Parents taking time off to support their children through stressful times in their lives such as exams is reported to be a growing trend. For example, a May 2025 survey by MyEdSpace suggested seven in 10 parents had taken time off to help their children revise for their GCSEs.
Subject to certain conditions, employed birth and adoptive parents, and those who have or expect to have responsibility for a child, have a statutory right to take parental leave, which is unpaid time off work to look after children up to the age of 18, so in theory teen-ternity leave could fall into this category.
Currently, employees must have at least one year’s service to qualify. The Employment Rights Bill, which is working its way through Parliament, is set to change this so that parental leave will become a day-one right.
This right entitles each parent to take up to 18 weeks of parental leave per child. There are some limits on how this leave can be taken. For example, it must be taken before the child turns 18, it can only be used in weekly blocks and no more than four weeks can be taken per year, per child. In some circumstances, employers are also able to delay the taking of leave by parents for up to six months.
This is different to other types of parental time off that employees may be entitled to, such as maternity, paternity, adoption and shared parental leave, for which parents are usually entitled to some statutory pay.
Some employers might offer pay for parental leave, however employers are not obligated to pay their employees for this type of time off. It will be a consideration of a person’s contractual or company policy entitlement rather than a statutory obligation.
Therefore, parents who are thinking of taking teen-ternity leave should check their contract of employment and company policies to see if they are entitled to be paid.
As there seems to be a growing trend towards parents taking time off to support older children, it may be that employers in some industries, particularly those where there is strong competition for talent, may start to offer paid teen-ternity leave as one of their perks of employment.
Sarah Jackman is an employment lawyer at Dentons
