A couple of positive changes coming to the Paid Parental Leave Scheme that will affect you if your child is born after 1 January 2020.

Change to the gap allowed between two working days

When calculating if you meet the Work Test during the 13 months before your due date, you are currently allowed a gap between two work days of up to 56 days.

This means that if you don’t perform any paid work for up to 8 weeks during this time you will still be eligible for Paid Parental Leave. (Paid leave is considered to be a ‘work’ day and doesn’t count towards this gap.)

From 1 January 2020, this will become 12 weeks.

This is very useful for those who are on contract work or even if you are out of work for an extended time during your pregnancy.

Dangerous Jobs Provision

If your pregnancy forces you to stop work due to safety concerns, it’s possible that you wont work enough hours to meet the Work Test and therefore will miss out on receiving Paid Parental Leave. This may no longer be the case if you meet the following conditions:

• you’re pregnant or the birth mother of a newborn child
• your child’s date of birth is on or after 1 January 2020
• you stopped work because a workplace hazard was a risk to your pregnancy
• you won’t meet the work requirements in the 13 month work test period ending the day before your child’s birth,

then you may now meet the number of hours as the 13 months used to calculate this will now end on the day that you had to finish work instead of the date of birth.

You will still need to meet all of the eligibility requirements of the Work Test, but the dates involved in your calculation will be moved.