When Chris Breen and his wife lost their baby when she was just six weeks old, they needed time to grieve.
That’s because her planned paid maternity leave was cancelled by her employer.
“Priya’s mum was devastated,” Breen told 9News.
“When she was back at work, crying, I was at home.
“It made a big difference to me just having the space to deal with those emotions.
“It’s just an unfair situation.”
Breen, a high school teacher employed by the NSW government, said they lost Priya, his wife’s first baby, last July.
Priya had been in the NICU as she was born prematurely, and was doing well.
But she died a few weeks later from an unrelated condition.
When her mum told her work, the employment services company informed her she wouldn’t be able to take her planned paid maternity leave.
Instead it gave her personal leave for four weeks, which didn’t even cover the time her daughter was alive.
She did get government entitlements but Breen said when they contacted the Fair Work Ombudsman, they were told the firm did nothing wrong. It was allowed to cancel her planned paid paternity leave.
Now the the inner-west Sydney couple are calling for change.
They want to see a law change to offer “humane” rules that don’t force people back to work after such losses.
A petition they started calling for an end to “cancelling maternity leave for infant death or stillbirths” has more than 10,000 signatures
“The law is silent on whether they can cancel paid leave – it differs company to company,” Breen said.
His wife said since they started the petition other mothers who lost their babies had contacted her.
Some have been allowed their full paid maternity leave but others have also had to return to work.
“It is just horrific and inhumane,” she said.
“I want the government to change the Fair Work laws and not let employers in the private sector be given the onus of whether they want to give leave, and if so how much.”
Dr Giuseppe Carabetta, associate professor of employment law with the University of Technology Sydney Business School, said the rules varied for government support too.
“In the awful situation where a baby is stillborn, the employee is barred from taking what’s referred to as unpaid special parental leave under our national provisions; however there is provision for unpaid parental leave, as well as compassionate leave,” he said.
In 2021 Labor introduced a bill to change the law on paid parental leave for stillbirths.
Asked by 9News, Federal Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations Murray Watt said he would put the issue to the National Workplace Consultative Council with a view to closing any gap.
A spokeswoman for Fair Work Australia issued a statement to 9News.
“For employer-provided paid parental leave, whether an employer can cancel paid parental leave if an employee’s child dies within the leave period would depend on the terms within the source of the entitlement, whether that is an employee’s enterprise agreement, workplace policy or employment contract,” she said.