Rejected petition Review the decision not to extend maternity leave

The government refused to extend maternity leave due to coronavirus earlier in the year. In light of a resurgence of the virus and new lockdown restrictions we desperately need government to reconsider their decision and extend maternity leave by at least 3 months.

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New and expectant mothers during this pandemic have extremely little support. Because of government restrictions mothers and their babies are not allowed to mix with wider support circles as they aren't in their own household. What this means upon returning to work is that their babies will not be familiar with or may have never even met the people providing childcare, and may never have been without their mother. Therefore returning to work will be traumatic for both mother and child.

This petition was rejected

Why was this petition rejected?

There’s already a petition about this issue. We cannot accept a new petition when we already have one about a very similar issue.

You are more likely to get action on this issue if you sign and share a single petition.

You may wish to sign this petition which calls for the same action: https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/557195

You can find out more about coronavirus and how you can protect yourself and others here:

www.gov.uk/coronavirus
https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/coronavirus-covid-19/

The Government has also created an online service to help you find out what you can do if you’re struggling because of coronavirus: https://www.gov.uk/find-coronavirus-support

You can read NHS tips to help if you are worried about coronavirus here: https://www.nhs.uk/oneyou/every-mind-matters/coronavirus-covid-19-anxiety-tips

You can read impartial analysis of the Government response to coronavirus and policy developments here: https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/coronavirus/

You may also be interested to know that because of the large number of petitions that have been started in relation to coronavirus, the Petitions Committee has been questioning the Government about its response to the coronavirus outbreak.

Find out more: https://committees.parliament.uk/work/192/the-governments-response-to-coronavirus/

We only reject petitions that don’t meet the petition standards.

Date submitted 1 November 2020
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