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Play golf on paternity leave? You're lucky to have time to breathe

The government is reportedly considering making paid paternity leave mandatory for all new fathers.

A REPORT IN yesterday’s Irish Times suggests that the government is poised to introduce paid parental leave in this year’s budget.

At present, Ireland’s system of parental support lags some distance behind international best practice, to put it mildly.

We’re one of six European countries in which an employer has no obligation to pay its workers while they’re on parental leave.

We have no system of shared parental leave at all making it next to impossible for fathers to take an equal role in the rearing of their child.

By contrast, workers in Sweden are entitled to 480 days of leave at 80% of their regular wage, which they can split between the parental unit howsoever they deem fit (and that’s surplus to the 18 weeks of basic paid maternity leave). Oh to be from the land of the Skarsgårds.

Meanwhile, paternity benefit here was introduced just two years ago, and totals just €235 a week (don’t get me started on the fact you need a Public Services Card to claim it either).

To be welcomed

So the introduction of any kind of paid parental leave by the Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection, even if it is just two weeks to begin with, is to be welcomed. It’s a first step towards dragging us kicking and screaming into the world of modern parenting. And it might just take an axe to the gender pay gap while it’s at it.

Some of the other initiatives mooted don’t ring quite so true however. Like mandatory paternity leave.

That Irish Times report cites a departmental statistic of 62%, just under two-thirds, takeup of the current paternity benefit. This makes a deal more sense when you consider that a firm may not pay the father in question should they choose to take time off – meaning it may be they have to stay at work in order to best support their family, rather than taking two weeks off at a State-funded rate which may be a fraction of their normal wage.

However, a government source informs the Irish Times report that many men are using the benefit as an excuse “to go play golf”. Hence the need to make such leave mandatory, in order to force the beginnings of parity between mothers and father as to time devoted to caring for a newborn.

This is hard to fathom.

Four months ago my wife gave birth to our first daughter.

It turns out that years spent in the company of nieces and nephews hadn’t developed any dormant nurturing skills in my brain by osmosis. The first four weeks were absolutely terrifying.

You’re suddenly saddled with an exceptionally needy, exceptionally hungry, exceptionally crotchety bundle of joy with zero language skills who is totally and utterly dependent on you. Not to mention the fact they don’t yet know how to sleep.

The idea that we could have survived that first month without the two weeks of paternity leave (coupled with about 18 days holidays I’d squirrelled away) afforded by my company is laughable. I would have been of no support to my other half who was learning to be a mother. And if I found things tough, I can’t imagine for a second how hard her part was. And we both would have had nervous breakdowns.

No-brainer

If my employer hadn’t paid me for those two weeks however, I would have had a very unpalatable decision to make (I would have taken the two weeks’ unpaid leave actually, I’d see it as a no-brainer – those two weeks of development aren’t something you can claim back at a later date). But if the choice hadn’t been mine to make, had I been forced to either work or stay home, boy would I have resented it.

Currently, paternity benefit can be taken any time within the first six months. To delay it wouldn’t have worked for me, I had too little of a clue what I was doing, but I can understand why you might put it off to a time when you’re more comfortable in your new role, particularly if you have lots and lots of holidays to work with – a good friend is doing exactly that in fact.

I’ll hold my hands up – I don’t play golf. I do play football for pleasure though. That is to say I did. It’s been four months since I last togged out. I hope to do so again sometime this decade.

Not that I’d change it for the world. Watching a mini-human develop, one you can call your own that might even have the good grace to look a little bit like you, is the greatest privilege I’ve ever had.

Which brings us back to the golf comment. Because if that’s how the government views the takeup of its fairly useless paternity benefit, as a means for a wrong-headed father figure to get some quality time back on the course, it doesn’t bode well for the future development of our childcare services, which are already among the most expensive in the developed world. Seriously. Ireland doesn’t make it easy to procreate.

A close friend recently had twins (we’re at that stage of life where babies are everywhere, it’s very discommoding altogether). He’s been an avid golfer all his life. He’s unlikely to play again before the year 2025. He’s not complaining.

Forcing people to do anything, let alone take paternity leave, to save them from themselves isn’t a particularly clever approach in any circumstance.

If you really want people to take the benefit, make it worth their while. Unfortunately that would require longer-term thinking. And that just isn’t the Irish State’s forte.

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    Mute Michael McLoughlin
    Favourite Michael McLoughlin
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    Jul 29th 2017, 9:52 AM

    Still use my nano for runs and the gym , it’s great.

    113
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    Mute Seeking Truth
    Favourite Seeking Truth
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    Jul 29th 2017, 9:47 AM

    We had the classic iPod, then our daughter got the nano5 and our son the nano7. His has broken since, but hers still works.
    Would be nice to have an mp3 player not reliant on the internet to give kids to let them have music in their bedroom….tjat did not have a camera, text messaging, etc. In other words, can we have separate devices for each activity? Oh wait….we used to have it that way…..

    88
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    Mute Deborah Behan
    Favourite Deborah Behan
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    Jul 29th 2017, 12:57 PM

    @Seeking Truth: I bought my daughter a low tech stereo system and CDs! She loves that the radio never buffers!!!

    15
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    Mute Seeking Truth
    Favourite Seeking Truth
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    Jul 29th 2017, 5:04 PM

    @Deborah Behan: she has a CD player and can listen to the radio on her iPod nano. But Spotify makes things tricky!! Looking at a Sonos wireless speaker that runs from an app anywhere in the house so the device can stay downstairs but they are fairly spendy!!!

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    Mute Will Keane
    Favourite Will Keane
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    Jul 29th 2017, 9:46 AM

    Still have me 2gb nano and 80gb iPod 2nd edition and they are still going strong!

    45
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    Mute wiklagirl
    Favourite wiklagirl
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    Jul 29th 2017, 10:30 AM

    I still use my 120gb iPod. Long may it last !

    34
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    Mute WilhelminaMCallaghan
    Favourite WilhelminaMCallaghan
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    Jul 29th 2017, 9:32 AM

    I wish I had any iPod

    26
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    Mute Mr. Dragmire
    Favourite Mr. Dragmire
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    Jul 29th 2017, 11:12 AM

    I won an iPod nano 4th gen in college in 2004. I wasn’t into music really turn so I gave it to my sister who was. A few years later she gave it back when she got a phone that could store music. I used it for podcasts and music then. In 2010 I got an iPod touch 4th gen and used that instead. A couple years ago I gave the iPod nano back to my sister and she uses it for music in her car. It’s a great little device.

    20
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    Mute Catherine Sims
    Favourite Catherine Sims
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    Jul 29th 2017, 1:07 PM

    What’s a Walkman ??? :) I’m still hauling a record player around with a long extension lead :)

    19
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    Mute Melina Roberts
    Favourite Melina Roberts
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    Jul 29th 2017, 12:09 PM

    I have the first Generation IPod, took great care of it and think I even have the original box for it.I’m hoping it will be worth something in the future

    12
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    Mute Revolting Peasant
    Favourite Revolting Peasant
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    Jul 29th 2017, 10:57 PM

    @Melina Roberts: It probably will be. Apple recalled them a few years back due to battery issues and replaced them with a newer version (the small square thing whose button always breaks). If the screen wasn’t broken we wouldn’t of sent ours away. It was the original classic design.

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    Mute ivan lynch
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    Jul 29th 2017, 10:20 AM

    Pity…
    very tough to get a device these days that children want and can satisfy parents at the same time.

    12
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    Mute Alan Scott
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    Jul 29th 2017, 1:42 PM

    Over rated over priced just like VW Audi cars.

    8
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    Mute Rui Firmino
    Favourite Rui Firmino
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    Jul 30th 2017, 12:02 PM

    @Alan Scott: I got a nano 9 years ago and still works fine. Worth every cent!

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    Mute Ger
    Favourite Ger
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    Jul 29th 2017, 3:13 PM

    I had a 5th gen Nano about 10 years ago. It was a perfect piece of kit and had I not lost it it would probably still be my preferred way to listen to music.

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    Mute Eamonn Sheen
    Favourite Eamonn Sheen
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    Jul 29th 2017, 2:21 PM

    I had a 160gb iPod classic and have an iPod touch but never use it now. I use Spotify on my phone as my main source of music these days.

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    Mute Lily
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    Jul 29th 2017, 6:00 PM

    I waited for the first generation iPod touch. I still have it (though for a time I thought I lost it and got a 4th or 5th generation iPod touch and found the 1st generation one a few days later.)

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    Mute Leitrim303
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    Jul 29th 2017, 7:28 PM

    never liked apple devices

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    Mute Ciaran O Reilly
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    Jul 30th 2017, 7:59 PM

    Classic

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    Mute Charles McCarthy
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    Jul 29th 2017, 8:08 PM

    I have a one of those iPod classics U2 edition jobbys somewhere in the house, never even been used as I can’t find it. I’m sure that it is a great little device when it turns up! : O

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    Mute Gary Mason
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    Jul 29th 2017, 7:55 PM

    Never owned an Apple product and never will.

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    Mute George Roche
    Favourite George Roche
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    Jul 30th 2017, 8:11 AM

    My neck’s killing me carting this boombox about.

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