Single parents in Spain can apply for the same amount of paid parental leave as married couples, a district court has ruled. There are many single-parent families in this country..
The ruling, handed down this month by a court in southeastern Murcia, is the first to build on a November ruling by Spain’s Constitutional Court that prohibited discrimination against children born into single-parent families.
“The duration and intensity of a newborn’s need for care and attention is the same regardless of the family form in which it is born,” the Constitutional Court said in its ruling, which was also cited by the district court.
In practice, this means that single parents can claim the full amount of paid leave available to Spanish married couples. 6 weeks of compulsory leave that must be taken togetherplus an additional 10 weeks for each parent for a total of 16 weeks per parent. According to the district court’s ruling, one person can receive up to 32 weeks of paid leave if they are both parents.
Gender expert and Barcelona-based lawyer Carla Val said new parents in other parts of Spain could cite the Murcia court decision when applying for the benefit. He said that there is a sex. “This principle means that the rest of the courts will adopt this interpretation of the rights,” she said in a phone interview.
Social Rights Minister Pablo Bastinduy called the decision “great news and a victory for civil society after many years of struggles and demands.”
The ruling brings Spain into line with growing efforts to standardize the amount of leave for single parents and married couples, joining the following European countries: Finland, Germany and Swedenin addition to Australia.
Spain has one of them lowest birth rate The European Union has been trying to encourage more births for decades, offering incentives such as tax credits and child benefits, but with little success. Spain also recently increased the amount of leave available to fathers.
Peter Moss, professor emeritus at University College London, who has researched parental leave, said: “What Spain has actually done is to equate parental leave with maternity leave, which is quite unusual.” “We have equated the two,” he added.
According to government data, single parents make up one in 10 households in Spain. There were approximately 1.9 million single-parent households. 202081% of them were single-parent households, according to the latest government data available.
With this in mind, according to the government, the average annual income for women is approximately 24,400 euros (approximately $25,000), while the average annual income for men is approximately 24,400 euros (approximately $25,000). Many in Spain hailed the district court’s ruling as a step forward for gender equality in the country. numbers.
In its judgment, the court stated: Government data for 2023 It showed that 53 per cent of single-parent households were at risk of poverty or social exclusion, compared with 27 per cent of all households.
The lawsuit was filed by Silvia Pardo Moreno, 44, who gave birth to a daughter in Murcia in January 2022 and became a single mother. Pardo, who works part-time for an emergency services company, applied for 32 weeks of leave from Social Security, arguing that her daughter deserves the same care as her co-workers.
Pardo’s request was denied. So she put her 4-month-old daughter in day care and returned to work 16 weeks later.
“There were no children at that age in day care, because other children had the right to be seen by their parents longer,” she said in an interview after the ruling.
Pardo took the matter to court, but lost. She then appealed and sent the case to district court. This time, the court ruled in her favor.
Val, a lawyer, said the case law “gives single mothers additional security because they get an extra four months where they know they won’t be fired from their jobs.”
“The difference when a single woman decides to become a mother is whether she has to leave the care of her baby to someone else, such as a nanny,” Val added. “Babies need to be cared for, and women need to be protected. This benefit is most needed in the first year of life, when mothers need the most help.”
Pardo said she doesn’t know how the court will compensate her for her time. But she knows she can’t get back those first few weeks with her daughter, who turns 3 on Friday.
“I lost time more than anything,” she said. “When my daughter needed me the most, I wasn’t available.”
