it and feel that

36:48

you are ready to

36:51

really embrace and dedicate

36:53

yourself to having the

36:55

most informed, supported and

36:57

empowered journey. And

36:59

want to see if we may

37:01

be able to support you

37:03

in YPJ, your pregnancy and postnatal

37:05

journey. Please drop me a

37:07

Instagram DM at midwife underscore pip.

37:09

or get in touch on

37:11

my email pip at midwifepip .com

37:13

and let's chat through things and

37:16

see if we might be

37:18

a good match for each other.

37:20

I hope you've enjoyed listening and

37:22

wishing you all the best

37:24

on your journey through pregnancy, birth

37:27

and beyond. A

37:39

cursed mansion cloaked in

37:41

legend. I'm Sasha Auerbach.

37:43

Join me and Tom Ward every

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