The ‘New Start’ Initiative To Address The Work-Life Balance Challenges In The European Union

The introduction of carers’ leave: ‘Carer’ means a worker providing personal care or support in case of a serious illness or dependency of a relative (Art. 3/c). ‘Relative’ means a worker’s son, daughter, mother, father, spouse or partner in civil partnership, where such partnerships are envisaged by national law (Art. 3/d). ‘Dependency’ means a situation in which a person is, temporarily or permanently, in need of care due to disability or a serious medical condition other than serious illness (Art. 3/e). There is currently no carers’ leave regulated at EU level. According to the Proposal, Member States have to take the necessary measures to ensure that workers have the right to carers’ leave of at least five working days per year, per worker. Such right may be subject to appropriate substantiation of the medical condition of the worker’s relative (Art. 6). The rationale behind the introduction of this right is that improving the possibilities for workers to take a short period of time off to care for a relative can help to improve their work-life balance and, at the same time, avoid them dropping out of the labour market entirely.(39)

Improving parental leave: ‘Parental leave’ means leave from work on the grounds…