The Ministry of Social Rights is finalizing the lhey family diversity with which the Government intends to adapt the legislation to the new family models, as explained by the minister of the branch, Ione Belarra, last week at a public event. Among the updates that it intends to undertake with this new standard is the extend paternity and maternity leave from the current 16 weeks to 24 per parent. Likewise, he also wants parents who raise their children alone to be able to accumulate those two licenses, in such a way that they would get almost a year of paid leave.
“The law intends that the birth permits of single-parent families and two-parent families be equal once and for all, so that the children of single-parent families do not have fewer rights than the children of others,” explained Belarra.
New family models. The new law seeks to recognize the rights of the new family models that exist in Spain. In this way, in addition to that birth permit of almost 12 months for single-parent families, the rule will include the possibility that the parent can share half of that leave, that is, 24 weeks, with a cohabitant registered at their home or with a relative up to the second degree of consanguinity, according to El Confidencial.
The norm will also contemplate, said Belarra, that the consideration of a large family be granted to those parents who raise two children alone, to alleviate their economic situation. Since, assured the minister, “having a child in our country, sadly, is synonymous with poverty on many occasions, especially when it is done by a single person, who is almost always, moreover, a woman.”
Parenting Bonus. Likewise, Belarra points out that he intends to launch a monthly bonus for unemployed mothers of 100 euros per child between zero and three years old, an amount that would increase to 125 euros in the case of single-parent families with the unemployed parent.
Processing in September. Belarra, who belongs to United We Can, has assured that the text has already been agreed with his PSOE government partners, who have promised to take the rule to the Council of Ministers in September to start the approval process.
However, the final terms of the law may vary with respect to those that the minister has communicated, since for its approval it will have to go through a parliamentary process in which it is possible that some modifications proposed by the different political parties will be applied before for it to be promulgated.
The shortcomings of the law. Despite the progress that the new family law would imply, always according to the terms in which Minister Belarra has communicated it in the absence of knowing the draft of the project, the norm suffers from some deficiencies, according to 20 minutes.
The newspaper collects the testimony of a family made up of two parents, one of them with 85% recognized disability. These people point out that, according to what Belarra has explained, the rule will include the possibility of combining parental and maternal leave in single-parent families, but it does not contemplate a case like his, in which one of the members is completely dependent.
This family claims that the rule also includes the possibility that, when one of the parents is dependent, the other can enjoy the same weeks of leave as parents of single-parent families. Because, they point out, in the end the situation in both cases is similar: both have to take care of a large part of the care of the newborn and housework alone.
