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MATERNITY LEAVE

Legitimate period of absence from work, treated as a suspension of the contract of employment, due to pregnancy and childbirth.

Under French law, maternity leave commences six weeks before the expected date of the employee's confinement (eight weeks if she already has two or more children), and ends ten weeks after the confinement (sixteen weeks from the third child onwards). It is extended in the event of a pathological condition or of multiple births, and is adjusted if the birth is premature.

This leave is deemed, in principle, to be a period of effective employment. It constitutes a period during which protection against dismissal is specially increased (see maternity ), with the guaranteed right to return to the same job.