Access to paid maternity leave in Australia is unequal within organisations and across industry sectors

Access to paid maternity leave in Australia is unequal within organisations and across industry sectors, Monash University research has found.

Dr Susan Mayson, of the Department of Management in the Faculty of Business and Economics, said that of the approximately 30 per cent of Australian women who had access to paid maternity leave, most were well paid and highly valued workers.

"They are also usually employed in the public sector, where paid maternity leave is accepted as a legitimate and important entitlement," said Dr Mayson, who is also a researcher with Monash's new multidisciplinary Australian Centre for Employment and Work.

Dr Mayson's comments are supported by the results of a qualitative study by Monash honours graduate Ms Effie Polites, who interviewed a sample group of managers and other employees, including women who had taken or planned to take paid maternity leave and who were employed by the banking sector and a university in Australia last year.

"Ms Polites' work provided useful evidence about attitudes and behaviours regarding paid maternity leave among Australian workers," Dr Mayson said.

"One of her key findings was that access to paid maternity leave in the banking sector tended to be dependent on the attitudes of individual managers, and this corresponds with attitudes to paid maternity leave in the private sector.

"While paid maternity leave was available as an entitlement to all eligible staff in a particular bank, managerial discretion was a key factor in determining access. This potentially disadvantaged women because managers can view paid maternity leave as an inconvenience and therefore be uncooperative.

"In the same bank, with the same employment policies, a woman executive might receive paid maternity leave, while a woman working in the bank's call centre may find it more difficult to negotiate time off or, if they were a casual worker, might not be granted access to the leave at all."

However, paid maternity leave was more readily available at the university examined in the study because it was regarded as a legitimate entitlement in the public sector, although managerial discretion also emerged as an issue for some women.

"If paid maternity leave is to become more widespread or universal, it will have to involve small businesses whose priorities, concerns and financial resources will, in many cases, be different from those of big corporations," Dr Mayson said.

From this month, Dr Mayson's research will take on a new direction, looking into access and attitudes to paid maternity leave in small and large firms in the finance sector. Joining her in the research will be Monash colleagues Dr Paul DeLange, a senior lecturer in the Department of Accounting and Finance, Associate Professor Rowena Barrett, director of the Family and Small Business Research Unit, and Ms Wendy Webber, a lecturer in the Department of Management.

"We chose the finance sector because it has a large proportion of female employees at all levels, with many different kinds of employment ranging from full-time to casual, and it is part of a global industry," Dr Mayson said.

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