Fathers at work: explaining the gaps between entitlement to leave policies and uptake

ABSTRACT

Why are fathers in Scotland unlikely to use the full range of leave benefits available to them? Taking a capabilities approach allows us to explore the perspective that some fathers may experience an agency gap and thus not have the capabilities to utilise entitlements. This paper addresses the question empirically using a mixed-methods design which includes: analysis of data from the Growing up in Scotland study, 20 in-depth qualitative interviews with fathers of young children working in the public sector in dual-earner couples, as well as an audit of extra-statutory benefits offered to fathers by employers. We argue that the reliance on an extra-statutory leave system in the UK explains at least part of the gap between fathers’ entitlement to and uptake of statutory leave, as such benefits are not routinely available to all parents. The extra-statutory entitlement is more than just a ‘top-up’ to the statutory; it is rather a conversion factor for the take up of statutory entitlement, by fathers. Organisational cultural norms support many employed fathers in taking a couple of weeks leave post-birth, but longer leave duration for fathers is not yet a usual parenting practice in Scotland, particularly lower down the income distribution.

RÉSUMÉ

Pourquoi les pères écossais ont-ils peu de chances d'utiliser toute la gamme des congés disponibles? Adopter une approche basée sur les capacités nous permet d'explorer la perspective que certains pères peuvent rencontrer un manque d'agence et ne pas avoir les capacités d'utiliser les droits. Cet article aborde empiriquement la question en utilisant un modèle de méthodes mixtes qui comprend: l'analyse des données de l'étude Growing up in Scotland; 20 entretiens qualitatifs approfondis avec des pères de jeunes enfants travaillant dans le secteur public dans des couples à deux soutiens, ainsi que; une vérification des avantages extra-légaux offerts aux pères par les employeurs. Nous soutenons que la dépendance des parents à l'égard des congés extra-légaux explique au moins en partie l'écart entre le droit des pères à un congé légal et l'adoption de ce droit. Le droit extralégislatif est plus qu'un simple «appoint» à la loi; c'est plutôt un facteur de conversion pour l'adoption des droits statutaires par les pères. Les normes culturelles organisationnelles soutiennent de nombreux pères employés en prenant quelques semaines de congé après la naissance, mais une durée de congé plus longue pour les pères n'est pas encore une pratique parentale habituelle en Écosse.

KEYWORDS:

• Fathers
• leave policies
• leave uptake
• statutory benefits
• extra-statutory benefits
• capabilities approach

MOTS-CLÉS:

• Pères
• politiques de congés
• prise de congé
• avantages statutaires
• avantages extra-statutaires
• approche fondée sur les capacités

Acknowledgements

The authors gratefully acknowledge the funding of this study by Fathers’ Network Scotland. Special thanks to Sam Pringle for her contribution to all stages of this study. We are very grateful to Dr Katerina Apostolou for her assistance with data collection and transcription and Jessica Moran for her assistance with the employer audit. We are deeply indebted to all the families and children who participate in the GUS study for their involvement in these surveys over the years. Last but not least, we wish to thank the 20 fathers interviewed for this study for sharing their experiences and insights.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes on contributors

Alison Koslowski holds a Personal Chair in Social Policy and Research Methods at the University of Edinburgh. Her major research interest is comparative feminist scholarship into the division of work in societies. She is a member of the International Network on Leave Policies and Research.

Gitit Kadar-Satat is a Research Associate and Placement and Outreach Supervisor for the Edinburgh Q-Step Centre, based in the School of Social and Political Science, University of Edinburgh. She is interested in the social inequalities in leisure and time use.

ORCID

Alison Koslowski http://orcid.org/0000-0002-6221-718X

Notes

1 It is possible that regional economic differences could be correlated with the range of extra-statutory policies offered by employers, but such regional differences would need to take into account regional differences within the nations of the UK, as well as the differences between them.

2 As such, data about some non-resident fathers are missing from the analysis.

3 In addition, we used the “complex samples” procedure in SPSS to calculate all chi-square values and associated statistical significance tests.

4 We used the svy commands in Stata and the xtmelogit command to obtain post-estimations, in this case Wald tests and log likelihood values.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by Fathers Network Scotland.