Women who suffer a miscarriage should get two weeks of paid leave from work to grieve the loss of their baby, an influential group of MPs has said.
The government is under mounting pressure to introduce a new right of bereavement leave for women across the UK who lose their baby before 24 weeks’ gestation as a result of miscarriage, ectopic pregnancy, molar pregnancy, termination for medical reasons and embryo transfer loss.
Although a growing number of employers, including NHS Trusts, already offer the leave as a discretionary benefit, the Commons Women and Equality Committee said it needs become a universal right for women and their partners given the extensive physical and emotional impacts of baby loss.
Labour MP Sarah Owen, chairman of the committee, said: “I was not prepared for the shock of miscarrying at work during my first pregnancy.
“Like many women, I legally had to take sick leave.
“But I was grief stricken, not sick, but harbouring a deep sense of loss.”
Every year in the UK, an estimated 250,000 pregnancies end through miscarriage, according to the Women and Equalities Committee.
Currently only those who lose a baby after 24 weeks are entitled to two weeks of paid bereavement.
But Jude, whose surname has been kept anonymous for legal reasons, said she went back to work the day after she and her partner found out that their second round of IVF treatment had failed.
Jude and her husband Roger opened up about suffering months of failed IVF treatments.
She recalled that the whole process was soul-destroying for the south west London couple.
She said: “We would never have dreamed of asking for time off.
“I felt like I had this enormous secret that I couldn’t tell anyone.”
Jude returned to work the day after they were told that the embryo transfer had failed.
Despite her boss being supportive, her only option was to take sick leave, at the discretion of her employer.
Miscarriage Association CEO Vicki Robinson said: “We want everyone to recognise that this isn’t a medical episode, and it doesn’t just happen to the person who is physically pregnant.
“It is something that happens to two people who both deserve the time to grieve and begin to heal without the added pressure of financial or workplace insecurity.”
If ministers accept amendments to the employers rights bill bringing forward the change, couples who experience a miscarriage would no longer have to take sick leave as a result.
Other women feel that taking sick leave wasn’t even an option.
Robinson explained taking sick leave often doesn’t feel appropriate for many women who have lost a baby.
She said: “Taking sick leave doesn’t give them the validation that the experience deserves, that can be felt as a bereavement just like any other.”
After another failed round of IVF, Jude said she felt completely deflated.
She said: “We just felt so alone and like no one really understood the pain we were going through behind closed doors.
“I just couldn’t face going through it all again.
“If it was less of a taboo, and more talked about in the industry, we may have had more success.”
Jude and her husband now have two grown-up children and believe the right to paid bereavement leave could have been life changing.
Her husband attended meetings and worked tirelessly when the couple was going through IVF, and the loss of their last chance of having a baby of their own.
He said: “My part in the journey was never really considered.
“It was very much focused on what the woman goes through and there was no talk of support if things didn’t go to plan.
“If people did talk about it, they only ever talked about the positive outcomes, not the impact of embryo rejection or even whether the journey got to go that far.”
Jude says it also meant that he couldn’t support her in the way he would have wanted to as taking any time off was seen as a weakness in the industry.
She said: “As a woman, you feel like you can’t give up.
“But of course that is not how fertility works”
In the UK, around one in seven couples have difficulty conceiving, but infertility is not usually diagnosed until a couple has not managed to conceive after a year of trying.
A number or women have backed the proposal, including Robinson.
She said: “This archaic 12-week rule that we all seem to have assimilated means people are having to go through pregnancy loss alone.
“If people don’t speak about it, then when it happens to you, it feels very much like you’re on your own, almost like you’ve done something wrong.”
“We want it to be a statutory right so that everyone gets the same level of validation, recognition and support.
“It shouldn’t seem like your employer is just doing you a favour.”
Polling undertaken for Miscarriage Associate last year found nearly 90 per cent of people believe the loss of a baby at any stage is felt as a bereavement.
Robinson added that while many private sector firms, including those which are male-dominated, already offer bereavement leave in the event of a miscarriage, this is not enough.
She said: “It should not be a postcode lottery of provision, but a basic right.
“As it stands, the case for a minimum standard in law is overwhelming.”
The Employment Rights Bill is currently working its way through Parliament and has been described by the government as the biggest upgrade to rights at work for a generation.
Robinson said: “We want to make sure we’re living in a society where people talk about pregnancy and pregnancy loss.”
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