On Tuesday, MPs meeting in a parliamentary working group approved a joint proposal by the PS and PSD to extend parental leave. Under the proposal, parents would be entitled to fully paid leave for 180 days (six months) if it is shared, or 150 days (five months) if it is taken by only one of them.
In the first of these scenarios, each parent will have to take at least 30 consecutive days or two periods of 15 days in a row, in order to receive a benefit equal to their full reference wage, calculated by Social Security, for the period in which they are away from work. In single-parent families, the lone parent will be entitled to the full 180 days on 100% pay.
Alternatively, parents will be covered by a benefit worth 83% of their reference wage for six months (180 days) if the leave is not shared. They may also take up to 210 days of leave, paid at 90% if the father takes at least 60 consecutive days (two months) in addition to his 28-day exclusive parental leave, or at 86% if each parent stays at home with the baby, on an exclusive basis, for one of the last two months of leave.
The new legal framework will create more favourable conditions for parents than those currently in force. At present, fully paid leave only covers the first 120 days of the baby's life if there is no sharing, or 150 days if the father takes 30 days of leave on an exclusive basis. In both scenarios, parents can extend that period by a further month, although with a loss of income, as the benefit then corresponds to 80% and 83% of the reference amount respectively.
Following approval in the parliamentary working group, the text now moves on to the parliamentary Committee on Labour, Social Security and Inclusion and will then go to a final overall vote in the full chamber.
Even so, this extension of parental leave falls short of what was proposed in a citizens' legislative initiative submitted to parliament in 2023, which called for 100% pay during the baby's first 180 days of life, with the possibility of extending that period to 210 or even 240 days if the leave was shared. That initiative formed the basis for the joint amendment put forward by PS and PSD, a less ambitious proposal that has now been approved.
However, according to "Negócios" (source in Portuguese), this extension of parental leave will not affect leave that is already under way, as the measure approved by the working group will apply only to leave starting from next year.
The proposal also introduces the possibility for private-sector workers, as is already the case in the public sector, to opt for a continuous working day. This would allow employees with children under 12, or with dependants who have a disability or a chronic or oncological illness, to forgo their lunch or dinner break and work their hours in one stretch so that they can leave earlier. They will, however, retain the right to a break of up to 30 minutes.
How does Portugal compare with other European countries?
Even with the extension of parental leave, Portugal will still have a less generous system than, for example, neighbouring Spain (source in Portuguese). At present, in two-parent families, each parent is entitled to 19 weeks of fully paid leave, rising to 32 weeks in the case of single-parent families.
In France, until a few months ago, (source in Portuguese) maternity leave for a first child was just under four months on full pay, while fathers were entitled to 28 days of leave after the birth. New rules in force since July now allow parents to share an additional period of one or two months' leave on top of their existing entitlements. In such cases, they are paid 70% of their net salary in the first month and 60% in the second.
In Sweden, often cited as a benchmark in this field, the law provides for a total of 480 days (around 16 months) of paid leave, although the monthly benefit cannot exceed 80% of the recipient's salary. In Finland, (source in Portuguese) parents are entitled to 320 working days of leave per child (about 14 months): each parent has 160 working days, 63 of which can be transferred to the other parent. Parental benefit is calculated on the basis of the worker's income and paid by social security.