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Following is a question by the Hon Wong Kwok-hing and an oral reply by the Secretary for Economic Development and Labour, Mr Stephen Ip, in the Legislative Council today (June 21):
Question:
At present, female employees are entitled to statutory maternity leave while male employees are not entitled to statutory paternity leave. In this connection, will the Government inform this Council:
(a) whether it will study if the failure to legislate for paid paternity leave constitutes family status discrimination; if so, when such a study will be conducted; if not, the reasons for that;
(b) whether it will study the implications and benefits of legislating for paid paternity leave on society, economy, promotion of childbirth, and private organizations, etc; if so, when the study will be conducted; if not, the reasons for that; and
(c) of the list of countries which have legislated for paid paternity leave, the number of local organizations in the private sector which grant paid paternity leave to their employees, and whether it will consider offering paid paternity leave to civil servants?
Reply:
Madam President,
According to the Employment Ordinance, female employees are entitled to 10 weeks' maternity leave. Although we do not have legislative provisions for paternity leave, a male employee is entitled to take paid annual leave in consultation with his employer, thereby allowing him to take care of his wife after confinement and his newborn baby. Depending on the length of service, employees are entitled to statutory annual leave of 7 to 14 days.
On the proposal to legislate for paternity leave, we understand that at present relatively few economies provide for paternity leave. There is therefore little implementation experience for our reference. Moreover, as most companies in Hong Kong are small and medium sized enterprises, their flexibility in manpower deployment is comparatively low. Legislating for paternity leave would increase their operation costs and may also create implementation difficulties.
The Government encourages employers to adopt family-friendly employment practices. The Labour Department will step up promotional work on this front by launching a variety of publicity and educational activities such as seminars and discussion sessions. We will encourage employers to understand and care about the needs of their employees, such that the employees will be able to fulfil their obligations with respect to both work and family.
We are seeking the legal advice of the Department of Justice on whether failure to legislate for paid paternity leave would constitute family status discrimination. As the Equal Opportunities Commission administers the Family Status Discrimination Ordinance, we are consulting the Commission at the same time.
There are views that paid paternity leave is conducive to promoting childbirth, and is hence closely related to the population policy. The Committee on Social Development and Quality of Life of the Commission on Strategic Development is deliberating on the population policy, and the Council for Sustainable Development will launch an ¡§Invitation and Response Document¡¨ on population policy in late June, to invite different sectors of the community to offer their views on the various subjects under the population policy. Taking into account public feedback, the Council for Sustainable Development will make recommendations to the Government on the way forward for a sustainable population policy for Hong Kong. The Government will consider the recommendations of the Commission on Strategic Development and the Council for Sustainable Development in its formulation of a long-term strategy on population policy. We will make reference to any views and recommendations pertaining to paternity leave collected in the exercise.
As far as paternity leave arrangements in other places are concerned, we understand that some countries are providing paternity leave ranging from 2 to 15 days. For instance, Australia provides one week¡¦s paternity leave without pay, while Sweden provides 10 days' paternity leave with pay funded by social insurance. However, there is currently no international labour standard on paternity leave. We also do not have comprehensive information on paid paternity leave arrangements in other places. As for Hong Kong, we do not have statistics on the implementation of paternity leave in private enterprises.
In respect of Government employees, the vast majority of civil servants under Government's employment are provided with full-pay annual leave ranging from 22 to 40.5 days, depending on their ranks, terms of appointment and years of service. Annual leave is provided to ensure that staff members have sufficient rest in order to relieve their work pressure. To allow more flexibility in taking leave, the annual leave of civil servants can be accumulated up to a stipulated ceiling. Our record indicates that most civil servants have indeed accumulated a considerable balance of untaken leave which can be drawn for meeting personal needs that may arise during the year, including taking care of family members. At present, we have no plan to provide paid paternity leave in addition to the existing annual leave benefits of civil servants.
Ends/Wednesday, June 21, 2006
Issued at HKT 12:50
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