Women had only slightly more childcare responsibilities (41,701) than men (40,452) in 2018 but enjoyed more flexibility at work, a newly-released National Statistics Office publication has shown.

The 2018 Labour Force Survey analysed how adults aged 18 to 64 with care responsibilities reconciled work and family life.

It found that while women with care responsibilities worked an average of 34.3 hours per week, men worked eight hours more.

Almost one in five females reduced their working time, whereas 12.7 per cent of males looked for ways to increase their income.

Titled Reconciliation between work and family life, the publication states that one in every three employees with care responsibilities reported flexible working arrangements (32.8 per cent).

A larger share of women (56.2 per cent) had the possibility to vary the start and end of their working day when compared to their male counterparts (40.6 per cent).

More females reported flexibility in organising their working time to take whole days off (41.1 per cent females as opposed to 31.2 per cent males), and teleworking arrangements were used by more females (17.4 per cent) than males (11.4 per cent).

Long hours and caring for relatives

Long working hours (21.8 per cent) were the most common obstacle for reconciliating work and family life, according to the detailed analysis.

It ​shows that more than a quarter of persons in the 18-64 age bracket took care of children under 15 years of age (26.4 per cent), while 3.5 per cent took care of ill, elderly, or disabled relatives, 2.1 per cent reported multi-generational care responsibilities, while the remaining 68 per cent did not have any.

On average, persons with childcare responsibilities were 39 years old, while those with ill, elderly, or disabled care responsibilities were 48.

The majority of persons with care responsibilities were employed (78.2 per cent), 20.4 per cent were inactive and a further 1.4 per cent were unemployed.

One in every four persons with childcare responsibilities used childcare services; the majority arranged care alone or with their partner (60.2 per cent), while for 12.7 per cent, children could take care of themselves.

Nearly 12 per cent of persons with childcare responsibilities had informal support, namely grandparents’ help (11.6 per cent).

​The majority of persons aged between 18 and 64 stated that despite being employed and having children they did not take a career break (66.1 per cent).