a friend of mine has had a meeting this morning to discuss unpaid parental leave as her oh is working away in london for a week and she has noone to look after the kind
she has been refused, he said 'no thats what annual leave is for'!! is this right as she doesnt want to take annual leave as she doesnt have many left, surely she should be granted unpaid for childcare???
he has always had it in for her, not just saying it so just checking he isnt being unreasonable!? x

If she has parental rights to the child (I assume she does) and the child is under 5 then she has a right to take up to 4 weeks a year parental leave until the child is 5. However she does have to give 21 days notice of parental leave and it has to be taken in week blocks.

If it's less than 21 days away she can take emergency leave.
Time off for emergencies

All employees also have a right to a
reasonable amount of unpaid time off to deal with certain emergencies
involving their family. For example, a child falling ill, a breakdown in
childcare arrangements or a problem at a child’s school. You do not
have to give notice in advance for this emergency leave. But you will
need to tell your employer as soon as you can what the problem is and
when you expect to be back at work.

If she qualifies for the leave and she is being refused then she should speak to a manager or HR and may have to go down the route of putting in a complaint.

Hope some of that helps - have a look on direct.gov hun - most info is on there.

xx

yes she is fulltime carer to them and one is under 5 so she qualifies...see i found all the info on the gov websit, but wasnt sure if he could refuse as she still has a few annual leave left...she has phone HR and the woman in charge of our dept is contacting her tomo!!
thanx debs xx

I'll add my bit.

She can only take parental leave if she has been in their employment for at least a whole year.

The employer can ask for evidence I.e birth cert.

She should be informed by letter of the reason why it has been declined

When I was at home after having a cs my oh applied for special leave to look after me and kids and got paid for it, thinks it's dependents leave or something like that.

kelly-yeah she's been in employed there for 4 years! and can prove they child is hers with birth cert and things, he just said ,thats what annual leave is for' end of, no mention of a letter or anything!!
amanda, yeah we are entitled to 7 carers days, but she thought she'd ask for unpaid as she's be more likeley to get them...he's a knobhead, he used to work in a womens prison and still likes to think he does x

parental leave is seperate from annual leave and he cant force her to take it, from what i understand

Clare is correct. They need to give a valid reason. I'd write a letter to this boss including hr asking for a valid reason