Maureen Freely: Why have children when you never see them?

The point of flexible working is not higher productivity or better staff retention - it's a better quality of life

It's been an open secret for at least a quarter of a century, but now, at last, it's official. According to a survey published yesterday by the Department of Trade and Industry, British parents want flexible working hours. They want them more than a company car or a modest salary hike; more even than free access to a gym.

Of the 4,000 men and women interviewed, almost half said that flexible working was the benefit they wanted most in their next job. Of those with children under six, 80 per cent said that when they were deciding whether to apply for a job, work/life balance was the single most important factor.

But the message just isn't getting through to employers; only 60 of the 10,000 posts advertised on the recruitment website used for the survey listed flexible working as a possible benefit. According to James Reed, whose website carried out the DTI-backed survey, this points to a serious gap between what employees want and need and what employers are prepared to offer them.

Patricia Hewitt, the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry, went on to point out, not for the first time, that we were not just talking female talent. For her the poll was proof "that getting a better work/life balance is becoming much more important for all employees; men as well as woman".

It was good for business, she went on to say. It was now "well-established" that businesses offering flexible working had a competitive edge over those that didn't bother. She's right; there is a huge and growing body of evidence showing that employees with sane and balanced working schedules are less stressed, more productive, and easier to retain. We'll be hearing a lot about this research in months to come, as the Government sets out to promote the new parental employment rights that will come into effect on 6 April.

Most of the new rights are not about flexitime. Rather, they're about taking small, clearly delineated blocks of time off work: the focus is on new parents and young children and the importance of giving them "the best possible start". So paid maternity leave is set to increase from 18 to 26 weeks. For the first time ever, fathers will be able to take two weeks of paid paternity leave within eight weeks of birth and adoption. Also for the first time ever, adoptive parents will have the right to unpaid parental leave.

This right has been in place for all other parents since December 1999, and it allows them to take up to 13 unpaid weeks off work during the first five years of a child's life. It's had very poor take-up, however. Apparently the Government is blaming this on "lack of awareness". And this, it seems, is why it has embarked on this new campaign to make sure that parents know about the one new right that has to do with flexible working.

By European standards, it's awfully puny. But as its proponents are always quick to point out, it's better than nothing at all. From 6 April, all parents with children under six and all parents with disabled children under 18 will have the right to ask for flexible working, and their employers will have the "duty to consider their requests seriously". Or, to put it differently, employers will be under pressure to change their ways.

But the onus will be on employees to do the pushing. If an employer, having seriously considered a request, decides that there is a strong case against it (because there's a war on, say, or because there's a global economic downturn), there is little that the employee can do. In other words, the new right is not really a right at all. It has no bite. The Government has promised to consider something more coercive in future if this approach fails. In the meantime, it's still hoping that lots of upbeat press releases will do the trick.

But if the gap between employees and employers is as wide as their own research suggests, it's going to take more than sweet persuasion to close it. It's all very well to make "the business case"; and the business case for work/life balance is very strong. But we're talking about working practices here. We're asking employers to make fundamental changes in the way they operate. And history shows us that employers tend not to make fundamental changes unless they have to. If the trade union movement had confined itself to the business case, we'd still have children working down the mines.

In Sweden, where they've been thinking about these issues very seriously for more than two decades, they dare to work on a broader canvas. They spell out their principles. So when they discuss changes in employment law, they don't lose themselves in the small print. They don't forget to ask themselves what it's all for.

So the point of flexible working is not higher productivity or better staff retention or even attracting the top talent. It's a better quality of life for parents and their children. It's about making sure that parents who want to be involved in the rearing of their children get a chance to do so without having to become second-class citizens at work. To state a principle is not the same as making it come true; even in Sweden, male take-up of parental leave lags way behind female take-up. But there, at least, they know where they're trying to go – and why.

This is not to say we never ask these questions here. There can't be a parent in the country who does not ask them daily. It's not just new parents who feel the crunch. The nine-to-five office job makes life hell for anyone with a school-age child. The standard professional nine-to-nine/10/11 job is, of course, even worse. Better, cheaper childcare facilities can fill some gaps, some of the time. But what happens when a child is ill, on holiday, disabled, distressed, in trouble at school? What happens if there's only one parent? The standard solution – the solution many schools and employers of my acquaintance promote – is for the "primary caretaker" to step out of the full-time workforce. Which is fine, perhaps, if you can afford it. But most families can't.

Sooner or later, most primary caretakers end up in the shadowy world of part-time, casual, short-contract employment. More often than not, they are women. The most recent figures from the Equal Opportunities Commission show that the pay gap is almost twice as wide for women working part-time as it is for women working full-time. Women in full employment earn 19 per cent per hour less than men; women in part-time jobs earn 40 per cent less. This doesn't just hurt them and their children, it also impacts on the parents, most of them men, who stay in full-time work. They have to work longer hours to make up the difference. And the more they work, they less time they have with their families. Et ita ad infinitum.

But why have children if you never get a chance to see them? What's the point of having a family if all it does is sink you into stress and debt? And why is it always the parents who have to do the adjusting? There are so many different forms of flexible working. Properly negotiated, and properly supported by principled legislation, they benefit employers as much as they do employees.

But the most important benefits are not in the profit margins. It's about more time with our families, more time with our friends. Time to enjoy life, time to remember what it's all for. Time for the Government to show more leadership in this debate. Time, I think, to put the business case to bed.

mfreely@rosebud.u-net.com