Should I Delete That? - It's not just about dads - paternity leave is political

Episode Date: October 27, 2025

The UK has the worst paternity leave offering in Europe and the wider implication of this affects everyone, whether you have kids or not. Today we spoke to Alex Lloyd-Hunter from The Dad Shift and Rachel Horne from Pregnant Then Screwed about their joint campaign ‘UK Paternity Leave is a Mother F**KER’ We spoke about how the UK’s paternity leave offering is disastrous for mums, dads and kids - but also the devastating wider cultural impact it has on the gender pay gap, discrimination and the workforce. We have a window of political opportunity now as the government is undertaking a review of parental leave. Get engaged with The Dad Shift and Pregnant Then Screwed to see how you can help make a change.PREGNANT THEN SCREWEDTHE DAD SHIFTFollow @dadshiftuk on InstagramFollow @pregnant_then_screwed on InstagramSIGN THE OPEN LETTER - The Dad Shift are calling on the new Secretary of State for Business Peter Kyle MP to prioritise making a paternity leave policy that's fit for the 21st centuryThe government have also opened a new consultation called 'Make Work Pay' looking at building enhanced dismissal protections for pregnant women and new mothers. Pregnant Then Screwed will be sharing information on how to engage on their pages in the coming weeks. If you want to get in touch you can email us on [e-mail] Follow us on Instagram:@shouldideletethat@em_clarkson@alexlight_ldnShould I Delete That is produced by Faye LawrenceStudio Manager: Elliott MckayVideo Editor: Celia GomezSocial Media Manager: Sarah EnglishMusic: Alex Andrew Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

So we have the worst potential leave in the whole of Europe. It's two weeks, paid less than half a minimum wage if you're employed. They have no choice, but they feel guilty walking out the door on a mother that is pleading for them to stay because they are struggling so much. And they have no choice. Hello and welcome to shut to delete that. I'm Alex Light. I'm M. Clarkson. And we've got an important episode for you today.

Really important. So pregnant men screwed are an organisation that I suspect many of you guys have heard of. We know we've got a mostly female demographic. The dad shift, you might not be aware of yet. They're new to me, but I love what they're doing. They've done some really cool campaigns over the last weeks and months around London. They were responsible for putting papooses with little babies on them, strapping them to all the old male statues.

Did you see that? Yeah, was that them? Yeah, which was really cool. They are currently spearheading a campaign with Pregnant and Screwed about paternity leave, about statutory, well, parental pay. We know it's not good enough for maternity leave, but we often don't talk about the fact that paternity leave is woeful.

We get two weeks off statutory in the country. As we'll get into, this informs a lot of how we societally view gender roles. It is a massive contributing factor in the gender pay gap. There is statistical evidence to show that this is a fucking disaster, quite frankly. And we do get into that. that but we just wanted to have a little conversation between us before we started with the facts and the stats about why we wanted to do this episode and give it a caveat because it is quite a heavy conversation. It is a heavy conversation and I think I think halfway through you got worried that

we were we were being very off-putting to people who do not yet have kids. So we want to stress very heavily that we love having kids. Yeah. But having kids isn't always the easiest and and there are things set up within our, within the system, within our society that make having kids quite hard. Sometimes it can be hard. And this is one of those things, is paternity leave. It's brutal, two weeks. Going back to work after two weeks is brutal for everyone in the family, the mom, the dad,

the child as well. It's really difficult. So this is something I think we have to talk about. Yes, absolutely. And it's really important that we do this episode and that we raise awareness for this and that we shout about this as loud as we can so that it changes for future, well, not even generations,

like it will be our generation as well, but just people who have kids in a couple of years' time. But we love having kids. Kids are the best. Yeah, I think the point is, even if you don't yourself have children yet, you think, oh, maybe this isn't the episode for me.

Maybe you do have kids, you're through it. Maybe, like, I understand why these conversations can sometimes be, kind of feel not relevant or difficult to have, but I think what structurally me and strikes me throughout this conversation, which I've kind of been having a lot this week whilst this campaign's been going on, is this is an economic, this is an economic issue fundamentally. Right now, the UK, the cost of living crisis, these are widely reported

and acknowledged issues. This is at the crux of it. This is affecting my friends in real time. It's affecting us. It's affecting everybody I know. There's nobody untouched by the cost of living. Yes, but a huge part of that is this. This is an economic issue. This is a hugely political issue. And I think if you are politically engaged, if you are politically minded, if you're feeling the pinch or the stress anywhere in your life, conversations like this are vital for hopeful activism, which is what we need. So even if it doesn't affect you directly, for whatever reason, this conversation, this sort of activism, is benefiting all of us sort of across the board. And that's why we feel this is so valuable that we shout about this issue now and

forevermore. So well said. I'm hopeful activism. I love it. Should we get into the episode? Absolutely, let's go. Here's Rebecca and Alex. Hello, both of you. Thank you so much for coming in. You have spearheaded both your organisations, an amazing campaign over the last week as it will be.

We're recording during. And this episode will come out on the Monday that the Parliament are meeting to talk about and hopefully change, or be the beginning of the change of parental leave. Can I start Alex as another Alex in the studio? Can I start? We already have a boy, Alex. So you're going to have to be dad, Alex, I think.

For differentiation purposes. Can I ask Dad Alex, what it was for you that got you involved with Dad Shift and what, I mean, like, blue sky thinking, what's the dream for the world for dads and for parents and for families for you? So I've got two kids now, three and a half year old and a 10 week old. and I always knew that when I became a dad, I wanted to be a very hands-on dad. I wanted to do things as equally as possible with my wife,

both because she has a good career and is a brilliant feminist, and we wanted to make sure that we were fair at home and that she could carry in her career, but also because I saw growing up, my dad, like so many men of his generation, really did not have that bond with his kids. There was no opportunity to leave, of course, when he was becoming a father.

So my older brother, he was born 9 o'clock on a Sunday night. My dad was at his desk 9 a.m. the next day. He worked long hours, five days a week, didn't really play much of a role in looking after us. And he ended up pushed to the periphery of the family. And it cost him a kind of strong bond with us as kids. It also cost him his marriage ultimately. And we're much closer now. But, you know, we've talked about it.

And what comes through is how much he regrets missing out on that. And I think that cultural dynamic that, pushes dads to the ed is driven a lot by policy and structure and the two things kind of spin off each other and paternity leave is at the absolute heart that if you have a system that says mothers should take a year off to look after the kid but dad's back after two weeks or less that very clearly sends a cultural message that fathers are not really the place of them is not at home but the kids it's at work and that that reinforces the practical barriers and you end up the situation where mothers have to do everything at home and at work which they which

means that they're overwhelmed and overloaded and fathers who increasingly are recognized that the thing that makes for a happy life as a dad is connection it's not necessarily advancement in your career and they they they're unable to access that and do take the fair load that we want to take and so that is what made me really passionate about this and and then the dad's just specifically you know we saw as a dad's a lot of us thinking the same thing that there were groups like pregnant and screwed out there campaigning for this from a women's perspective and we sort of felt well it's not really fair to leave all of a burden for this change on women for something that we want right and we will benefit from when we're making their

life harder by the fact that no one is bringing men together to say look we need to be here so that was the impetus for setting up the dad shifts about a year ago it benefits everyone doesn't it that's the thing literally benefits the entire family doesn't benefit corporations I guess but well you say that but actually there's there's a ton of ways that corporations lose out from this So like we hear all the time from dads and other non-birthing parents to take paternity leave. I went back after two weeks and I was basically a zombie. I was sleep deprived. I was anxious about my partner who was struggling at home.

I was missing my baby. And so I coasted. And then for many, they experienced mental health problems because the pay is so bad of paternity pay. And it costs so much having a baby that you end up on a lot of financial pressure. You're under the same pressure at work. And so you even end up going off six. So actually companies are losing out from this two. and that is why so many other places in Europe have already taken the steps to improve this for everyone

because it is actually something that benefits families, companies, society across the board. And actually there's a really strong economic case as well. Drosuf Roundtree Foundation does some research, it will cost the government, I think, was it $1 billion? $1 billion to give Dad six weeks per turn to pay at 90%. But the return that they calculated was $2.63, something like that, billion. So actually, it makes economic sense. And what we're really hoping to do and pregnant and screwed are all about challenging those cultural norms and shifting that change. We're hoping to influence businesses and the government and just everyone to kind of think about actually paternity leave, maternity, parental leave isn't an economic burden.

It's actually a boost to businesses, to the economy and ultimately what the government are trying to achieve at the moment. And there's so many studies. There's countless studies out there that back that as well. Am I right in thinking? Probably not because economics have literally been a downfall for as long as I've been aware of them in my own brain. But as far as I understand it, the paternity, and I don't know if this is just anecdotal or if there are stats to back it up, and I'm sure one of you guys will hopefully know. But the gender pay gap starts or is exacerbated by paternity leave and maternity leave and the disparity between the two.

Is that right? Is it a case that paternity leave is a factor in that? Oh, 100%. And I would say actually it starts way before then even, but paternity leave, what it does to mums, it forces them to pay the price. So if your partner's not there, and if we're buying into this, let's face it, Dickensian idea that dad goes to work, mum stays home, looks after the kids, what you're doing is reinforcing that stereotype and it ends up the burden falls on the mum and it's her career that stills. It's her pension pot that gets smaller. Even like someone wrote into us the other day and they said, what I'm struggling with is that I'm on maternity leave and my student loan is still incurring interest, but I'm not

paying it because I'm not earning any money. So when I go back, not only will I have missed out on this amount of time my career, potentially miss promotions, the stigma, my pension pot's going to be less and actually my student loan is going to be more. And it just, it's little things like that, it all stacks up. And that's why you get so many moms in debt, so many moms not going on to, will not go and beyond middle management. So many moms dropping out the workforce throughout their careers, but particularly women in their 50s as well, because they've gone through it all. And all of a sudden, they're not looking after babies. They're looking after teenagers with mental health issues. They're looking after their own parents. And just the pressure, the buildup, the mental impact of the motherhood penalty is huge. We did some research in, um, 23, and we found out that 43% of mothers felt they were forced to go back to work because they couldn't afford to at 12 weeks. And that's just insane. And they're the people that we're really here for. Everyone, we're here for moms, dads, dads, parents, non-birthing partners, adoptive parents, the list goes on and on. But that group of, that cohort of parents

that can't afford to take paternity leave. Can you imagine the stress of that of both having to go back at 12 weeks or just being left on your own after one day, two days, three days because your partner is self-employed and doesn't get any paternity leave. It's nuts. Yeah, it's interesting because anecdotally, you know, like no one feels sorry for an influencer that I'm not asking anyone to feel sorry for me. But I mean, in our job, as is the case for a lot of jobs, if you start, if you're self-employed and you stop working, your job stops. If in our industry, if you stop working for long, it disappears. So we had a choice that was like, not really a choice. It's like if I'd stop doing my job for a bit, I'd lose my job forever, so I can't stop doing

my job. So I didn't stop after my first baby was born. I mean, I stopped for four weeks and we did decide to do it a bit differently this time because the pod's a big part of our job. And we've both been moms now and learned from my mistakes the first time. But second time I took six weeks. So that was better. But it was a bit longer. the pod but still like self-employed moms we know that struggle and my husband became very passionate about it and ultimately ended up leaving his job after our first daughter was born because he found that he was just missing so much and it's there's less anger than I thought there'd be for me as a mom there was just more sadness that he was missing so much and now me and my husband

worked together and we've and it's hard in its way being self-employed and whatever but it's also incredible and we're really lucky that it's working but this is the same thing. This is the sadness I keep seeing in my friends and I'm sure Alex you feel it as a dad but and you see it more is this a conversation that's happening within within it's happening in my life because my husband's good at talking about his feelings but I know you know like men typically aren't so brilliant right so is it a case that everybody's feeling sadness about this is it is it a case that that's what it is it's like I'm sad to be going back to work or do most men just think well this is just what I do. This is just what we do. I think there is a lot of sadness. Like there's a few

key themes that come up in the, we get said hundreds and hundreds of people's stories from mum's dads. And on the dad's side, there's a few themes that keep coming up. One is I'm missing out. I'm so sad to be missing out. Another is guilt. They feel they have no choice, but they feel guilty walking out the door on a mother that is pleading for them to stay because they are struggling so much and they have no choice. And the third is just the crushing pressure that is placed on new, both parents, but it's different kinds of pressure. And for fathers and other non-birthing parents, it's typically that pressure to provide, keep the lights on, be the one that that keeps the boat afloat. And so last week we did a kind of campaign action where people went around and

stuck, you know, the yellow parking tickets and they say penalty charge notice, we change into paternity charge notice and people want to stuck them on prams and packets of formula and nappies and so on, just to like set out the costs that are associated with being a new parent. So it costs something like five to 10 grand now to have a baby in the first year because things have got way more expensive nappies and so on. Your paternity pay doesn't even cost by you the average pram. And you add on top of that how bad maternity pay is, you know, if both parents take their full parental leave and you're on that, average salary, it costs tens of thousands of pounds at the exact point that your costs are going

up. And typically because the structure pushes women to be the one who are at home and the men, the ones who go back to pay the bills and work, the financial pressure falls on men. So we did research with Movember, the mental health charity recently, where 50% of dads said that their physical mental health had suffered as a result of a financial pressure of a new baby. And when I say that's that to other fathers are like, yeah. I mean, there's no surprise. Like, there's a general sense of like everyone is struggling with this. Like it's crushing. And to come back to your point about self-employment, that is one of the biggest problems in the paternity system. So we have the worst paternity leave in the whole of Europe. It's two weeks, paid less than half a minimum wage

if you're employed. The average across Europe is eight weeks at full pay. So we're in a different league compared to much less wealthy of the countries. If you're self-employed, you get absolutely nothing. And so we work with a lot with people in the construction industry who are often particularly hardest hit by this because they're going back to work after a day or two to physically demanding like physically dangerous jobs. And there's one of our supporters Tom who he very bravely tells his story where he took his partner had a C-section twice for both their kids unexpected. He took six weeks off his time to look after her, look after the kids, do the right thing, be a good dad, be there. And the financial burden he took on was so great

that he seven years later is still paying it off and it got to the point where he he tried to take his own life like the financial pressure was so crushing and so paternity leave is the first kind of domino in many of these um these societal problems whether it's the motherhood penalty whether it's a kind of mental health and physical health problems that parents face so you say so the UK has the worst paternity leave offering in the in Europe in all of Europe which country does get it right. So Spain is a really interesting one that we talk about a lot because a decade ago they had two weeks as well. And their government has increased it by a week or two at a time, a year for a few years. So they now offer 16 weeks at full pay. And everyone takes it. It's like

95% uprate, uptake rate, because it's properly paid. Everyone can afford it. And the evidence coming back is it's already dramatically shifting the norms around parenting and gender roles. And And then the Scandinavian countries, unsurprisingly, do this really well and have for a while. So you look at Sweden, they offer 90 days for each parent, ring fence for that parent, and then 300 days on top that they can share as they see fit. Wow. And the ring fence element is really important. All the evidence is that if you just dump a bunch of share parental leave on the table and say, right, divide it up amongst

yourselves, that doesn't challenge the cultural norms enough to enable men to take it sufficiently. So it doesn't start happening until you have a ring fence allowance. You say, you can take this. It's properly paid so that you can afford. to take it. And that's when you start to see quite rapid changes in uptake rates and societal norms. Was it one of the countries, and I can't remember which one made it mandatory to take their share? Is that right? Was there one country that someone sent me a message about it or left a comment on the real I did saying that they, that in their country, and I feel like it was Spain, no one was

taking the paternity even though the offering was great. And so they started making it sort of more mandated that they had to? There are some countries where a portion of it is mandated. Okay. In Spain, it's not the full amount, as far as I'm aware. But there, I think, you know, people take it because it's fully paid. Like, why would you not? And it's cross society.

If you are the only one doing it, you're sticking your neck on the line. But if the entire country is doing it and it's just normal and it's what people do, then it's expected. And so that's why, you know, that's a big part of why we're focusing on statutory, parental leave so that everyone has the same entitlements and everyone can move forward and that can shift the cultural norms and not saying look businesses you have to fix this yourselves right because if you go on a business by business approach you're not going to get the societal wide shift that you need why do you think the UK is so far behind with this because it's really hard to believe

that this is where we're at that there's two weeks pay it's I would say it's I would say it's our culture it's it's the stereotypes it's a stigma of what we've always done. And it's the pressure that working class families have in terms of being able to afford to take leave. But also, when you look at those jobs that you think about the finance sector, some organisations are doing good work. Others say they're doing good work and they have the offer. But actually, if you take that leave, that's going to have an impact on your career. And we've seen that. We've seen the evidence. There's been loads of news reports about it. We had a conversation about it when we first came in today. But I would say absolutely, it's that cultural

shift that needs to happen to challenge this and mandating a portion of paternity leave and maternity leave increasing that as well is really important to changing that. And when you think about what we was talking about before in terms of us against Europe and what we look like, Make Mother's Matters did a survey recently and they looked at 11 or 12 countries in Europe, including the UK, and we've worked with them on this. and it came back that 71% of mothers in the UK are really struggling with a mental overload of just having a child, being pregnant, having a child, being a mother.

And in comparison to all the other countries, like Germany was something like 49, Poland was 61, we were the fifth worst on the list out of 11. So we're not even, you know, like halfway there. And we shouldn't be. It really, you know, there's a lot of talk, there's a lot of policy changes that have happened. happened or could happen, but it's still utterly rubbish. And I think that's why this campaign

has been so important to being moms and dads, all parents together, non-birthing parents together to have that discussion and take it to Parliament, take it to the public as a united front, I think. I think there also has been a political challenge as well. So the previous government's attempt to fix the problems in our parental leave system was to introduce share parental leave, which they brought in 2015, so that allowed you to transfer some of the maternity leave over to the non-birthing parent. And on paper, it sounds really good. It sounds really egalitarian, right? It's flexible. But the reality is that it just isn't really working. So less than 2% of families use it. About 50% of people don't even know it exists. And the problem is it's so poorly

paid. Most people can't afford to take it. And a lot of families are unwilling to take away maternity leave to give it to the father because maternity leave is also important and it feels like this is maternity leave this is for mums it's like a difficult thing to say I'm taking that and so I can get some good leave but because that was the government's big bet they basically then didn't do anything else on it so there is actually now a really positive thing around this is there is a window political opportunity the current government pledged in their manifesto to review the whole parental leave system within the first year they've started that review that began in July, and they're going to be reporting at the end of next year.

So that is basically the focus of the campaign, as we've got this year, where if the government makes the right decision, we could come out at the end with longer, better paid paternity leave and hopefully a lot of improvements to maternity leave as well. To your point about sort of the politics of this, like we are living in really divided times, and I think it is amazing to see mums and dads working together, right? Because ultimately it seems to be with these things. a lot of the time it's women asking for more and men telling shut up and get on with it. So it is nice that there's like a bit and obviously not all men, but while we've got like

the rise of reform and the rise of traditional values and the rise of conservatism and all at that, like it is very encouraging to see a united front. But are you guys noticing within the sort of wider conversation and the like the sort of politically charged divisive culture that we're in at the moment, that there is resistance to this. And if so, where's it coming from? I think the stereotypes are creeping back in. Like, I don't want to go back on time. And I truly believe in cross-party reform. That's the only way to truly change policy and make it land. But if you go back to kind of Maggie Fatcher days, she really created this, you know, this wonderful image of mum being at home, mum running the house, mum seeing best. I mean,

she was holding cabinet meetings whilst doing her ironing, you know. And that really sent a strong message to mothers in the UK. And you can see some of that creeping back in now, but I would like to think we're quite savvy to it. And as much as you got those challenging headlines and that narrative seeping through, as far as I'm aware, they haven't really touched on things like education policy, like maternity policy. They've not vocalised an opinion on that yet.

So I'm excited to talk to them and look at what. what they want to do because I want to know. Tell me. The wider kind of political cultural environment, there is these kind of worrying signs that a grievance towards women's progress or perceived progress over the last few decades is being weaponised to push men towards the right, essentially. And this message has been told that, you know,

women's gains have to come at men's expense. It's a zero-sum game. And women are coming into the world. workforce and you know you're struggling in your career because women are here and women get all the power in the world like these are the narratives that have been told they're not correct and one of the tragedies of it is that women obviously lose out from that but i think men also lose out from that you know that that and this idea that's being pushed that really the the route to regaining a sense of status and fulfillment as a man is through dominance over women it's this

kind of rich and ripped archetype and actually that That is not where happiness comes from as a man. You know, we see that the rates of male suicide are very high. The rates of male loneliness are very high. There are alcoholism, you know, deaths of despair very high. Where happiness comes from as a man is through connection. And one way that can be with your kids and your family. And I think that is what a lot of the parents in our movement get

and this generation increasingly get. But then on the other side, there have been people pushed in the other direction. And part of why we wanted to do paternity leave is it's such a perfect issue for, undermining that zero-sum game idea because it benefits men and it benefits women. And I think that is why it's so important that you have organisations like the Das Shift and Pregnant's Group working together

very explicitly, coalitionally to say there are men and women in the same fight together for mutual benefit and actually this idea that we're in competition is kind of bullshit and it serves no one. So it's good to hear that you haven't had much pushback on it on the campaign which is quite surprising given the times of whatever again. Oh, it's landed so well. And of course, you know, we're sharing really controversial content. The campaign, you know, we've called it paternity leave is a mother beep for a reason because it actually is, you know, that no one pays the price more so than the mums of dad's missing out financially and in terms of being there. But the response has been overwhelming and the stories, the insights and C-sections, we've really focused on that in this campaign because it's such a tangible example of how.

the maths just doesn't add up. You have a C-section. You need to have at least six weeks off to recover. Like you genuinely, you've had major surgery, you've had trauma. And then when you think about the numbers, something like 230,000 women last year had C-sections, 20,000 of those husbands were self-employed. So they didn't get any paternity leave. How is that mum functioning? How is she picking up her child, walking up the stairs? How is she taking herself to the bathroom, you know. You've got literally wounds rupturing. You've got mum sleeping on the floor because dad's not there, they can't get up. When you think about maternal mental health, suicide is the number one cause of death for a mother, a new mum. And that's insane. That's

from the government's data, part of their suicide strategy. And that is just unimaginable. Why is that happening? Why are moms feeling the burden and being mistreated, being discriminated in this way when actually it's really avoidable. There's some tangible and really quick fixes. Spain, the perfect example of what we can do to empower families and support mothers and fathers. And also we need to think, yes, about the self-employed. We need to think about adoptive parents. We need to think about same-sex parents, but also single moms. Like, what on earth are they doing? Hands up like to everything to them, power to single moms. Because I just don't. know how you can have a child on your own. And that's another thing that I'm sure we'll get to

and it will come out further along down the line. But kingship carers, you know, who are those other people that can come in and support those moms? Because it's just there has to be, you need a village, right? And that has to be present, especially in those first couple of weeks. I was talking to my sister on the way here. Her son's four now and she's got another one. but she had a really complicated birth and she was in labour for like a really long time and then she had a complicated birth and then her son was sick and so they were in the hospital for six days so they got home and her husband had four working days left of paternity leave and I didn't understand I feel bad now because I didn't understand I wasn't a mum at that

point so I didn't I didn't really like grasp the just how how devastated that was but she was just flawed and luckily she had family like us around her but if she hadn't I just don't I just don't know what she would have done you don't expect it do you you don't see that you don't visualize that as part of your journey to becoming a mum and ending in that way after having going through the trauma pure trauma it sounds awful and then ending in that way and it's just not something that you think about until it's happened or someone you know it's happened to but it's It's not rare. It genuinely happens a lot to a significant number of women. And it's something that has to change. And partners being around more during those first couple of weeks is it, you know,

it's not just bonding. It's wonderful. We want dads to bond with their children. But it's about survival. And that's what it comes down to. It feels crucial. It doesn't feel like, oh, a nice little, oh, it's nice that they get spent some time. It feels like absolutely necessary. Yeah. I think it is one of the best examples. of how the system has just become outdated over time. It's a system that hasn't been, this review that's happening now is the first time the system's been reviewed as a whole ever.

And it was designed, well, it kind of evolved over a time where it's much less likely that both parents would be holding down a full-time job and that the cost of living would require both parents to be working full-time for you to survive. And you'd be much more likely to live around family so you would expect, you know, mom or mom-in-law can come in

and look after you for a few weeks. And of course, like the societal norms are different. And you now get the situation where, yeah, as Rebecca's been talking about, mothers had just left without the ability to do basic physical recovery after major surgery. And it's one of the clearest examples of how the system's completely not fit for purpose at the moment. It's for women who have vaginal births as well, right? They can be, you know, they can be in some seriously, like bleeding, stitched and. But even if you're fine. And even if you're fine.

If you're physically fine, but I think what I find like, and there's, I think that's why there's like a tiny little boomer inside of me that just plays devil advocate every time we have this conversation because I can hear it. I'm like, shut up. But we have always just got on with it, right? And as you're speaking and as I made this video the day talking about it. And I think back to like having both my babies, I had an emergency cesarean first time elective, the second. And it's like particularly the second because you've already got a toddler. They'd say like don't pick up your don't pick up this. Don't do this. What choice have you got? Like you just. get on with it. And that's the fact of the matter, really, is that, you know, we say like, oh, it's impossible and this is survival. And it's, and I know some of these times has devastating consequences, but the fact of the matter is, we are just doing it. And it's awful. And it's amazing. And it's all these other things. And it's hugely contradictory. And it's a very difficult thing to talk about. But I don't know, like, on the little boomer in me, there's a little bit that feels like maybe there's part of the resistance, but the reason it's taking so long to change. It's because we are getting it. It's not like we can just down tools.

It's not like we can go on strike and just say, right, well, we're not going to do it. Because then our kids will perish. It's not going to work. So, like, we have to keep going. So as long as we kind of, and it's annoying, because it's like as long as we show everyone that we can do it, which mothers just do, you kind of just keep having to, right? Yeah, of course you do, because what would happen if mum just stopped or dad just stopped, you know, everything would fall down, you know, and society would break apart. So you have to do it. But what is interesting now is that, you know, I've always been angry about it and our community

are really angry. But it feels like that momentum, that anger is growing. And although we're continuing to do it, we're raising our voices and really highlighting that issue. And you can see it all over social media. You can see it by how many parents and individuals have engaged with our campaign so far. And what is great that we've seen recently, like Grace Carter, I speaking to her yesterday, She ran, is running the campaign end parental poverty.

And she got over 100,000 people to sign a petition to demand that the government do something. So now, as a result of that, there's going to be the debate we spoke about in Parliament. And that's incredible. That's real movement. And Grace is not a campaigner. This isn't her day job. She's just done this on the side. It's a hustle.

But has mobilized over 100,000 people. And we're really excited about that. I'm certainly looking forward to it. I'll be tuning in. I'll be watching Parliament TV like the policy nerd I am. But it's incredible. And I think that's the shift that's happened. But don't forget that the motherhood penalty isn't just those first couple of weeks.

It isn't a difficult pregnancy. It starts before then. If you have a miscarriage, ONASTATA recently flagged that you lose around £4,000 the following year from your salary. and that's because of discrimination. It's not because you've missed work days. It's because workplace think you're unreliable. You might have another baby. You've been sick.

Other ONS days that came out a couple of weeks ago, you probably saw it all over social media. We all got really excited about it because it's the biggest data set we've ever had released about what the motherhood penalty looks like. Average mom, the first five years after having a child, you lose, on average, $65,000 of income. if you have free children over that five-year period, it's over £100,000.

Now, that is, that's a statistical penalty that we know exists now, and we have that data, and that's brilliant. But, God, that's huge. It's a massive amount. Combine that with still careers, combine that with lost promotions, and everything else in between that you suffer just for becoming a mother. And I think on top of that, they're all the, you know, Verrevei's very real. like financial costs that you've spoken to and the numbers are wild.

Oh, crazy. And then underneath that, there are these hidden costs. And if the cost, you're right, parents do just carry it. We kind of have to carry on. We make it work. But what that obscures is the costs that we pay as a society and as individuals down the road. So like if you just point to parental mental health as one example here,

you can kind of join the dots. So there's evidence that if you have good pertaintings, you leave, mothers are 25% less likely to have post-natal depression. The other reason is that's pretty obvious, you get enough support. The point at which fathers go back to work in this country is the exact moment you're most at risk of developing post-age depression, a kind of two-to-four-week window. And then you go take the next step and there's evidence that maternal and paternal mental health is strongly correlated with the mental health outcomes of their children in later life.

So if you and your first year, either the mother or the father struggle with your mental health, your child is more like to struggle with their own mental health down the road. So there's that cost baked in right from the beginning for them and for society. And equally, we bake in these costs when it comes to making it harder for fathers to be present. So again, very clear evidence. More paternity leave means men take on more childcare. More childcare means that they end up closer to their kids of a bigger role in their lives. And there was a study just released in Australia, a big study of kind of 15,000 men

where one in three men admitted that they'd used domestic violence. at some point in their relationship, which is a shocking number. They were 50% less likely to have done that if they had a close relationship of their dad. So again, like the impacts of this system, whether it's through the mother penalty, whether it's through locking fathers out,

whether it's through baking and mental health problems. Like they're so diffuse, but they're very hard to track. And just by looking at the kind of, you know, we do get that pushback from older generations. It's like, well, we struggle through it in our day. And actually, I really get, that like I'm very empathetic to that perspective and but it doesn't mean that there

aren't costs to that and that we shouldn't make it better now but we understand what those costs are yeah a huge ripple effect right yeah I hadn't even considered half of those things it's just huge it's like it impacts everyone it impacts the entire family and I think you know that the point there like you're getting hit from all sides you're getting hit financially mentally physically like it's it's incredible that people are still choosing to have children and the one they can afford to and mentally, you know, they, well, maybe they just don't know

what's going to hit them, I didn't, 10 years ago. I think that's half of it, right? You don't quite understand the severity of all of it. Yeah, and you talk about that boomer thing. You are in the thick of it and you do just crack on. It's only when you look back or you have a crisis that you think, God, like, what is this? This isn't normal.

This isn't how it should be. We've probably lost all non-parents already at this point and they're probably all just like taking wedding rings off and being like, you know, what it's off, I'm to fuck this, I'm not doing it. But I just, for anyone listening, and I don't know if you guys have been in agreement, you don't need to be, but I would still say, despite all of this, because it is bad stuff, it is horrendous and it's impossible. And we talk, we are talking all the bad things. Yeah. Still, parents are choosing and choosing to do it

again and again. And like, I don't know, I know, I know within this campaign, we have to be honest about the reality of it. But I, I just want to be careful as well, but within it, it's like, that we have some, like, promise that it's not all, like, the worst thing in the whole world. Do you know what I mean? Yeah. And I think that's the key, isn't it? Is that we're choosing to do it. And we do it again.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm trying to do it again. Yeah. It's the best thing in the world. It's a thousand times worth it. You know, like either if you have children or your sister has children or, you know, your friend, watching them grow and seeing that and being part of that, it's beautiful. And, you know what?

We're going to bring our children. children up with those right morals and values so that society slowly changes. And that's great. You know, we can do that. We're aware. And that's a wonderful thing about being able to talk about stuff like this here is that we can challenge those norms and lead to better outcomes for our kids. And yeah, you know, like, you know, I have laid it on fic today. There's a lot of things that are challenging. But there's nothing that's not avoidable. Like all this is definitely fixable. And it just takes policy. I'm not going to say tweaks because they need to go further than that, but like not massive changes to make things easier to make the school run more lighthearted

and to make the idea of going and doing a weekly shop not as terrifying as it is at the moment. And I love my kids and they're great. They bring me so much joy. But equally, like, I like my career. I love my job. And I want to be. paid the same as my counterparts. I want to be valued and I want financial security. So it's it's it's it's I'm hopefully for my little girl I'm modelling the behavior that she will see take on herself and between us and all the other organizations out there we're going to create huge change particularly now in this year that will just you know make things so much better for parents and families um going forward but also you don't need to be a parent like think about for.

treatment what can we do to support women and men going through that and there's lots of points of you know thinking about grandparents and people without children you know this is important for everyone in terms of the like specifics of this campaign and the policy change how much of it I mean obviously it's on the government but how much of it needs to be on companies and corporations as well. And what do they need to do? So what you are increasingly seeing is a kind of two-tier system emerging where typically bigger companies with more money, recognizing that actually offering good paternity leave

is a really good business move, both because it helps them hire good people and keep them, but also because they recognize that thing of actually it's not really great for team morale, team productivity to have people back after two weeks before they're ready. I mean, I used to run a small business of about 20 staff, and we offered six weeks paternity leave, partly because I want a six weeks paternity leave to run this one of our kids, but also it's the right thing to do.

But like from a selfish business perspective, I was like, I don't really want guys in front of clients two weeks in when their world is upside down, they don't know which way is up. They're knackards. They're going to make mistakes. And like they're going to, fair enough.

Like they're human beings. And just by giving people a little bit of extra grace, you give you know they feel grateful they feel come back more motivated they stay they have they're less likely they'll have health problems the problem is is that it is an expensive thing for a business to take on themselves so smaller businesses typically can't afford it so you're seeing this widening gap between people who work in finance or big tech companies or law typically have really good paternity leave whether or not people feel able to take it which is a different question and then self-employed people small businesses who often say like we'd love to do this

we just can't afford it. So my message to businesses, anyone running a business doing, it's like, if you can do it, do it. It's a good business decision. But that's why we're focused on statutory because if you make it, if you put the owner's on business to sort this, it's just going to be a lottery. And some people won't get decent paternity leave at all.

Okay. Such an interesting thing from the small business perspective. Because of course, like, you know, it's a horrendous reality. And it's only as I'm getting to this point, you know, you hear about it your whole life. But it's only as, you know, we look around and like, all our friends are like in their 30s having kids, that it's like, yeah, of course it's harder for them to get jobs. And it's such a funny thing that you have a trope and then you actually come up in the face of it. And it's like, if you're a small company and you're hiring, hiring a recently married 32-year-old woman is going to be more of a risk for you than hiring a man because you're not going to have to give him the same thing.

And it's actually, it's sort of revolting when it's like that, isn't it? because it's just like, here, look, we'll use her, hurt him, and we've, I don't know, it's just, it's really inhumane. It is. There's a study by Baff University recently and I was like, I feel like I'm pretty over this issue, but I was so shot. They spoke to, it was only a small sample, 37 businesses, and they spoke to them, and I don't know how they got them to open up about this, about hiring women that are

pregnant or could become pregnant, and 27 of them or they're about said that they wouldn't do it and they explained why but that was for me i was just like i was flabbergasted i was like what like that it's it's that significant and it's yeah it's a small sample but a significant number of that sample just like no we couldn't do it we couldn't take that risk and it it happens but equally there's some amazing companies out there doing really good stuff to look after families is providing flexible leave. You know, I'm fully remote now, and I get to, when my leg's not broken, I get to go and do the school runs, go to parents' evening, go to the sports days.

There's some really generous companies out there that do that. And I'd say that's increasing. And we're getting more of them coming to us to engage with us, asking us what does good look like? They're going to working families. They do some fantastic work in the sector with organisations, helping them get it right. And, you know, I feel really encouraged by that. And I think everything that's happening in government at the moment is pushing that in the right direction.

And genuinely, I do think it's a once-in-lifetime opportunity for us. And it's great that we're all able to work together and move towards that goal. I think that that discrimination that Breck is talking about is one of the strongest arguments for offering longer paternity leave. because if you start to equalize things more, it moves from any woman age 25 to 40, early 40s is a baby risk, it's the phrase it's you, so I won't hire them.

To any person age 25 to 40 is a baby risk, male or female. And then you've got a choice. You either hire them or you hire no one in that age bracket, in which case you are locking yourself out of like one of the biggest pools of talent. And so, yeah, the stats that pregnant and screwed have, the research you did this year, but like 74,000 women a year

lose their jobs on maternity leave or straight after, a lot of that is driven by just how wide the gap is between what it costs the business for a mother to go on maternity leave versus what it costs the father to go on paternity leave. Yeah, that's so true that equalizing it as well will eventually change company culture towards, you know, men feeling like they can't take paternity leave, like scared to take it, it's going to be stigmatized for it.

Yeah, and that's what we're all about, at pregnant and screwed, it's changing that culture. That's the biggest thing that will impact and make things better. And if government mandate policy to force that to happen, then it will just go from strength to strength, hopefully, like we've seen in Spain. But it's an exciting time for us and organisations like us to really kind of challenge. And I feel like government are listening. Like we're sat on a lot of round tables, having a lot of conversations around. asking what we want, the challenging conversations, you know, and we'll always push for more. But it feels like a moment in time, doesn't it?

Absolutely, yeah, yeah. I think to the point earlier as well, I was like not scaring people off if they really haven't gone by now, but it's... They've definitely gone. I'm speaking on deaf ears, but I'm going to say the point anyway, what is encouraging and what is really nice is I think maybe like it, even in the like few years that I've been like cognizant of babies and my friends have started doing it, I feel like the conversation's moved on so much.

so much now that I can send my husband out as like some veteran father when our new friends have babies. I'm like, go, help them. Like, spread your wisdom. And like in a way that I don't think, you know, still when you think of fatherhood, you've got the like cigar and the outside the brim and whatever and like not involved. And it's, that's all changed so quick. And it is really nice now that I do feel like that the boys in my life,

the men in my life have got the space within that to say to each other. But also I can say to Alex and my. friends and my colleagues in a way that isn't going to, like, risk everything. I can be like, oh, that's really fucking hard. And it's a safer place because there's, there's conversations, I was like, yeah, of course, it's really hard. But we're okay. We've got it. You know, we're together. And I think where people used to have to suffer so much more quietly on both sides, men and women, it does feel, I certainly feel, so great, yeah, that it's easier now to open up about the struggles that we're having at least, which is, is not insignificant. And to the people that

are listening who aren't parents yet. This is very cool what these guys are doing because it might make things a lot more manageable and easier. Can't get any worse. I think, I mean, our lad to what I've been said, fatherhood is the best thing that I've ever done. And that's why this campaign exists because we think fatherhood is awesome. And it's part of how you can have a really good life as a bloke.

But like, I think there is that conversation has shifted. People are aware of some of the challenges around parenting and how this country is much worse than others at supporting parents. But the evidence is that that is not, you know, our birth rate is dropping. The evidence is not that that's what's making people not have kids because they're like, God, that looks shit. I don't want to do that.

It's because they're worried about money. And the cost of living's gone up. And when you look at things like how badly paid paternity and maternity pay it is, people say, I really want kids, but I can't afford it. And actually, you're now much more likely if you're wealthier to have more kids than if you're poorer, like the gap between the amount of kids that people say that they want, and they have is the greatest

for people who earn the least money so like in a way that's I mean it's sad but it's heartening but like people still think having kids is great it's the proof that if it's easy that's like the clearest indication that the money is the issue

right? Oh it is 100% and you know what like households are changing my husband gets stuck in my friend's husbands get stuck in it's you know that the dynamics at home are changing and they're shifting in the workplace a bit as well.

And, you know, the fact that we've got 100,000 people that sign this petition shows that that change has happened and now we just need the politicians to catch up. Yeah, you guys are doing, you know, modern, I hate the expression. Like, modern dads are like, you are doing it. Like, you know, everyone knows how to put, I mean, it's still, my mom is a very progressive woman and it still shocks her to watch my husband operate. She's like, God, he's good.

And I'm like, you know, and he is, but it's like, so am I. But no one walks, no one follows me around going, God, she's. I know. My mom's like, you're so lucky. I'm like, yeah. And we are really lucky. She's lucky. But it's, I will, I just want to be followed around with the same enthusiasm, basically. Yes, yes, yes. I would like some commotion too. Unless we're just not that good. That's also possible. Not at all. It's an impossibility. Thank you guys so much. Thank you so, so much for coming in. When, when will we, when will we, when will we know? And what can people do? Yes, what can people do? Yes. When will we know? What can people do?

so from the when we know the government is finishing this review end of 2026 so there's a while and our job collectively until then is to basically keep this front of mind like keep it in the news keep it on social media guys people like posting as much they can online getting involved in our campaign moments people like you posting online is like really helpful to keep that going and if people want to get involved on the dad shift sides they can go to our website which is dadshift.org. There's a big button that we're top to sign our petition. And also we've got a WhatsApp community if you want to join that.

And we talk about how you can get involved in stunts and actions and things like the motherfucker stunt that we did this this week. And we're on social media at Dashift UK and pregnancy group. There's lots of ways. Yeah, absolutely. Website. We've got all our information on there. We actually have an amazing HR helpline as well.

So if you need any support in terms of maternity discrimination, you know, it's run by volunteers. It's small, but I say it's mighty and impacts a punch. But equally, just keep banging on the door. The debate today is really important, and I think that we should write to our MPs and tell them to go if they're not going already. We should write to our MPs and tell them our own stories and why it's important. It's really important to understand what's going on, their constituencies and what are impacting the people they represent.

But yeah, just be loud, bang on the door and talk about it. That's the great thing that we said before. Keep talking, keep sharing, whether it's on social media, whether it's at the school gates, whether it's in the office, just let's challenge that, that norm and, you know, keep progressing in the right direction. Gorgeous. Amazing. Thank you so much. Thank you both so much. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, guys. Should I delete that as part of the ACAST creator network?