Sorry i was mistaken, it is two weeks for your wife, but she must tell her employers 28days before her return that this is the case. Unfortunately in your respect men cannot transfer the maternity leave over to themselves as yet this is under discussion at the moment. You do however qualfy for either 1 or 2 weeks depending on your employer and this is paid at £117.18 a week or if your lucky full pay again dependent on the employer. YOu might be best looking into whether your child tax credits would increase by you not earning compared to you earning to see if this would pay for you come out of work, then you could ask for a leave of absence. Hope this makes sense,

That's not quite correct, it is 2 weeks that your wife would have to be off not 6. 6 weeks is the length of time she will earn 90% salary.

At the moment this isn't the case. your wife is not allowed to return to work until 6weeks unfortunately. The government are looking into this but i don' think it'll change till 2010. You could go to the government website for more info.

Hi, As a future father.I would like to be the one taking maternity leave instead of my partner.She would like to take two weeks off work and then return to work.Is it possible for a father to take 6 months maternity leave, and if so, would my employer have to pay for that or would he be able to claim it back from the government.