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LCQ6: Paternity leave
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     Following is a question by the Hon Wong Kwok-hing and a reply by the Secretary for Labour and Welfare, Mr Matthew Cheung Kin-chung, in the Legislative Council today (October 17):

Question:

     The SAR Government of the last term started to provide paid paternity leave to eligible male employees on April 1 this year, and it also conducted a study on legislating for the provision of paternity leave.  In this connection, will the Government inform this Council:

(a) of the respective numbers of civil servants and non-civil service contract staff who applied for and were granted paternity leave since April 1 this year;

(b) whether it knows the number of public and subvented organisations that provide paid paternity leave to their employees at present; the percentage of such number in the total number of public and subvented organisations; the total number of the employees concerned who are entitled to paid paternity leave, and the number of days of paternity leave they can take each time; and

(c) given that during his election campaign, the Chief Executive had pledged that he would progressively extend the system of providing paternity leave to the subvented and private sectors after being elected to the office, of the authorities' plans to honour such pledge, as well as the timeframe and the relevant details; if they do not have such plans and timeframe, of the reasons for that?

Reply:

President,

     My reply to the question raised by the Hon Wong Kwok-hing is as follows:

(a) The provision of five working days of paid paternity leave to eligible government employees has been implemented with effect from April 1, 2012.  In the half year up to September 30, 2012, a total of 1 315 paternity leave applications from government employees have been approved, including 1 264 from civil servants (96.1 per cent) and 51 from non-civil servants (3.9 per cent).

(b) We do not have the data on paid paternity leave provided by public and government subvented organisations to their employees.  The terms of employment of their staff are employment matters between them as employers and their employees.  Having regard to their own circumstances, these organisations are free to decide whether to adopt any family-friendly employment practice or measure, including the granting of paid paternity leave to employees.

(c) As one of the promoters in family-friendly employment practices, the Labour Department (LD) has since 2006 been promoting a family-friendly culture, including the provision of paternity leave, and encouraging human resources executives, employers and representatives of industry-based employers' associations to implement different forms of family-friendly employment practices, through its network of 18 Human Resources Managers Clubs and 9 industry-based Tripartite Committees.  Over the years, either on its own or in collaboration with other relevant government departments and organisations, LD has also been continuously promoting family-friendly employment practices including paternity leave through various publicity channels such as large-scale seminars, roving exhibitions, educational DVDs, publicity videos, feature articles, publications and promotional leaflets.

     After six years of promotional efforts, the number of organisations providing paternity leave to employees has been increasing continuously.  Findings of the surveys conducted by LD with member establishments of its 18 Human Resources Managers Clubs show that the percentage of respondent organisations voluntarily offering paternity leave to their employees gradually increased from 16% in 2006 to 38.7% in 2012.

     Separately, LD has conducted a study on legislating for paternity leave.  In the process, we have looked into the practices of other economies where paternity leave is provided by law and examined the various issues that the Administration has to deal with if paternity leave is made a statutory benefit for all male employees in Hong Kong, having regard to the preponderance of small and medium enterprises in Hong Kong.

     LD is currently consulting the Labour Advisory Board actively on the subject of legislating for paternity leave.

Ends/Wednesday, October 17, 2012
Issued at HKT 15:27

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