Netball Australia reveal new parental leave policy for staff

Netball Australia has revealed a new parental leave policy to better support employees and their families, including paid parental leave up to 18 weeks for primary carers.

Under the new policy, entitlements for primary carers have significantly increased from eight to 18 weeks.

The additional support has also been extended to secondary carers, with paid secondary carer leave increasing from two to six weeks.

In a key change to the policy, Netball Australia now provides provisions for child and support person travel for primary carers. Any employee who is the primary carer for a child aged younger than 24 months who is required to travel for work purposes domestically or internationally will have the travel costs covered for a child and a carer.

Netball is the leading sport for women and girls, which is reflected in its workforce with 76 per cent of Netball Australia staff identifying as female.

Advising of the move, Netball Australia Chief Executive, Kelly Ryan stated “we want to ensure we are fully supporting our return-to-work parents and their families.

“Netball has a leading parental leave policy for Suncorp Super Netball and Diamonds athletes, and we are delighted it now extends to our staff.

“Our parental leave benefits have been enhanced to increase paid primary and secondary parental leave, while making progressive changes towards levelling the gender pay gap.

“This policy entitles staff to the same provisions as professional athletes, including supporting employees who are primary carers of young children and required to travel.”

Key aspects of the policy include:

• Increased paid parental leave for primary carers from eight to 18 weeks

• Increased paid parental leave for secondary carers from two to six weeks

• Five days fertility leave per year

• Increased paid surrogacy leave from four to eight weeks