Kathleen Lynch (Cork North Central, Labour)

I move amendment No. 22:

In page 7, to delete lines 49 and 50.

This amendment relates to an adoptive parent who becomes ill while on leave. On return, such parents are no longer entitled to take the remainder of the adoptive leave due to them. This arises as a result of a lack of understanding, albeit not on the Minister of State's part, and I am surprised to find it in the Bill.

If a mother becomes sufficiently ill to require hospitalisation or so that she simply cannot take care of her child, she should not be deprived of what she would expect to receive. Under the proposed legislation, it appears that as such a mother came off the disability benefit to which she would be entitled when sick, she could not take the remainder of her adoptive leave. This seems incredible as she would lose out on bonding time with her child. In the first instance, an adoptive mother does not have the same bond with her child as would a natural mother and it must be built on. While this can also happen with women who give birth naturally, clearly there is more bonding to be done when a child is adopted. Under the proposed legislation, however, if, for example, the mother becomes ill for three weeks of the 16 weeks, when she comes off disability benefit, she is unable to take the remainder of the adoptive leave. It is possible that a mother could become ill 13 weeks into the adoptive leave period and it would then not be available to her at the end of her illness. However, it should be. If there is a period of time in which a mother cannot nurture her child because of illness, then she should be able to take the remainder of her adoptive leave as an automatic right when the period in which she is sick ends.

The Minister of State is probably afraid that people will move from adoptive leave to disability benefit and back again in order to extend their period away from work. That fear would have been allayed had the amendment proposing a 26-week leave period been accepted. However, I do not believe that people would act like that. I do not know many women who would do so. Women are put to the pin of their collars in order to return to work, sort out babysitters and all the rest, so as to pay massively inflated mortgages. I ask the Minister of State to accept this amendment because it makes sense. Increasingly, I have noticed a trend in legislation which assumes that people will do the wrong thing.

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