Top executives call for greater sharing of parental leave to keep women engaged in workforce

The nation’s business leaders say greater sharing of parental leave can keep women connected to the workforce.

Allowing both parents to share early childhood parental leave makes good economic sense.

The nation’s business leaders have called for greater sharing of parental leave responsibilities as a means of keeping women connected to the workforce.

As more of Australia’s largest corporates move to broaden their own parental leave policies to enable both men and women to take advantage of the schemes, some of the country’s most influential chief executives have welcomed the federal government’s steps to instil a similar sharing of responsibilities as a crucial element in fostering greater economic growth.

“Equal opportunity for women is not only critical for equality generally but is also essential for economic growth,” NAB chief executive Ross McEwan said in The Australian’s 2022 CEO Survey.

“Encouraging more men to take parental leave is essential to (making it a shared responsibility) and that means providing all parents with the same access to parenting leave entitlements, including primary, secondary, adoption, foster and kinship carers,” he said.

NAB chief executive Ross McEwan. Picture: David Crosling

As part of its proposed enterprise agreement – which was last month knocked back by the bank’s staff – NAB had included measures that would have broadened paid parental leave into a shared responsibility between men and women.

“We also support government policies to subsidise and improve access to childcare, because cheaper childcare removes financial disincentives to return to work, and it is typically mothers whose careers are held back by this,” Mr McEwan said.

HESTA chief executive Debby Blakey noted that if women could stay connected with the workforce they typically had higher earnings throughout their career, resulting in greater financial security as they aged.

“Women take 93.5 per cent of primary carer’s leave, which can increase their risk of financial insecurity in retirement,” Ms Blakey said.

“We think there is an important conversation to have around how policy changes like parental leave can help rebalancing the distribution of work and care in families, helping address the gender pay gap but also having broader productivity benefits.”

HESTA chief executive Debby Blakey. Picture: Ian Currie

“Flexibility and equality within paid parental leave is so important and we think we have an important role as an employer.”

HESTA currently offers 14 weeks of paid parental leave to the primary carer – regardless of gender.

“Having access to this leave has significant health and wellbeing benefits for families and the community more broadly. We also think it makes smart business sense as it’s supporting employee retention and engagement,” Ms Blakey said.

The support for both men and women to share caring responsibilities in the first years of a child’s life comes ahead of proposed changes to the federal government’s paid parental leave policy that would make it easier for men to access the scheme, promoting more flexibility in work and care arrangements.

The federal government’s proposed changes include rolling parental leave pay, and dad and partner pay, into one 20-week scheme, paid at the minimum wage, that could be taken by either parent.

Medibank chief executive David Koczkar. Picture: Nicki Connolly

The total parental leave pay available to families would then increase by two weeks each July until 2026 when it would be capped at 26 weeks.

The changes to government paid parental leave would help to address issues of gender equality, Medibank chief executive David Koczkar said.

“The fewer barriers to workforce participation, the wider the pool of workers,” Mr Koczkar told The Australian.

“These are targeted economic reforms that will boost productivity and help to address labour shortages which stymie growth. These reforms will also help to address issues related to gender inequality.”

The health insurer broadened its own corporate parental leave scheme in 2018.

“Removing the labels of primary and secondary carer encourages equal and shared parenting responsibilities. Our data shows the impact of this – with the proportion of men taking parental leave of more than two weeks now 10-times higher than before we introduced the policy.”

AustralianSuper chief executive Paul Schroder.

AustralianSuper chief executive Paul Schroder spoke of the importance of women’s participation in the workforce.

“We agree with the staged extension to the government’s paid parental leave, which includes the ability for either parent to utilise the leave rather than it being the primary caregiver,” he said.

“This may enable some families to utilise it for the father/partner to stay at home with the child and support the primary caregiver to re-enter the workforce.

“Female workforce participation is critical in developing a more diverse workforce which leads to better outcomes and any initiative to remove roadblocks to allow for workforce participation is welcome,” he added.