Fathers group calls for major overhaul of paternity leave policy

Ot­to Car­ring­ton

Se­nior Re­porter

ot­to.car­ring­[email protected]

Rhon­dall Fee­les, pres­i­dent of the Fa­thers As­so­ci­a­tion of Trinidad and To­ba­go (FATT), has is­sued a call to the Gov­ern­ment and the labour move­ment to leg­is­late sub­stan­tial pa­ter­ni­ty leave of eight to 12 weeks, ar­gu­ing that mean­ing­ful parental rights for men are long over­due.

Fee­les was speak­ing at a col­lab­o­ra­tive “Hike and Plant” event in Williamsville, where vol­un­teers, young cou­ples and fam­i­lies plant­ed more than 100 seedlings in a sym­bol­ic lega­cy-build­ing ex­er­cise.

He high­light­ed what he de­scribed as a long­stand­ing gap in labour rights for fa­thers in T&T, not­ing that de­spite men be­ing part of the work­force for more than a cen­tu­ry, their le­gal rights as par­ents re­main lim­it­ed.

“Men have been a part of the labour force for the last 129 years, yet they still have not been able to ob­tain mean­ing­ful parental rights,” Fee­les said.

“Cur­rent­ly, what men have is a two-to-three-day CPO (Chief Per­son­nel Of­fi­cer) di­rec­tion for per­ma­nent em­ploy­ment. We are say­ing it is time for leg­is­lat­ed op­por­tu­ni­ty leave of an eq­ui­table na­ture so that men can be a part of their chil­dren’s lives.”

Fee­les cit­ed sci­en­tif­ic re­search on pa­ter­nal bond­ing, ref­er­enc­ing stud­ies on neu­ro­plas­tic­i­ty from the Uni­ver­si­ty of South­ern Cal­i­for­nia con­duct­ed by Dr Dar­by Sax­by and Dr Lau­ra Cár­de­nas. The re­search sug­gests that the male brain un­der­goes mea­sur­able changes and is “trained” to­ward im­proved par­ent­ing when fa­thers are grant­ed ear­ly and mean­ing­ful in­ter­ac­tion with new­borns.

“It takes more than go­ing on a podi­um to­mor­row for Fa­ther’s Day and say­ing, ‘Men, be bet­ter fa­thers,’” Fee­les said. “It takes gov­ern­ment and lead­er­ship to do what is nec­es­sary to sup­port fa­thers through the brain train­ing of fa­ther­hood in­to their male cy­cle of life.”

The FATT leader al­so called on labour unions to ad­vo­cate for pa­ter­ni­ty leave with the same in­ten­si­ty ap­plied to oth­er in­dus­tri­al re­la­tions is­sues.

“We are the fa­thers’ ad­vo­cate, yes, but for years men have stood by your side. Men make up about 80 to 90 per cent of your mem­ber­ship,” he said, urg­ing unions to sup­port a manda­to­ry eight to 12 weeks of pa­ter­nal leave in the work­place.

The event, mark­ing the sec­ond year of col­lab­o­ra­tion be­tween FATT and the Hike and Plant ini­tia­tive, saw strong com­mu­ni­ty par­tic­i­pa­tion.

Fee­les ex­pressed grat­i­tude to res­i­dents of Williamsville, co­or­di­na­tor Shahzad Mo­hammed, and a lo­cal mosque that pro­vid­ed park­ing fa­cil­i­ties for pa­trons.

He al­so spoke about the of­ten un­seen emo­tion­al and phys­i­cal re­spon­si­bil­i­ties car­ried by male heads of house­holds, who bal­ance the roles of dis­ci­pli­nar­i­an and pro­tec­tor.

He urged chil­dren to show ap­pre­ci­a­tion for their fa­thers re­gard­less of fi­nan­cial cir­cum­stances.

“Let them know you care, let them know you love them, let them know that you ap­pre­ci­ate all that he does for you—whether he could buy a gift for you or bring a co­conut for you on a day you don’t have the mon­ey to buy a gift,” Fee­les said.

“That is what fa­thers need to feel in their fam­i­ly: seen and ap­pre­ci­at­ed. To feel as though they ex­ist.”