Breaking News: Key Updates to Paternity Leave — What You Need to Know

The government has recently published draft amendments to Paternity Leave regulations, coming into force from 8^th March 2024, aimed at making paternity leave more flexible

The Regulations make the following changes:

• employees will be able to take their two-week paternity leave entitlement as two separate one-week blocks (rather than having to take just one week in total or two consecutive weeks).
• employees will be able to take paternity leave at any time in the 52 weeks after birth (rather than having to take leave in the 56 days following birth).
• employees will only need to give 28 days’ notice of their intention to take paternity leave (reduced from the previous position that required notice to be given 15 weeks before the Expected Week of Childbirth (EWC)).

The Regulations apply where the EWC (expected week of confinement) is on, or after, 6 April 2024.

PayPacket’s MD Cas Thompson commented ‘This is positive news that will help millions navigate the challenges families face during the first year of a new-born’s life and we welcome any and all steps that make that time a little easier’

You can review the draft regulations here: 

https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukdsi/2024/9780348256116/pdfs/ukdsi_9780348256116_en.pdf