Supreme Court has recognized this Friday the right of single-parent families headed by public employees to extend leave for the birth of a child from 16 to 26 weeks to avoid discrimination against the newborn.
The Fourth Section of the Contentious-Administrative Chamber has issued a ruling in which it recognizes that this is the interpretation that must be given to the permit regulated in the Public Personnel Statute, a decision that comes after the appeal of a teacher from Valladolid to the who rejected her request to add to her maternity leave of 16 weeks las 10 remaining that would correspond to the other parent (the other 6 must be enjoyed jointly immediately after birth).
A Contentious-Administrative court ruled in favor of the mother, understanding that applying the current regulations to a single two-parent family model was clearly discriminatory, but the Superior Court of Justice of Castilla-León annulled said ruling.
The debate on the extension of birth permits in these cases has caused disparity of criteria in the Chambers and in the different Superior Courts of Justicebut now the Supreme Court ruling has decided to prioritize the interest of newborn minors to avoid “the appearance of any form of discrimination due to birth, and any other personal or social condition or circumstance, depending on whether they were born in a type or another family”.
“The type of family cannot determine the difference in treatment, so that someone born in a single-parent family will enjoy family care, attention and protection (established in article 68 of the Civil Code) for a much shorter time, 16 weeks, than If he had been born in a two-parent family, he would have 26 weeks,” says Judge Pilar Teso’s presentation.
Until now, the only case of a single-parent family that the law has expressly regulated is that caused by the death of the mother, which does allow the sum of the leave of both parents.
However, the Supreme Court ruling will not affect, in principle, single-parent households whose heads of family are not public employees, whose situation is pending resolution in the Constitutional Court, before which there are several appeals filed.