Forum Brief: Work-life balance

Flexible hours and other "family friendly" employment policies are of limited help to working mothers if their work spills over too much into their home life or they feel overloaded and under stress while at work, according to a report for the Joseph Rowntree Foundation.

A spokesman for the DTI told ePolitix.com: "Helping working parents - men as well as women - balance work and family life is a key issue facing our economy and our society.

"Many businesses are already adopting work life balance practices, and seeing real benefits as a result."The government has implemented a range of measures to support working parents - since April this year, parents of children under 6 and disabled children under 18 have had the right to request flexible working. New mothers can now take 6 months paid maternity leave, with another 6 months unpaid if they want it, and new fathers get 2 weeks paid paternity leave for the first time.

"These measures offer more choice and support than ever before to balance work and family life. Now we need parents themselves to take charge of the agenda, to challenge and change their working patterns."

Forum Response: Joseph Rowntree Foundation

Tracey Reynolds, a research fellow and co-author of the report, said: "This was a small-scale study, but our findings do highlight how stresses in family relationships can arise as much from the quality of time spent at work by mothers as the amount of time they spend at work.

"Family-friendly workplace policies and practices may have helped some of the mothers we interviewed to modify their time schedules, but they were ineffective in helping them to deal with the stresses of paid work and the strains that they placed on family relationships."

Forum Response: Usdaw

Sir Bill Connor, general secretary of shopworkers' union Usdaw, told ePolitix.com: "Usdaw has always campaigned for improved rights for working parents, particularly relating to work-life balance issues.

"Such rights are crucial in today's labour market; to help parents off benefits and back into work and to meet the recruitment requirements of companies.

"We share JRF's concerns that some of the existing rights are, in practice, not available to lower paid workers. That is why Usdaw is campaigning for the right to paid time-off to care for dependents and paid parental leave.

"A recent Usdaw survey of working parents shows that over half of our members could not afford to take time-off without pay.

"Usdaw very much welcomes the government introducing new rights to help with work/life balance issues, but we will continue to campaign for paid rightsfor all working parents."

Forum Response: Institute of Directors

A spokesman for the IoD told ePolitix.com: "Everyone should be able to balance their work lives and home and family lives satisfactorily. British employers know this and are some of the most flexible in the world.

"Survey evidence shows that most employees are satisfied with their workplace and see work as a positive part of their lives."