WOMEN and their partners should be entitled to paid bereavement leave if they experience a miscarriage, MPs have recommended.

Sick leave is an “inappropriate and inadequate form of employer support” for couples after such a pregnancy loss, the women and equalities committee said.

While statutory parental bereavement leave has been available since April 2020 for stillbirths after 24 weeks, there is no provision for pre-24-week pregnancy losses.

The committee said an estimated more than one in five pregnancies end before 24 weeks, with between 10 per cent and 20 per cent of pregnancies ending in the first 12 weeks.

MPs acknowledged that a “growing number of employers have specific pregnancy loss leave and pay policies,” including NHS Trusts, but said there remain “very substantial gaps in provision.”

The committee said it intends to put forward amendments to the Employment Rights Bill.

A Department for Business and Trade spokesperson said the Bill would “establish a new right to bereavement leave, make paternity and parental leave a day-one right, and strengthen protections for pregnant women and new mothers returning to work.”