Parental Rights Survey, 2019

Alternative title: Maternity and Paternity Rights; MPRS 2019

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The Parental Rights Survey, previously titled the Maternity and Paternity Rights Survey series (MPRS) and the Maternity Rights Survey, has been monitoring the take-up of maternity benefits and mothers' decisions relating to childcare and employment following the birth of the child since the late 1970s, covering changes to maternity and parental rights legislation and their effects over time. The 1993, 2002, 2009-2010 and 2019 surveys are currently held at the UK Data Service.

The aims of the Parental Rights Survey, 2019 (part of the Maternity and Paternity Rights series (MPRS)), were to:

• Monitor take-up of maternity and paternity benefits and how this has changed;
• Understand the impact of key legislative changes in parental rights since 2009-10, including the introduction of Shared Parental Leave and Pay (SPL and P) and rights for fathers and partners to attend antenatal appointments;
• Examine the factors contributing to parents' decisions in this area and the factors that enable women to remain in work;
• Explore parental attitudes towards childcare responsibility and how this has changed;
• Provide a detailed, statistically representative, up-to-date picture of mothers' experiences and take-up of maternity rights and benefits;
• Examine changes in mothers' engagement and experience in the labour market prior to, and following, the birth of their child;
• Track changes (if any) for mothers since the 2009/10 survey;
• Identify differences in take-up and eligibility across key demographic, socioeconomic and occupation groups, and how these have changed (if at all) since 2009/10; 
• Provide a detailed, statistically representative and up-to-date picture of fathers' take-up of Paternity Leave and Paternity Pay in order to collect robust data on the various provisions for fathers during and after the mothers' pregnancies;
• To track any changes (if any) for fathers since the 2009/10 survey;
• To explore the attitudes of both mothers and fathers on sharing childcare responsibilities.

MAIN TOPICS

• Demographics and eligibility (household composition, demographic details, employment and leave taken, health, education, childcare, childcare used for the baby)
• Employment before baby was born (employment history including detailed information about the last job before the baby was born and also details of the job just before the oldest child was born (if applicable))
• Employment after the baby was born (detailed information about jobs after the baby was born, 
• taking time off work to have the baby, details about the type of leave taken and KIT/SPLIT days)
• Maternity pay (type, length and amount of maternity pay received)
• Influences on work decisions (factors that may have influenced mothers who had not returned to work to stay at home)
• Gender role attitudes
• Family finance and final question (benefits received, household income, happiness)
• Partner's work and details.

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