Human Resources

This policy explains how much time you can take with your partner to share your childcare responsibilities if the primary carer ends their maternity or adoption leave early. It also explains how much you'll be paid during your leave.

• If you're a primary carer, you'll be obliged to take 2 weeks leave following birth or adoption. You can share the remaining 50 weeks leave from the birth or placement of your child up to its first birthday or during the first year of placement. 
• You can plan to take time off together, separately or a combination of both, and leave can be booked in single continuous blocks.  You can also request to take leave in discontinuous blocks, where you return to work in between periods of leave.
• If you have 52 weeks or more continuous service you'll be eligible for University Shared Parental Pay (USPP) of either up to 14 weeks full pay or up to 6 weeks full pay and 16 weeks half pay. You can also share 37 weeks Statutory Shared Parental pay (SSPP) depending on your earnings. 
• SSPP will be included in your full pay. When you're on half pay it will be on top of that amount. 
• If you don’t qualify for USPP you'll be given up to 37 weeks SSPP depending on your earnings. You can choose to take the remaining 13 weeks of your shared parental leave without pay.

Our policy endeavours to be fully inclusive and supportive of all types of couples and family relationships and we have attempted to reflect this within our policy. Where individual staff members are in relationships not outlined in the document and are finding barriers to access, we encourage a conversation with your HR Manager. We will evolve our policy in line with your feedback, regulations, best practice and legislative developments.