Family-friendly reform of employment law in the UK: an overstretched flexibility

This paper provides a critical assessment of the family-friendly reform of employment law in the UK. It begins with the analysis of the EU policies on work-life balance as the important context of the reform in the UK. The second part of the paper provides and outline of the family-friendly provisions introduced by the Labour and Coalition Governments between 1997 and 2015 and investigates the rationale behind the reform. The paper questions the consistency of the approach to the family-friendly reform of employment law adopted by the Labour and Coalition governments. It argues that the economic rationale has underpinned the flexibility aspect of family-friendly agenda in both EU and UK policies. In its final part, the paper analyses the flaws in the regulation of family-friendly entitlements and argues that, without proper incentives and guarantees, the reform is unlikely to provide working parents and carers with a real choice and flexibility.