ON March 21, amendments to the 2021 Employment Act were passed after the third reading.

Many among the working population, especially the younger ones, are joyous upon hearing this news, because the amendments include extending female employees’ paid maternity leave from 60 to 98 days, while male employees can also have seven days of paid paternity leave.

In fact, at the committee stage after the second reading, the government accepted the suggestion to improve the bill tabled for the first reading, which initially proposed only 90 days maternity leave and three days paternity leave.

As early as 2000, the International Labour Organization set the minimum number of days of paid maternity leave in the Maternity Protection Convention, which is 14 weeks or 98 days.

Although Malaysia is almost 22 years late to the party, it is better late than never, and finally meets the minimum requirement.

Looking at countries in the Asia-Pacific region, Malaysia is now on par with them in terms of paid maternity leave. Consider this as a normalisation step for Malaysia in line with international best practices.

However, comparing the length of maternity leave and its benefits across countries could be difficult, because in some countries paid maternity leave is not on a full salary, or the number of benefits is reduced after a certain period.

For example, the length of maternity leave in Japan is a total of 14 weeks, it is divided into six weeks before childbirth and eight weeks postnatal, but social insurance only provides two-thirds of the salary.

The United Kingdom provides 39 weeks of paid maternity leave but only pays 90% of the weekly salary for the first six weeks and then the next 33 weeks according to a standard salary cap.

The final 13 weeks of maternity leave are optional but unpaid. Some countries also offer parental leave, the benefit allowances are calculated differently. Currently, no parental leave is enacted in Malaysia.

Meet the needs of female labour

Some say that the difference in maternity leave and welfare is a reflection of the civilisation and social development for a particular country, but this is not necessarily true.

The United States is one of the countries in which the federal government does not legislate for mandatory paid maternity leave.

In my opinion, the reality on the ground can better explain the length of maternity leave, which depends on how much the government or society generally values and relies on women’s participation in labour and economic activities.

In general, if a country has a declining fertility rate, an aging population, as well as maintaining a high demand for female labour, the government and employers would then tend to agree to provide better maternity leave benefits for female employees and are more willing to retain their service after giving birth.

Some employers understand that right talent and skills are not easy to find and replace, and once they find the persons, they will try their best to keep them. Also, it has become the major trend for more women to join the workforce.

Given the gradual but significant improvement of women’s education and professional level in recent decades, employers must appreciate and cherish the benefits that the talents bring to the company, and therefore they have an obligation to protect women’s labour rights.

Extending paid maternity leave certainly has positive implications.

Although there are multiple reasons to explain the declining fertility rate in many countries, statutory paid maternity leave does help to increase the willingness of some women to give birth.

Australia mandated paid maternity leave for private sector in 2011, and research found that the policy increased respondents’ willingness to have an extra child by 16%.

An earlier survey in 2006 found that proposed paid maternity leave motivated mostly young female workers in the 15-24 age group, increasing their willingness to reproduce by about a third.

Even if paid maternity leave may not necessarily increase a country’s fertility rate, imagine if a country does not have such a policy, will the fertility rate plummet further?

Reduce family burden

The country sends a signal of goodwill to support family development and family planning, simply by extending paid maternity leave and granting paid paternity leave.

Honestly, there shouldn’t be many people, if any, who really intend to bring their children into the world just because they want to enjoy these maternity benefits.

However, the latest amendments to the act will definitely reduce the financial and psychological burden on new families. It is important to acknowledge that planning for childbirth and raising children is a major life event, new parents are most anxious and worried.

Even though some mothers will likely find it insufficient still, 98 days of paid maternity leave is definitely much better than the earlier statutory 60 days.

The first childbirth experience is crucial, as usually it affects the desire and possibility of the next childbirth. Hence any form of government support would be appreciated.

The current federal government policy in encouraging fertility includes income tax relief, and some state governments such as Penang, have a programme to provide birth incentives.

While there aren’t many public cash rewards, you should appreciate that government benefits in healthcare and education are also a kind of subsidies that reduce parenting costs.

Therefore, as long as female employees can return to the workplace and keep their jobs, they can continue to provide household expenses and maintain the most important financial foundation for raising children.

Businesses should pay for maternity leave

Some also said that companies should not bear the full cost of paid maternity leave. They “cannot afford to pay an extra month’s salary to the ‘absentees”, so they need the government or social insurance agencies to share the burden. I do not agree with this argument.

Wages paid by companies to employees actually only account for 36% of the gross production value. Malaysia is one of the countries with the lowest wages-to-gross production value ratio (compensation of employees of GDP) in the region, which means that our salary has been long suppressed.

The total fertility rate in our country has been declining year by year. A sum of 1.7 babies per woman was recorded in 2020 among the childbearing female age group, so female employees giving birth are not incidents as frequent as the company would imagine.

It is unreasonable to say that the company could not afford to support two times of 98-day maternity leave for a particular female employee in a span of a few years, knowing that this is likely all she requires during her lifetime.

As for self-employed or freelance workers, the government should provide maternity and paternity leave benefits through other means so that the former can also receive the benefit equally.

In order to prevent gender-selective bias in recruitment and employment by private companies, the state should also increase the number of days of paternity leave for male employees.

In this way, raising children is regarded as the responsibility of both parents, and therefore women cannot be “blamed” for giving birth and taking maternity leave, because that child also needs to be taken care of by the father.

It is a trend and reality that women’s rights and interests are on the rise and thus, it is better to pay more attention to gender equality. It is a more sensible approach for female employees to choose to not keep silent over discrimination or injustice, and seek another job opportunity.

Therefore, a workplace and company culture discriminating against women would be counterproductive, and will make the company suffer long-term losses.

If enterprises could have foresight, family harmony and increase in fertility rate will help to grow future labour force and talents.

Businesses and the government cannot look at short-term interest of the firms at the expense of future workforce and economic fundamentals.

Adjusting social attitudes towards gender role

Personally, I believe in gender equality, and therefore it should also mean equal responsibility for both men and women.

Breastfeeding aside, I should expect myself to be able to do everything my wife can do.

Singapore allows two weeks of paid paternity leave, which can be increased to four weeks to share the leave with the wife.

I hope the government could also consider providing flexible parental leave shared by both parents in future, and hopefully they could bear part of the allowance.

Even unpaid parental leave would be useful for contingencies, such as when a child is sick and needs to stay at home to be taken care of by a parent.

I believe that allowing men to take more parental leave will help normalise gender equality in parenting. In this way, society can gradually adjust the perceived family role of women in society. – April 18, 2022.

* Lim Chee Han is a founding member of Agora Society and a policy researcher. He holds a PhD in infection biology from Hannover Medical School, Germany, and an MSc in immunology and BSc in biotechnology from Imperial College London. Health and socioeconomic policies are his concerns. He believes a nation can advance significantly if policymaking and research are taken seriously.

* This is the opinion of the writer or publication and does not necessarily represent the views of The Malaysian Insight. Article may be edited for brevity and clarity.