Government proposes law on leave for urgent family reasons

In order fully to implement the EU Directive on parental leave, in March 1998 the Swedish Government presented Parliament with a proposal for a new act on leave for urgent family reasons.

According to the Government most of the requirements of the EU Council Directive on parental leave (96/34/EC) are already covered by Swedish legislation (TN9801201S). For example, mothers and fathers have the right to full leave until the child is 18 months old, or even longer if they have still not fully utilised their entitlement to parental benefits by that time. When they have resumed work, they have the right to leave to care for the child when it is sick, up until its 12th birthday. However, although most employers would in all probability give a parent leave of absence if, for example, his or her teenage child had an accident, workers have no absolute right to leave in such a situation. Thus, to implement the Directive fully Sweden needs to adopt some additional rules.

Preferably, this should be done "by means of collective agreements", the Ministry of Labour stated in a memorandum in the end of 1997. However, it turned out that of the large employers' organisations only the Swedish Association of Local Authorities (Kommunförbundet) and the Federation of Swedish County Councils (Landstingsförbundet) were prepared to negotiate such an agreement, while the Swedish Employers' Confederation (Svenska Arbetsgivareföreningen, SAF) stated that there was no need for additional provisions. The two largest trade union confederations, on the other hand, recommended legislation.

Consequently the Government presented to Parliament on 12 March 1998 a proposal for a new act on leave for urgent family reasons in cases of sickness or accident making the employee's immediate presence indispensable. There should be no length-of-service qualification for entitlement and no notice period required, and the Government does not think that it is necessary to limit the leave to a certain amount of time. Nevertheless, it suggests that unions and employers' organisations should be able to conclude central collective agreements limiting the leave to a certain number of days per year or case, or both. An employer which violates the act will be liable to pay damages to the employee. The act is due to come into force on 3 June 1998.