‘Work-life balance’ is not a very old concept. It emerged as a social policy aim in the 1970s to reconcile family life with work life.

Today, we speak more broadly about work-life balance, understanding that work hours should be balanced with family life as well as with education, training and community life. In short, working individuals in the EU are entitled to seek fulfilment in their personal time too, including through leisure activities.

But the concept of work-life balance deals with a more fundamental inequality that pervades societies.

The EU treaties empower us to work in favour of equalising the opportunities for both men and women to enter the labour market and hold down a job. This means working to reduce pay gaps and disparities in employment, work and training opportunities on the basis of sex.

The Work-Life Balance Directive describes the problems that it seeks to solve. The law as it stood incentivised mothers to remain out of work to raise their children, raising barriers for their return to work. Without guarantees of parental leave, fathers had no incentive to participate in their children’s upbringing by taking time off work.

This reality is becoming less and less applicable today. One of the directive’s innovations is to cater for family arrangements that go beyond the traditional conception of the nuclear family.

This was done by design. Special attention was dedicated to ensuring that the directive holds firm against a fluctuating world where even concepts of work are malleable. This ensures that issues are tackled as they arise and the rights provided by the directive do not falter at the first hurdle.

In this spirit, I could not agree more with the Times of Malta editorial ('Juggling with work-life balance’, August 5), which stated that “fathers who are not married should have the same rights as those who are”.

In fact, making paternity leave a right protected by EU law is one of the highlights of my legislative career in the European Parliament. After leading the negotiations, we managed to secure what Elisa Chieregato hails as “the long-awaited right to paternity leave at the EU level” (‘A Work-Life Balance for All? Assessing the Inclusiveness of EU Directive 2019/1158’, International Journal of Comparative Labour Law and Industrial Relations).

The directive is also a battle won in the fight against gender inequality- David Casa

This right is dependent on the status of fatherhood or the second parent, in the case of same-sex couples. And while the parameters for this status remain a member state competence, it should be independent of the marital status of the parents. In Malta, registering a father when the parents aren’t married is a relatively simple process.

The directive does not stop at a minimum of 10 days of paternity leave. Parents each have four months of parental leave. With the new directive, two of these months must now be paid and non-transferable between parents.

We have lawfully guaranteed non-transferable parental leave, so that fathers are now more boldly empowered to participate in childbearing responsibilities. The directive creates legal protections for parents to share their parental responsibilities and achieve a healthier balance between professional and private life.

But the directive is also a battle won in the fight against gender inequality. Empowering fathers to participate in their child’s upbringing, by guaranteeing leave, lowers the barriers for women to reintegrate into the workforce following the arrival of a child. We anticipate that when the directive is fully transposed throughout the EU, fathers will take up their leave.

There were concerns from businesses that these rights would be detrimental to productivity. But happier, healthier workers are more productive. Importantly, the directive attracts women to seek or remain in employment after adoption or birth, something that will increase, not reduce, the workforce.

The directive is not perfect. There are valid criticisms that it does not go far enough or has slightly too many safeguards. But what it achieves is a massive step forward. Besides leave for parents, it protects leave for carers. It conveys the right to request more flexible arrangements for work, an indispensable tool in the age of the coronavirus.

The EU directive must be incorporated into national legislation across the EU by not later than August next year. But it only sets minimum standards. It is up to each government to decide whether to go even further. This is part of the debate we should be having in the run-up to the introduction of these rights.

The directive is a bold and innovative regime that protects workers and families. It offers rights for a more equitable, social Europe. I am proud to have done my part in delivering it for Maltese and European citizens.

David Casa was the European Parliament’s lead negotiator of the Work-Life  Balance Directive.