Jurisdiction(s):
United Kingdom

Related legal acts

Key definition

Parental leave definition

What does Parental leave mean? parental leave is time off work, normally unpaid, that an eligible parent (including an adoptive parent) takes to care for a child. In England & Wales and Scotland, and in Northern Ireland, it is a statutory right defined in legislation (Employment Rights Act 1996 and the Maternity and Parental Leave etc. Regulations 1999, with Northern Ireland equivalents). Each parent has up to 18 weeks’ unpaid leave per child, to be taken before the child’s 18th birthday. It is non‑transferable, usually taken in blocks of one week (or in days if the child is disabled), capped at four weeks per...

Shared parental leave after birth: practitioner guide to eligibility tests, curtailment, statutory notices, booking and varying leave, early birth exceptions, and employment rights

Published by a LexisNexis Employment expert

Practice notes

This Practice Note sets out the shared Parental leave framework for births under section 75E of the Employment Rights Act 1996 (ERA 1996) and the Shared Parental Leave Regulations 2014 (SPL Regs 2014), SI 2014/3050. In outline, after a child is born, the mother and one other person — either the child’s father, or an individual who is married to, the civil partner of, or the partner of, the mother — may share up to 50 of the 52 weeks of leave that would otherwise be the mother’s Maternity leave. It does not add to the total leave available; instead, it enables those two people to divide that existing entitlement if they wish.

Overview of shared parental leave and pay on birth

In brief, eligible parents who share responsibility for a child can use shared parental leave in the first year after:

the birth of their child
adopting a child (refer to Practice Note: Shared parental leave (adoption))
obtaining a parental order following a surrogacy arrangement (refer to Practice Note: Shared parental leave (adoption)—Parental order parents)...

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Web page updated on 21/05/2026

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