As a choice to be a stay at home working
mother, I am always championing for more respect and development on a
Government level for the rights to/and of parents in Australia when it comes to entering
and exiting the workforce to bring up their children. I would like to see
a work force where children are simply a part of the way we do everything and
pregnant women, can continue to work from home or in the office where their
children are top priority. Addressing these issues was a political
campaign for Rudd leading up to his election, and I was wondering when we were
going to hear anything about it. Well, here is the first introduction to
change. The Paid Parental Leave Scheme. It's nice to see they
haven't segregated women and men from parental roles and a direct financial
support for the biggest job in the world they are about to undertake.
Monday 23
November 2009
The Australian Government is proposing to
introduce a Paid Parental Leave (PPL) scheme as part of the 2009/10
Federal Budget. The proposed scheme will be made available for parents who are
primary carers of children that have been born or adopted on or after 1 January
2011.
To be eligible for the proposed PPL scheme,
the primary carer must have:
- been engaged in work continuously for at least 10 of the 13 months
prior to the birth or adoption date of the child
- undertaken at least 330 hours of paid work in the 10
month period (an average of around one day of paid work a week).
Legislation for the proposed scheme will be
introduced into Parliament in 2010.
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More......
So far, it's a good start, however I would like to see them stop using the word "scheme". If someone said "I have a good scheme for you", one eyebrow would uncontrollably arch. Anyway, as I said it's a start, and the only person I can think of that wouldn't be happy with looking at this would be my mother. Only because she missed out with the 10 of us. Just a little bit p#ssed off! Love ya mum. ;)
http://www.business.vic.gov.au