In the avalanche of over 3,000 amendments that rained down on the maneuver in Parliament, the changes to the measure on the parental leave paid for a month at 80% and however reserved, in the text, only for mothers. The unions are clamoring for it and the government seems to have already implemented this indication at the summit in Palazzo Chigi on Tuesday 6 December. But let’s go in order.
Not just mothers
Article 66 of the original text and then the stamped one that arrived in the Chamber contains a novelty illustrated by the premier herself at the launch in the Council of Ministers: «We have added an optional month of leave, not compulsory, but paid at 80 percent and usable up to the sixth year of the child’s life – he said – a sort of little piggy bank of time» for mothers. Beyond the misunderstanding on the term “additional” which does not appear in the text of the maneuver, the fact that the provision applied only to mothers was out of the question.
The provision of article 66
It is article 66 of the text of the maneuver that clearly states it: the provision provides for an increase from 30% to 80% of the allowance for parental leave for female employees within the maximum limit of one month to be used within the sixth year of life of the child with reference to female workers who end their maternity leave after 31 December 2022, as the explanatory report explains.
On this, however, the trade unions and some political forces have asked for a step back. Actually, sideways. And therefore the extension also to fathers of the possibility of taking advantage of the salary increased by 80% in the event that they take advantage of leave. In Italy in 2020 according to Openpolis-Con i bambini data, men who took advantage of abstention from work to take care of their children were 22.30% in the private sector compared to almost 78% of women.
The mini-reform
The leave package available to parents had recently been reformed by the previous government through decree 105/2022 which came into force in August. In that reform, the months of compensated leave were extended to 30% of the salary, taking them from 6 to 9 until the child’s 12th birthday. Now we intervene on one of these months raised to 80% but within the sixth year of the boy or girl.