Good news for new parents employed by insurance company Aviva. Both moms and dads are now entitled to 16 weeks paid parental leave.

But Aviva's policy is more progressive than most Singaporean companies or public organisations, as it also announced that this would apply to employees regardless of gender, sexual orientation or marital status.

It also covers adopted kids.

The only requirement is that you had to be employed for a minimum of three months continuous service.

Announcing the new perk for its employees on Nov. 24, Aviva said:

"Effective as of 19 November 2017, the new policy offers sixteen weeks parental leave at full pay within the first twelve months of a child’s arrival. It applies to all Singapore-based permanent Aviva employees regardless of gender, nationality, sexual orientation, marital status, and covers both birth and / or adoption. Employees welcoming a new child twice within a year are entitled to sixteen weeks of parental leave each time, which can be utilised within a year of the arrival of each child."

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International intiative

The key entitlements include:

• Sixteen weeks paternity / maternity leave at full pay.
• Includes employees across all levels of the company.
• If both parents are employees of Aviva, they will each have their own entitlement to leave and pay, which they can take at the same time.
• No limit on the number of new children.
• In addition to Aviva's existing parental leave policy, like 4 weeks Shared Parental Leave.

The policy is in line with a Group-wide initiative, rolled out in Singapore as well as U.K., Ireland, France, and Canada. There are also plans to extend the policy to other countries where Aviva has a presence in 2018.

According to Aviva, their aim is to create a diverse and inclusive working culture in which barriers to career progression are removed.

Government parental leave

In Nov. 2016, Parliament amended the Child Development Co-Savings Act. Effective from Jan. 1, 2017, eligible working fathers were entitled to two weeks paid paternity leave, funded by the government.

However, this came with the caveat that the father in question needed to be lawfully married to the child's mother between conception and birth -- a caveat which Aviva's policy does not include.

That's pretty progressive.

Top image from Pixabay.

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