Is paid maternity leave enough?

Maley argues that paid maternity leave is not the answer to any question - increased fertility rates, enhanced gender equity or increased workplace productivity - that the real answer is to provide stable marriages, tax credits and enhance the value of motherhood. To the detriment of logical debate, however, he makes grandiose justifications for WHY it is not acceptable to have paid maternity leave, such as:

deliberate policies designed to bribe or coerce couples to have more children would be repugnant. Like the Chinese one-child policy, it would treat men and women as no more than instruments in a controlled breeding exercise intended to achieve a certain level of population.

Fourteen weeks government funded leave to ease the transition of women in and out of the workforce and provide a more supportive early environment for the mother and child, and China's one child policy that has resulted in some women seeking refugee status in Australia - I can see the similarity! The Baby Bonus of course is the real one child policy - it only applies to one child. Or this one:

Compulsory or government-provided paid maternity leave cannot be justified as a 'gender equity' measure. It is properly an issue for voluntary negotiation between employers and employees. The question of employment continuity for employed mothers should be separated from the question of a maternity or dependent child payment.

As I said earlier, we can already see how well this works for those not in professional positions. But apparently it is these women's choice to undergo financial and professional penalties in order to give birth. I would not argue that having a baby is not a choice - but why make it a punishable offence for some women when it is a valid social contribution to society?

Maley further argues:

A woman, it is claimed, has 'no choice' but to give up work continuity and income when she has a baby ... 'No choice' is the basis of this argument; but this is misleading, and no question of injustice or coercion arises. Working mothers and prospective working mothers always have the option of not working. The decision to work is a free one, as is the decision to have a baby, and both have foreseeable consequences. There is no coercion here, and no injustice unless it is claimed that the imperatives attached to pregnancy and parturition are injustices inflicted upon women by some human agency."

This is an echo of the Treasurer's words I reported earlier. As we all know - it is far easier to deal with the consequences of this choice if you are a professional woman in the public service or big business with better workplace entitlements and a higher income capacity. What if you are a casual factory worker for whom the income is vital? Should you be penalised for not being a corporate lawyer?

Finally, he states that:

...evidence suggests that the reasons why women are choosing to have fewer, or no, children go beyond an either/or choice between career and children. It is probable that falling fertility is, in part, a response to profound social and economic changes. And it may be that these are so deeply determined, so entrenched and popular as to be beyond reversal or mitigation except at unacceptable financial and social cost. The movement of mothers into the workforce is an outstanding example, along with the increasing fragility of married life.

Here I agree - it is because of social and economic change. Yet apparently the solution is not to adjust families workplaces to suit the changes that global economic and social changes has brought, but to maintain impediments to this adjustment. Does he propose that taking mothers out of the workforce is the solution? He probably does.

For your illumination, Barry Maley is a senior research fellow at the Centre for Independent Studies and his work is featured by organisations such as: