What will future birth leave look like? Union and employer representatives, associations of elected officials and family movements were to meet, Wednesday May 15, at the Ministry of Solidarity and Health, at the invitation of the government, to begin a new consultation on the contours of this system supposed to replace , ultimately, parental leave.
The latter, created in 1977 and reformed in 2014, allows parents to suspend their professional activity, totally or partially, after the birth of a child and until the child is 3 years old. But it suffers from its low compensation (448 euros per month in the event of complete interruption of activity), which makes it unattractive: only 14% of mothers and barely 1% of fathers use it. Very often, parents take it upon themselves due to lack of a childcare solution before schooling.
Issues of (professional) equality between women and men, but also better sharing of tasks are therefore at the heart of the reflection. The general framework for the reform has already been laid out by Emmanuel Macron, in a magazine interview Shepublished on May 8. “Three months for mothers, three months for fathers, cumulative during the child’s first year, and compensated up to 50% of salary up to the Social Security ceiling”or 1,900 euros, specified the President of the Republic, who reiterated his desire to make it an instrument to boost the birth rate.
This new leave, which does not replace maternity leave, lasting sixteen weeks, and paternity leave, lasting twenty-eight days, should come into force “end of 2025”. It will appear in the next Social Security financing bill, discussed at the start of the school year in September, assured the Minister for Children, Youth and Families, Sarah El Haïry, in an interview with La Tribune Sunday.
Until then, many questions arise: will the three-month period be renewable? Transferable between both parents? Will there be specific provisions for single-parent families? Is a mandatory nature envisaged to force fathers to take advantage of it?
“A hell of a step back”
Among the social partners, some are offended at having learned about the first arbitrations through the press. “Between September and December [2023]we have already participated in a consultation led by [l’ancienne ministre des solidarités] Aurore Bergé, where we were able to address important elements on the birth rate, the question of childcare and professional inequalities between women and men”, recalls the vice-president of the French Confederation of Christian Workers, Pascale Coton. The modalities revealed by the Head of State seem to him to be “a big step back from what we had relied on”. She particularly regrets that it is ultimately not planned that the new system will be linked to current parental leave.
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