It has been one of the slowest rules of the entire legislature and the one that has generated the most tensions in recent times in the heart of the Government, but it finally sees the light. The new Law on Families, approved this Tuesday by the Council of Ministers, is one of the great milestones for the Ministry of Social Rights, commanded by the leader of Podemos, Ione Belarra, who seeks to “expand” the rights of families and recognize the “diversity” that today defines the idea of ??family.
“The concept of family is not limited to families of matrimonial origin,” says the text of the law, approved by the Council of Ministers in the second round and which is now on the path of parliamentary processing. Thus, the standard has been designed as a “response” to the social reality of our country, with the aim of “ensuring equal rights for the different types of families and the protection of family diversity” through new permits, equalization or the elimination of concepts such as “large family”, which is now included in a new category, called “families with the greatest need for parenting support”, along with other cases.
The norm recognizes the existence of numerous family models beyond the traditional ones of matrimonial origin. The CGPJ, as EL MUNDO reports this Tuesday, puts the number of different types at 20 and warns the Government that they can generate “confusion, legal uncertainty and inequality” by overlapping certain cases and “exceeding the constitutional framework.”
In the count made by the Judiciary, based on the text of the Belarra law, two-parent, single-parent or single-parent families, young people (under 29 years of age), LGTBI homoparental or homoparental families, families with greater needs for parenting support are included. (current large families), families in which there is only one parent, families in which there are people with disabilities and/or in a situation of dependency, multiple families (in which there are multiple births, adoptions or fostering), families in which produce adoptions or foster care, or reconstituted families (with children from previous relationships).
Also families residing in rural areas, immigrant families, transnational families, intercultural families, families abroad, returned families, families in vulnerable situations, single people, people united in marriage, or common-law couples.
“People must be able to form the families they decide, if they want to, and they must choose who they want to share their lives with. And the institutions will be there to accompany them, to protect them and to support them,” Minister Belarra said in this regard.
The redefinition of family types is not the only novelty provided by the Social Rights standard. One of the great achievements of which Ione Belarra’s department boasts is the equalization between marriages and common-law couples in terms of access to the 15 days of permission for registration that to date had only those who had contracted a union matrimonial.
With this measure, they highlight from the Executive, it will be possible to “practically culminate” the equality between those people united by a marriage and common-law couples.
Another of the advances represented by the approval of the law is the introduction of a paid leave of five days a year to care for relatives up to the second degree or cohabitants, which can be used in the event of a serious accident or illness, hospitalization or surgical intervention. without hospitalization that needs rest.
There are other permits: an eight-week parental leave is included, which can be enjoyed continuously or discontinuously, full or part-time, until the minor turns 8 years old. This permission, in this case, is not paid.
A third permit has also been designed, useful for cases of “force majeure,” explains the ministry, to care for a family member immediately, due to, for example, a sudden illness or accident. It can be used by the hour until you use a total of four days a year.
One of the most controversial points of the law has been the elimination of the concept of large family and the inclusion of this category within a new one, baptized as “families with greater needs for parenting support.” A name change that is not shared by large families, whose associations have already threatened to demonstrate against the norm.
With the approval of the text, single-parent families with two children will also be considered in this way. Also families with two children where an ascendant or descendant has a disability; families with two children headed by a victim of gender violence or by a spouse who has obtained sole guardianship and custody without the right to maintenance, as well as families with two children in which one parent is undergoing hospital treatment for a year or has entered prison.
In the same way, families that until now were considered large in the general category, such as those with four children, instead of five as up to now, will be considered “family with the greatest needs for support for upbringing in a special category.” This range will also include those with three children in case of multiple births, instead of four as at present, and families with three children and low income -up to 150% of the Multiple Effects Public Income Indicator ( Iprem)-.
On the other hand, the parenting income expands to new situations. In this way, the aid of 100 euros per month for families with children up to three years of age will be structurally guaranteed. The extension executed by the Government includes all mothers who are receiving an unemployment benefit, contributory or not. Also to those who, without previously meeting the requirements, contribute 30 days from the date of delivery.
According to the criteria of The Trust Project