1. A NEW START TO SUPPORT WORK_LIFE BALANCE OF PARENTS AND CARERS
#SocialRights
Cinzia Sechi, ETUC Advisor
PERC Women’s Committee meeting, Brussels 26 October 2017

2. The Work-Life balance initiative comprises:
- A proposal for a Directive on work-life balance for working parents and carers
- A Commission Communication with policy and funding measures

3. Objectives
1. Increase female participation in the labour market and reduce the gender gap, including pay and pension gaps
2. Give workers a real choice when balancing their professional and caring responsibilities by modernising the current legal and policy framework
3. Supporting Member States' modern family policies to address the demographic challenges
4. Offer non legislative targeted measures to address shortcomings in care services facilities and the economic disincentives to work for second earners.

4. Problem definition

5. Challenges Gender gaps (a) in employment rate (20-64) and
(b) full-time equivalent employment rate (ER FTE gap), 2015
First, the economic and labour market situation in the European Union has changed considerably. More and more women are highly qualified and and put their career high on the priority list.
However, women are still under-represented in the labour force, despite their overall high qualifications. The overall employment rate of women is 11.6 percentage points lower than that of men and in full time equivalent, the gap exceeds 18 points, because part-time workers are mainly women.

6. Challenges
Parenthood and other caring responsibilities appear to be an important driver for the employment differences between women and men. In average in the EU women spend 13 more hours per week than men on care and household activities and in nearly all Member States, the gender employment gap widens substantially after having children. On average in 2015, the employment rate of women with one child under the age of 6 is 8.8 percentage points (pp) lower than for women without young children, and in several countries this difference is over 30 pp.
Conversely, parenthood has the opposite effect on the employment rates of men. In all EU Member States, fathers of one child under 6 are more likely to be employed than non-fathers. In 2015, the employment rate of fathers of one child under 6 was on average 12.2 pp higher than non-fathers, and in some countries this difference exceeded 18 pp. At the same time, men are increasingly taking up their role as parents showing a preference for working arrangements that fit with family responsibilities. This shows that involving men and fathers in the caring roles is not, and should not be, a women's issue only.

7. Challenges
Reasons for women's inactivity in percentage of total women inactivity (aged 20-64), EU 28

8. Challenges Underrepresentation of women in the labour market
Important driver
There are 3 main challenges, which contribute to the unbalanced sharing of caring responsibilities. The first one is inadequate family-related leaves and flexible working arrangements.
The availability, or lack-thereof, of leave arrangements can strongly influence women’s decisions to stay at home or return to the labour market after assuming care responsibilities.
However, what we concentrate on with this initiative is the availability and attractiveness of leave arrangements for fathers, ie. paternity and parental leaves, which has a considerable impact on the division of work and care between parents, and in turn on overall female employment outcomes. Those Member States that have earmarked a significant portion of leave to fathers and paid the leave at a relatively high replacement rate tend to experience higher take-up by fathers and positive results in terms of mothers’ employment outcomes. For example, in Sweden, reserving parental leave to the father has led to a doubling in the number of parental leave days taken by men. Female employment is among the highest in the EU in Sweden, and mothers with young children are more likely to be employed than non-mothers, whereas in the EU28 on average, mothers are far less likely to be in employment.
The lack of adequate leave to take care of other dependent relatives also exacerbates the unequal sharing of caring responsibilities between women and men. Where there is no carers' leave provision, it is generally women who will work part-time or drop out of the labour market in order to take care of their relative for a short period of time.
In addition to inadequate or ill-designed leaves, the unavailability of flexible working arrangements can lead to some people, particularly women, to drop out of the labour market altogether when taking on caring responsibilities. Flexible working arrangements include remote working, flexible working schedules, and reduced working hours (part-time work). That being said, while such measures can be useful in allowing some women to remain in the labour market after having children, large gender differences in their take-up can result in wider gender gaps in terms of earnings and career progression opportunities, as well as pension entitlements later on, in particular for part-time work.
The second main challenge which contributes to the unbalanced sharing of caring responsibilities between women and men is the lack of accessible, affordable and quality formal care services (childcare, out-of-school care, long-term care).
Difficulties in accessing affordable and quality formal childcare (ECEC and out-of-school care) services can also lead many women to reduce their working hours or drop out of the labour market. The EU set the Barcelona targets in 2002 to improve the provision of formal childcare arrangements by 2010 and reaffirmed in the European Pact for Gender Equality spanning until 2020, given that a majority of Member States have still not achieved them.
A lack of formal long-term care arrangements can also lead many people with dependent relatives, most often women, to take on the role of informal carers, and lead them to take long leaves of absence from the labour market or dropping out completely. The incidence of providing informal care to elderly relatives is highest among the 50 to 64-year-olds. Working women are up to 1.6 times more likely to be informal carers than working men.
The third main challenge which contributes to the unbalanced sharing of caring responsibilities between women and men is economic disincentives for second-earners to work.
Some Member States have tax-benefit systems - through joint taxation systems, transferable tax credits or deductions for single earner households - that create high marginal effective tax rates on the second earner in a household, the woman in the majority of couples, thereby discouraging them from entering employment or increasing working hours. Large fiscal disincentives exist for second earners to increase their work intensity in seven Member States, while a much larger number of Member States appear to have some form of tax-benefit disincentive when factoring in allowances and childcare costs.
Unbalanced sharing of caring responsibilities
Reinforced by
Insufficient childcare, out-of-school and long-term care services
Economic disincentives for second-earners
Inadequate leaves and flexible working arrangements

9. Challenges Current EU legal framework on family-related leaves…
Maternity Leave Directive (92/85/EEC)
Parental Leave Directive (2010/18/EU)
+ Directive on Gender Equality in Employment (2006/54)

10. Challenges
… does not ensure a gender-balanced take-up of leave

11. Challenges
… does not take into account the increasing need for informal carers in light of an ageing population
Population aged 50 and over reporting to be informal carers, 2013 (or nearest year)

12. Challenges
Current EU legal framework on flexible working arrangements (FWA) … Parental Leave Directive (2010/18/EU) ➤ Right to request reduced and flexible working hours upon return from leave Part-Time Work Directive (97/81/EC) ➤ Right to request change from part-time to full-time and vice-versa

13. Challenges
… does not provide a right to request FWA for all working parents and carers  × ×

14. Measures proposed

15. A Directive on Work-Life Balance
Paternity leave (new): 10 working days, compensated at least at sick pay level;
Parental leave (strengthened): Compensation of the 4 months at least at sick pay level and non-transferability for the whole period, entitlement to flexible uptake, rise of the age of the child from 8 to 12.
Carers' leave (new): 5 working days/year to take care of child or dependent relative, compensated at least at sick pay level
Flexible working arrangements (strengthened): Right for parents of children up to 12 or carers to request FWA (reduced working hours, flexible working hours and flexibility in place of work)

16. Proposal for a Directive
Coherence with EU policies
EU Treaties
Legal acquis on work-life balance
European Pillar of Social Rights
European Charter of Fundamental Rights
Barcelona targets
European Semester
Commission Recommendation on Investing in Children
Strategic Engagement on Gender Equality

17. Proposal for a Directive
The new measures regarding family-related leaves and FWA can be found in the proposal for a directive.
The proposal for a Directive on Work-Life Balance for Parents and Carers takes a broad approach and builds on the existing rights (parental part-time directives), enhances them and introduces new rights.
The proposal takes a life cycle approach and includes:
The introduction of paternity leave. Fathers will be able to take at least 10 working days of paternity leave around the time of birth of the child, compensated at least at the level of sick pay.
Why necessary? Favour bonding; better cognitive development of the child; less stress for fathers.
Additionally, introducing the right to paternity leave should have a positive impact on female participation in the labour market as it will have a strong leverage effect on the take-up of parental leave by men. In Portugal, where entitlements to paternity leave have been significantly strengthened (including through introducing compulsory leave) 80% of fathers who take-up paternity leave use also parental leave.
The strengthening of parental leave ;
Keeps existing rights and enhances them…
[4 parameters are important; two are core parameters and determine the success of the measure, two are complementary;
Core parametres: pay; non-transferability. Supporting: non-discrimation and dismissal protection and time to take it.]
…by making the 4-month period compensated at least at sick pay level and non-transferable from a parent to another. Parents will also have the right to request to take leave in a flexible way (part-time or in a piecemeal way) and the age of the child up to which parents can take leave will be increased from 8 to 12 years old.
We have seen that Member States that have earmarked a significant portion of leave to fathers and paid the leave at a relatively high replacement rate tend to experience higher take-up by fathers and positive results in terms of mothers’ employment outcomes (e.g. Sweden and Germany)

18. Proposal for a Directive
The introduction of carers' leave for workers caring for seriously ill or dependent relatives. Working carers will be able to take 5 days per year, compensated at least at sick pay level. Duly justified.
The extension of the right to request flexible working arrangements (reduced working hours, flexible working hours and flexibility in place of work) to all working parents of children up to 12 and carers with dependent relatives.
The introduction of dismissal protection for workers making use of the above rights.
This proposal is about offering real choices to both parents. There is broad evidence that leave provisions play an important role in promoting a more equal share of family duties between men and women.
If leave is not paid or if it is transferable, we are actually not offering a choice, this would maintain the status quo whereby second-earners (mostly women) take care of children and dependent relatives and men go to work. Children have the right to engage with and benefit from both parents.

19. ETUC critical comments to the legislative package on WLB
Strongly regrets that the Maternity leave Directive has not been revised and ask to revise this decision in 2 years time if progress has not been achieved in terms of maternity protection against dismissal
Flexible working arrangements should be adapted to workers’ needs throughout a life-cycle approach
Directive should apply to all workers, including atypical workers (e.g. self-employed, domestic workers, etc.)
Directive should apply to all companies, including SMEs

20. Non-legislative measures
Ensuring protection against discrimination and dismissal for parents (including pregnant women and workers coming back from a leave) and carers
Better enforcement of existing dismissal protection under EU law; financial support to public authorities to enforce dismissal protection acquis
Encouraging a gender-balanced use of family- related leaves and flexible working arrangements
Benchmark and monitor gender-balanced design/use leaves and FWA in the Semester; EU-level data; Sharing best practices on Family-friendly organisation/ label; breastfeeding facilities; leave periods credited in pension systems
Financing new pilot schemes for the developement of innovative working arrnagments (EaSI)

21. Non-legislative measures proposed
Improving Quality, Affordability, Access to care:
Encourage use of EFSI
Request MS to reprogramme ESIF to address CSRs
Benchmarks on childcare and long-term care services
Monitor in the European Semester
EU-level data
Sharing of good practices
Removing economic disincentives for second earners which prevent women from accessing the labour market or working full-time :
Benchmarks on addressing tax-benefit disincentives
Monitoring in EU Semester
Sharing good practices

22. ETUC critical comments to the non legislative package on WLB
Regrets that the Barcelona targets are not made explicit and identified as the benchmark to be reached by 2020 by Member States
Regrets that a new target on the elderly care provisions has not been put forward
A new EU employment strategy for the care sector should be launched
Concerns on PPPs to finance social infrastructure

23. The Voice of European Workers