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50% of working mothers have not been wholly successful in requesting flexible working

A Trade Union Congress (TUC) recently collaborated with online parenting portal Mother Pukka to conduct a study on flexible working.

The report, ‘Denied and discriminated against’, found that 50% of almost 13,000 working mothers who took part in the study had had their flexible working requests either rejected or only partially accepted by their employer.

42% of women stated they were reluctant to request flexible working because they were concerned about how their employer would react. In fact, they did not want to make a flexible working request if their request could just be rejected.

Of those women who were working flexibly, 86% specified that they had experienced workplace discrimination and felt disadvantaged following their decision to choose flexible working.

The TUC have advocated that every job advertisement should refer to the legal right to request flexible working. The government is holding a consultation on this point, amongst other reform proposals for flexible working.