“I had to make a choice between bonding with my new daughter, or paying the bills,” says Jason Walton, who became a father in early 2020.
He was working as a self-employed landscaping subcontractor at the time, which meant there was no paternity pay.
His only option was to take a week off work, unpaid, before heading back “with a heavy heart” to the daily grind – a decision which he now believes cost him his relationship.
“If you’re self-employed and you can’t do your job, then you don’t get paid, it’s simple as that,” he says.
New research from Graeme Downie MP and campaign group The Dad Shift reveals 942,000 self-employed fathers are paying a whopping £1.1 billion in National Insurance contributions each year, while receiving nothing back in paternity leave or support when a new baby arrives.
The UK’s statutory paternity leave offers new fathers two weeks off at £184.03 a week. But this offer is unavailable for self-employed dads, though self-employed mothers are eligible for 39 weeks of maternity allowance.
On The Tools, the UK’s largest online construction community, polled 2,000 electricians, builders, plumbers and other tradespeople and found one in three tradesmen (30%) didn’t take any time off at all when their last child was born.
Additionally, 55% said they found it difficult to support their family while making a living.
More than half (53%) felt unsafe at work due to exhaustion after the arrival of a new baby, and 47% said they’d struggled to support their partner.
Discussing what it was like to return to work just one week after having a baby, Walton recalls: “Doing groundwork in a heavy clay, soaking-wet garden isn’t easy, especially with only a couple of hours broken sleep under your belt.
“It was so tough. Using heavy machinery, laying slabs. All whilst being completely exhausted and at the end of my nerve. All with the knowledge that you’ve no choice but to get on with it.”
The dad says it damaged his experience of being a new dad, and also caused “a long-lasting rift” in his relationship, which ultimately ended.
“We just could never find our ‘happy’ again,” he adds.
Tom Windle, a self-employed landscaper with two children aged two and six years old, says he’s “still suffering the repercussions of not having any paid paternity leave”.
His first child was born five weeks early via emergency c-section, which Windle explains meant his wife was bed-bound for around six weeks. Neither of them could work during this time and the consequences were huge.
“As both husband and father, it was my duty to step up and make sure they were both looked after. But that meant I couldn’t work. I couldn’t afford to actually live and look after my family,” he says.
“Six years down the line, I’ve now got another child, and both children are happy and healthy. But, sadly, we’re still suffering the repercussions of two months off work for both me and my wife. We still struggle financially to make ends meet.”
Windle says his return to work after the birth of his first child was “difficult” because he was “mentally, physically, and emotionally exhausted”.
“I wasn’t myself; I was a shadow of a man,” he adds.
Both he and his wife were also navigating the grips of postnatal depression which culminated in Windle trying to take his own life.
“Finances play a huge part in mental health, and being forced into a situation where we couldn’t work – not because we hadn’t planned, but because the pregnancy and birth ended so dramatically – mean’t we weren’t prepared,” he says.
“Both my wife and I have struggled massively with mental health ever since.”
For both fathers, the answer is simple: we need to offer paternity pay for self-employed dads – and better paternity pay for fathers in general, as the UK’s paternity leave offering is one of the worst in Europe.
“Parents and fathers in particular should be helped out a lot more,” says Windle, “because it’s not just about the money, it’s about the precious time spent with your family … It’s important to make those bonds, and be there for one another.”
When HuffPost UK contacted the government about this, a spokesperson for the Department of Business and Trade said: “We are making paternity leave and unpaid parental leave day one rights as part of our Employment Rights Bill, and are also carrying out a review of wider statutory parental leave to ensure it offers the best possible support to working families.
“We recognise the issues raised. However, the current parental leave system focuses on supporting employed parents who need specific protections, while self-employed people have more flexibility and autonomy over when and how they work and the time they can have off.”
According to On The Tools, 84% of tradespeople polled believe paying National Insurance contributions while not receiving any paternity support is “unfair”.
What’s more, 80% agreed that giving fathers a decent amount of properly paid paternity leave would prove politicians’ support for working families, and 69% would be more likely to vote for a party that offered fathers, including self-employed dads, that support.
George Gabriel, co-founder of The Dad Shift, said: “Self-employed dads have every reason to be furious. This is about decent working blokes who pay their way and don’t get even the measly support they should be entitled to.
“If Labour want to prove they’re on the side of working families they can start by closing this loophole, one which leaves self-employed dads shelling out £1.1 billion a year without a penny back when their babies arrive.
“Every parent knows how expensive it is when a child arrives. Making self-employed dads shell out over a grand in NICs [National Insurance contributions] while they choose between heading straight back to work so they can provide financially or spending the time they need with their new babies and recovering partners – honestly, it takes the piss.”
As for Windle, he firmly believes that had he received some financial support during that difficult time after the birth of his first child, things might be different now.
“I don’t think I would have struggled with my mental health in the same way, nor my wife: a lot of her postnatal depression included feeling helpless or incapable of looking after our baby. If I had been there more freely, or had been more financially capable, neither of us would have felt like that,” he reflects.
“Those first couple of years with a new child would have been enjoyable and peaceful and lovely memories. Instead, it was quite a traumatic time for all of us.”
Help and support:
- Mind, open Monday to Friday, 9am-6pm on 0300 123 3393.
- Samaritans offers a listening service which is open 24 hours a day, on 116 123 (UK and ROI – this number is FREE to call and will not appear on your phone bill).
- CALM (the Campaign Against Living Miserably) offer a helpline open 5pm-midnight, 365 days a year, on 0800 58 58 58, and a webchat service.
- The Mix is a free support service for people under 25. Call 0808 808 4994 or email help@themix.org.uk
- Rethink Mental Illness offers practical help through its advice line which can be reached on 0808 801 0525 (Monday to Friday 10am-4pm). More info can be found on rethink.org.
