Stephen Farry
North Down · Alliance Party · Northern Ireland
“Speaking for a party that has a longer pedigree in advocating a public inquiry than both the DUP and Sinn Féin, I nonetheless welcome this announcement, despite the torturous path that we have had and, indeed, the missed opportunities.”
“The first was a reform of the petition of concern to take it back to the original intent when it was designed in 1998. It was clear at that stage that Arlene Foster banged the table and said, "No, never. We are not doing that. That is a way whereby we are going to have to fold on equal marriage: it's not happening".”
“<BR /> <BR />The main points that I make concern the substance of the order. There are probably three aspects that the Minister needs to address properly before the Assembly, and they really relate to what other options he has.”
“That raises the question of why they want to go as far as 2022, especially when I am not sure — I would welcome any clarification to the contrary on it — that there has been formal Executive approval of this.”
“<BR /> <BR />There are three major substantive issues that I do not believe have been properly aired on this: VAT; European Commission infraction proceedings; and, most important, the opportunity foregone to revisit the classification of Northern Ireland Water and the ability, through a separate water charge, to allow it to borrow commerc…”
“While my party was supportive of the Good Friday Agreement back in 1998, at that time, we expressed some reservations around the very detailed nature of the proposals and how those could, in due course, destabilise Northern Ireland and prevent us from realising our full potential. We have been very much vindicated in that analysis.”
The complete record
Every one of 2,504 lines we hold for Stephen Farry, in date order, each linked to its source. Free to read, in full, without an account. Page 33 of 51.
“If we look at what David Ford does in Justice, we see that people are dependent on legal aid and on the police being around to give them protection when they are vulnerable. All those things are going to be in jeopardy if we end up pursuing this agenda of more and more cuts. All those cuts will bite on people. <BR /> <BR />It is not just about cuts. It is about the lost opportunity costs of transforming the economy. If we want to go back to talking about the prosperity process, we find that it involves investing resources in economic drivers. It means spending more money on skills. It means investing in our infrastructure. It means building more office space. It means mobilising all the levers that are there to transform our economy. If we have less money, there is less money to spend on those levers.”
“They are the people who depend on the health service. Whenever operations are postponed or never happen and whenever we cut public health, we see that that has the biggest impact on those who are living in deprivation and who do not get the support, for example, to change their lifestyle to make them more sustainable. Cuts are going to be made to early years education when we are trying to break through intergenerational educational disadvantage, which again is about giving people opportunities. When I end up having to have an impact through job schemes, employment programmes and places at further education colleges and in higher education, that is about giving people a chance to move out of poverty and to have a stake in society.”
“<BR /> <BR />Our duty as a Government and an Assembly is to act for the common good of all the people of Northern Ireland and to protect them, including the most vulnerable, from the fate that awaits them either through full-blown Tory cuts, which three parties are committed to voting for tonight — they are actively for Tory cuts — or through deeper cuts in public spending, which will see services cut even further. We already have difficulties with our public spending. People are already suffering. We well know the effect of the cuts. Indeed, the Members who are actually voting for more cuts tonight are the ones who often complain the loudest about the impact of those cuts. <BR /> <BR />We are going to see even steeper cuts. Those cuts will bite very much on those who are most vulnerable.”
“We have a duty to progress this legislation because the consequences of us not doing so are so dramatic. I am stunned that people do not appreciate the gravity of what is about to unfold if this legislation does not go through. We can pass it tonight and progress welfare reform and still continue with the discussions to explore what else happens. The welfare reform that we are about to pass in Northern Ireland is a better deal than already applies in Scotland. They do not even have welfare powers. That is something that is up for discussion, and, indeed, there may be a certain reticence about devolving those types of powers, given the implications of people going off on solo runs on these issues. Let us have that discussion with Scotland, but let us not wait for that to do our duty on welfare reform.”
“Yes. <BR /> <BR />We have heard a lot about needing more time for negotiations and how negotiations have not really started. I am afraid that, for a lot of us, this comes across as being an excuse to avoid taking a difficult decision. Any excuse is rattled out, the latest one being that we now have the Scottish nationalists in an even stronger position in Westminster and they will be negotiating for something and maybe we should hang on to see what comes from that. That may be all well and good, and, frankly, we should be part of those discussions, but that need not happen to the mutual exclusion of us passing the Final Stage of the Welfare Reform Bill this evening.”
“In some senses, that neatly brings me to my closing point. We —”
“<BR /> <BR />Furthermore, it is a matter of fact that, on Friday, discussions were happening between the Northern Ireland Office and the Northern Ireland Civil Service about putting together a proposal in relation to a prosperity panel for Northern Ireland. The notion that, somehow, no one was listening to the SDLP is far from reality. They were being listened to. People were working with them, and people were being generous to them in trying to find some degree of coherence to what was being said to the other parties. Papers were being put together to put to the party at the selfsame time as its members were behind closed doors, fighting amongst themselves and deciding to put a dagger through devolution and put the institutions in jeopardy. That is what the record shows.”
“Let me be very clear to the Member in setting this out: my party acknowledged that there was a point to be made about what the Member terms the "prosperity process". We recognised that we needed to have a further discussion about what economic interventions we can make to build on our existing economic strategy, Programme for Government and economic pact, particularly looking ahead to corporation tax and changes in the nature of devolution across these islands. To be perfectly frank and brutal about it, beyond a slogan, we did not hear in those discussions any substance from the SDLP as to what its prosperity pact actually meant. If anything, it was me, David Ford and a few others, including Arlene Foster and Peter Robinson, who actually put meat on the bones of what the Member was talking about.”
“I cannot get my head around how, within a matter of hours, they were proclaiming that they had signed a petition of concern and that, essentially, negotiations were over. Something happened behind closed doors in that intervening period. I believe that Dr McDonnell was, at that time, sincere about trying to find an agreement, but, within a matter of hours, he seemed to have been overruled by the rest of his party, which I thought was in favour of the Good Friday Agreement.”
“Last week, there were productive discussions around the table in Stormont House between the five parties. I do not know what is going on in the SDLP — people are speculating — but Alasdair McDonnell and Fearghal McKinney were at the table, seeking to negotiate in good faith. That is certainly how I picked it up. Other people were concerned that the rest of the party was not there; the other 20 wings of the party were not at the table, giving their view at that time, which should have given us a certain health warning. As recently as Friday morning, I left the room with the impression that the SDLP was still wishing to discuss the issue, even at the eleventh hour, when negotiations should have long since closed.”
“<BR /> <BR />Even if we grant the SDLP grace today and say that it had the scope to table those amendments, it tried to do so and failed. They were blocked by a petition of concern, which, ironically, is what they are using today to block the Bill's Final Stage. They cannot really complain about the use of the petition of concern back then given that they are using it today to frustrate any progress. Even if those amendments were unsuccessful, all five parties in the Executive, as parties to the Stormont Castle Agreement, should be giving their assent to the Bill's Final Stage today. That is what they committed to doing, and that is where their duty lies in this respect. <BR /> <BR />It gets worse in terms of the bad faith around negotiations.”
“<BR /> <BR />It may well be fine for the SDLP to make the argument that it was seeking to propose amendments to improve the Stormont Castle Agreement. Again, however, any amendments it tabled that sought to change it ran contrary to what it had agreed to as a political party. Indeed, the only parties with any legitimacy in proposing amendments at Consideration Stage and Further Consideration Stage were the parties outside the Executive. The amendments may have been ill thought out and may have been folly in many respects, but they had a perfect entitlement, as parties, to put them forward and have them tested. The SDLP, frankly, was trying to have it both ways, proposing amendments after it had signed up to the agreement that the Minister was trying to put through the Assembly at that time.”
“Parties had different approaches to the Stormont House Agreement, and people nuanced how they responded to that agreement in different ways. Some were more fulsome in their support, notably Sinn Féin, and some, including the SDLP, were more conditional, to be fair to them in that regard. However, there was no conditionality around the Stormont Castle Agreement: everyone was very clear about what they were doing because the finances were at the heart of that agreement. The headroom for finances was central to having confidence among the five parties to move on. The notion that someone could say that they were signing up to it in principle does not wash one bit. I was there. I saw what happened, and that is a rewriting of history.”
“It closed, essentially, with the Stormont Castle Agreement and the Stormont House Agreement, which five parties signed up to. I was there, and five parties signed up to the Stormont Castle Agreement. Let us be very clear about that: there were no ifs, buts or conditionality in the room when the five parties, by themselves, made the Stormont Castle Agreement. All five parties were very clear about what they were signing up to do. The fact is that parties have welshed on the agreement that was made and they have gone back, for various political calculations, and changed their mind, leaving us in major difficulties. That applies as much to the SDLP as to Sinn Féin, although they breached their commitments to the Stormont Castle Agreement at different paces. <BR /> <BR />When I refer to Stormont Castle, I am referring to the deal on welfare.”
“That brings me to the issue of negotiations, picking up on Dr McDonnell's point that certain parties have acted honourably on the issue of talks. I will not go into the concept of the Assembly acting in an honest manner; I will let that one hang for now. The approach that has been taken to negotiations by the SDLP and Sinn Féin has been anything but honourable. We have had endless negotiation around welfare reform for the best part of three years, and today we hear that people are being bounced on the issue, that it is far too soon, that negotiations have not really started or that we can do it so much better. The latest one from the SDLP is that it is committed to having mature and — wait for it — responsible discussions around these issues. That ship sailed a long time ago.”
“We are not here to have a discussion about the nature of any compromise that we would fashion; it is about whether we ever have a compromise at all. People seem to be determined not to have that.”
“The other aspect relates to power-sharing itself. We have a coalition Government, which is a mandatory coalition. Some of us want to change it and have a voluntary coalition and an opposition, which is a shout-out to Mr McCallister in case he raises the point later. That is an ambition for change which is, again, consistent with the agreement. However, for power-sharing to work in any society, whether it is in Northern Ireland or anywhere else in the world, we have to see willingness on the part of parties to accommodate one another, to have a sense of give and take, a willingness to compromise and a willingness to act in a rational manner. At present, we are in danger of parties not being willing to govern Northern Ireland. They are simply setting their face against any sense of responsible decision-making.”
“I cannot get my head around the fact that parties that claim to be pro-agreement are intent on taking that particular direction of travel. I just cannot understand it at all. When the petition of concern was lodged on Friday, it was the seventeenth anniversary of the referendum in which 71% of the people of Northern Ireland put their faith in a different future. That future is now having its heart ripped out. <BR /> <BR />There are fundamental points. I made the point about why we are in danger of breaching the Good Friday Agreement, and I referenced the principle of consent and how people are somehow pretending that what that means in practice somehow does not pertain when it comes to welfare reform.”
“That will begin to have implications for the institutions, and if the institutions become unsustainable, that will call into question the Good Friday Agreement itself. <BR /> <BR />A remark was made about the different arrangements that were put in place for the devolution of policing and justice. Those were very discrete interventions that were necessary to ensure that there was community confidence in the devolution of policing and justice, which built on the Good Friday Agreement. What we are talking about here is a fundamental challenge that undermines the Good Friday Agreement and rips the heart out of it. If there is no functioning Executive and Assembly, there is no Good Friday Agreement. That is where people are intent on taking us based on the logic of what they are doing.”
“To be very clear, once we hit the Budget figures that we are contemplating or once we are in a situation that the Civil Service begins to put in place a Budget over the head of politicians, devolution itself will be in crisis. I cannot predict how different parties will react to that situation. Similarly, we could see a situation in which some powers of the Assembly on the administration of welfare are taken back to Westminster as it essentially imposes welfare reform over our heads. So, for the first time, we will see a reversal of devolution. That will be against the grain of what is happening elsewhere in the UK, which is a desire to see more devolution. In Northern Ireland, devolution could go into reverse.”
“For sure, there would have been some very difficult decisions about how we would resource it to invest in the other drivers, but we are nowhere close to even having those types of discussions, and being able to get to those points is slipping further and further into the future, if ever. Frankly, if our budgets unravel any further, the notion of the devolution of corporation tax will not be tenable. That is another consequence that we are facing up to. <BR /> <BR />Perhaps most bizarrely of all, given the nature of the parties that signed the petition of concern — again, that is a further example of its abuse — is the potential unravelling of these political institutions.”
“I will not embarrass the Member, but the letter asked what assurance I could give to someone who contacted them about their ability to exit under the voluntary exit scheme. I asked, "Are you serious? Are you having a laugh? Do you not realise the reason why there is uncertainty with the voluntary exit scheme is because of the failure to progress the Stormont House Agreement?" It is absolutely staggering that people are not joining up the dots and making those types of connections. <BR /> <BR />Corporation tax is already disappearing off into the distance. That was going to transform the economy of Northern Ireland and create many, many new jobs.”
“The logical consequence of anyone's support of the Good Friday Agreement is that they recognise that reality, even those parties that want to see a united Ireland. That is the stark reality that they have to accept, and, at the moment, they are failing to do so. The Conservative Party may not have much of a mandate in Scotland and Wales and no mandate in Northern Ireland, but it won the election across the UK as a whole, fair and square, based on the electoral system that is in place. <BR /> <BR />Other consequences could flow from this. We are in danger of losing the voluntary exit scheme for civil servants. Just before I came down to the Chamber, I opened a piece of correspondence that was in my ministerial folder and was struck by a letter from a Member from Sinn Féin.”
“We have done the best that we can, but we have to appreciate that we are not our own masters on welfare. We are part of a much wider political system. <BR /> <BR />We regularly hear comments that say, "The Conservatives have no mandate in Northern Ireland, so how dare they do all this?" One of the fundamental tenets of the Good Friday Agreement is the principle of consent, which means that all of us, including those parties that do not wish Northern Ireland to continue as part of the UK, have nonetheless accepted, like everyone else, that it will remain part of the UK. That means that they accept, ipso facto, that a national UK Government set policy on national issues. Welfare is one of those issues.”
“Yes, very much so. We are, essentially, at the mercy of the Conservative Government; that is where people in the Assembly will leave the people of Northern Ireland when it comes to welfare. We have to bear in mind that, as many Members have said, we are not here as a sovereign state; we are here as part of a wider UK. We receive our money from the Treasury, whether through the block grant in DEL money or annually managed expenditure (AME) money. We are dependent upon that. Welfare reform, in practice, is set at a UK level. We have some ability to mitigate and have flexibilities, and we have maximised our ability to run those, both with regard to our ability to negotiate them and to pay them. Every time we negotiate a flexibility, it has to come off the Budget in some other way.”
“There is an issue around accruals. That is the danger that we face. What may bring this home to some people is almost a reverse of what happened on the back of Sunningdale. We had the famous pictures of farmers blocking the Prince of Wales Avenue with their farm vehicles in protest. This time round, we may see the pitchforks up in protest about the inability of some parties to take decisions on the vital interests of Northern Ireland.”
“There will be the loss of last year's mitigation, that is the loan that the Executive received; the fact that we have to pay more in welfare penalties on an ongoing basis; and the fact that we have to fund the voluntary exit scheme. If, on the back of this, we, in turn, do not pass a Budget for this year, we then face a situation where budgets will be struck by civil servants, and there will be astronomical cuts to those budgets — beyond the level faced by any other society in western Europe in recent memory. That is the stark choice that faces us.”
“They would rather that people suffer than they have to go through the Lobbies and have themselves associated with something that many of us in this Chamber find distasteful. We recognise that it is our duty and responsibility as the Government and legislators of Northern Ireland. We have to address society as we find it today, not some idealist fantasy land where we can do things differently. We have to face the stark realities before us. <BR /> <BR />Other major consequences flow from this. Potentially, we will see the unravelling of our budgets. Again, we have what may be viewed as the lesser-case scenario, where the pressures from the unravelling of the Stormont House Agreement build up around us.”
“We have a stark choice before us on these issues. On welfare, the choice is very simple: we proceed with the local variation of welfare reform with all the flexibilities and mitigations that we have negotiated or we see the full blunt force of the stark version of reform that is taking place in Great Britain. No other choices are available. Nothing else has been proposed. No other sustainable, financially solvent approach has been suggested by any party in the Assembly. That is the choice that awaits us. All those who will block this vote tonight are supporting the full version of Tory welfare cuts in Northern Ireland. <BR /> <BR />All I can think of to try to rationalise the process is that some people just do not want to have their fingerprints on it.”
“People are already feeling the pain, at best in terms of investment deferred and, at worst, investment lost, so people need to be very conscious of where things are at present.”
“I go back to the point that I made in an intervention to Mr Kennedy. It was not just the fact that we were due to have a major golf tournament in Northern Ireland this week, which, thankfully, is still going ahead. We were potentially going to have a major US investment trip on these shores, with blue-chip companies potentially looking to invest in our economy. That is now postponed, in the best-case scenario, and, in the worst-case scenario, is lost. That is the very real consequence of even a standstill in the decision-making process that we have had, or lack of decision-making process that we have had, over the past number of months. I hate to think what the implications are going to be if we actually end up taking the wrong decisions, which will plunge Northern Ireland into deep uncertainty.”
“It is very hard to get your head around the stark fact that, after today's vote, if, indeed, parties vote on the basis that they have declared so far, everything will change in Northern Ireland. There will be implications for our political process and our budgeting process. Those implications will be massive and considerable, and the danger is that they will be long-lasting and that all the people of Northern Ireland will pay the price as a consequence. People need to be very clear about what they are doing tonight and not come back in a few weeks and say, "I didn't realise what we were signing up to or what the implications were." People have been warned extremely clearly about the implications. <BR /> <BR />A different future is available, or was available, to us in Northern Ireland.”
“I very much concur with what the Member says about the Irish Open, but the Irish Open this week was not just a hook to attract golfers to Northern Ireland: if things had gone differently with our political decision-making over the past number of months, this week we would have seen a major US investment trip to Northern Ireland, with some major blue-chip investors interested in bringing jobs to Northern Ireland. That has long since disappeared, and whether we get it back or not is a major question. The consequences of the delay around welfare are already being felt acutely beyond just golf.”
“On a point of order, Mr Speaker. In the light of the comments made by you, Mr Speaker, last Monday about comments of a personal nature being made from the Floor to Members, calling into question my colleague's eyesight would surely fall under the advice that you gave to Members.”
“Again, I thank the Chair for his comments and confirmation of the Committee's response, and I congratulate Members on following all that.”
“The regulations modify the Paternity and Adoption Leave Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2002, the Maternity and Adoption Leave (Curtailment of Statutory Rights to Leave) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2015 and the Shared Parental Leave Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2015. The purpose of the modifications is to provide entitlement to adoption, paternity and shared parental leave to qualifying parental order parents. The amendments provide different triggers and qualification points to recognise that the leave relates to the birth of a child born with the help of a surrogate and not an adoption. <BR /> <BR />Again, I am grateful to the Committee for Employment and Learning and the Examiner of Statutory Rules for their scrutiny of these rules.”
“As stated before, a parental order parent is someone who, on the day of the child's birth, intends to apply for a parental order under section 54 of the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Act 2008 with another person in respect of the child and expects the court to make such an order, or someone who obtains such an order. <BR /> <BR />The Paternity, Adoption and Shared Parental Leave (Parental Order Cases) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2015 rely, in part, on enabling powers modified by the Employment Rights (Northern Ireland) Order 1996 (Application of Articles 107A, 107B, 107G, 107I, 112A and 112B to Parental Order Cases) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2015.”
“<BR /> <BR />The Employment Rights (Northern Ireland) Order 1996 (Application of Articles 107A, 107B, 107G, 107I, 112A and 112B to Parental Order Cases) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2015 apply and modify existing powers to allow the making of regulations to give an eligible employee entitlement to statutory adoption leave, paternity leave and shared parental leave if that employee has a child born with the help of a surrogate and the employee is a parental order parent.”
“Under that section, a court may make an order providing for a child of a surrogate mother to be treated as the child of the applicants for the order if certain conditions are satisfied. The modifications are to provide an entitlement to shared parental pay in respect of adoption, modified in a way that provides different triggers and qualification points to recognise that the statutory pay relates to the birth of a child and not an adoption.”
“They also amend the Paternity and Adoption Leave (Adoption from Overseas) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2003 so that those regulations incorporate changes equivalent to those made to the Paternity and Adoption Leave Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2002 in relation to births and adoptions in Northern Ireland by the Paternity and Adoption Leave (Amendment) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2015. <BR /> <BR />The Statutory Shared Parental Pay (Parental Order Cases) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2015 modify the Statutory Shared Parental Pay (General) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2015 in cases where a person has applied with another person for a parental order under section 54 of the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Act 2008.”
“<BR /> <BR />The Shared Parental Leave and Paternity and Adoption Leave (Adoptions from Overseas) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2015 modify the Maternity and Adoption Leave (Curtailment of Statutory Rights to Leave) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2015 and the Shared Parental Leave Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2015 so that each appropriately reflects entitlement to shared parental leave for qualifying individuals adopting from overseas and the different triggers and qualification points that exist in these cases.”
“<BR /> <BR />The sole purpose of the Employment Rights (Northern Ireland) Order 1996 (Application of Articles 107G and 107I to Adoptions from Overseas) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2015 is to modify existing powers in primary legislation to allow the making of regulations giving entitlement to shared parental leave to employees who are adopting from overseas. Such regulations are made separately.”
“This group of regulations caters specifically for parents who have adopted their child from overseas or who have become parents using a surrogacy arrangement. For the purposes of these specific regulations and others concerned with adoptions from overseas, an adoption from overseas is defined as an adoption of a child who enters Northern Ireland from outside the United Kingdom in connection with or for the purposes of adoption which does not involve the placement of the child for adoption under the law of any part of the United Kingdom. The modifications that these regulations apply relate to dates and evidential requirements that are relevant to the entitlement and notification of statutory shared parental pay in adoption cases.”
“The Statutory Shared Parental Pay (Adoptions from Overseas) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2015 modify the Statutory Shared Parental Pay (General) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2015 to provide an entitlement to statutory shared parental pay for qualifying individuals adopting from overseas and reflect the different triggers and qualification points that exist in cases of adoption from overseas. This is the first in the final group of regulations before the House today. <BR /> <BR />This group of regulations adjusts the application of the key shared parental leave and pay regulations to ensure that the rights that they confer are also available to those whose journey to becoming parents has been via a slightly different route.”
“I thank all the Members who spoke — in particular, the Chair. I thank the Committee for its support of this particular set of motions.”
“<BR /> <BR />The effect will be that unpaid parental leave will be able to be taken at any point up a child’s eighteenth birthday, including immediately before, after, or in between periods of other family-related leave. Extending to the child's eighteenth birthday the time until which an employee may exercise entitlement to unpaid parental leave reflects the fact that caring responsibilities do not end when the child reaches five or starts school. <BR /> <BR />Again, I pass on my thanks to the Committee for Employment and Learning and the Examiner of Statutory Rules for their scrutiny of these rules.”
“The Maternity and Parental Leave etc. (Amendment) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2015 amend the Maternity and Parental Leave etc. Regulations (Northern Ireland) 1999. The purpose of doing so is to remove the limitation on the right to unpaid parental leave so that it may be taken at any time before a child’s eighteenth birthday. Members should note that the right to unpaid parental leave is entirely distinct from the right to shared parental leave, which is the main subject of today’s motions. <BR /> <BR />The regulations also amend the right to return to work after maternity and parental leave, to reflect the introduction of shared parental leave by the Shared Parental Leave Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2015.”
“<BR /> <BR />The benefit of curtailing leave, rather than the mother or adopter simply returning to work, is that it enables the number of weeks of maternity or adoption leave that will be untaken at the date to be known in advance. It also allows a child’s father or the mother’s or adopter’s partner to start taking shared parental leave whilst the mother or adopter remains on maternity or adoption leave. This enables both parents to be at home together with the child from the earliest stages following birth or placement for adoption. Separate regulations establish entitlement to curtail statutory maternity pay, maternity allowance or statutory adoption pay in order to allow statutory shared parental pay to arise.”
“<BR /> <BR />Finally, the regulations protect employees who suffer a detriment or who are dismissed because of time off work for antenatal or adoption appointments. The right to take time off for these appointments was introduced by the 2015 Act, which amended the Employment Rights (Northern Ireland) Order 1996 to make relevant provision. <BR /> <BR />The Maternity and Adoption Leave (Curtailment of Statutory Rights to Leave) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2015 enable an expectant mother, a mother on maternity leave, an adopter or a prospective adopter to give notice to end his or her relevant entitlement on a specific future date. When such entitlements have been curtailed, the balance of the untaken period of leave may be taken as shared parental leave if the parents satisfy entitlement and notification criteria.”
“They also confer the right to paternity leave on the spouses, civil partners and partners of prospective adopters in that situation. <BR /> <BR />The regulations also prevent paternity leave from being taken for an adoption placement if such leave has already been taken at an earlier stage as part of a fostering for adoption process for the same child. They achieve the same end in relation to adoption leave, so that it may also not be taken on two occasions for the same child. They also prevent paternity leave from being taken if a person has already taken paid time off to attend an adoption appointment for the child and is thus the adopter or has already taken shared parental leave.”