Dear Kate Hepher

La Leche League Great Britain is a member of the Breastfeeding Manifesto’s coalition. As a charity whose aim is to support breastfeeding mothers, we are pleased to see that the Single Equality Bill addresses Objective 5 of the manifesto to protect a mother’s right to breastfeed in public places. We have some suggestions to make on the legislation to ensure that it achieves its aims.

The Bill proposes that the definition of ‘maternity’ be 52 weeks, which means that a mother who breastfeeds a child older than one year is not protected.

The World Health Organisation’s Global Strategy on Infant and Young Child Feeding recommends breastfeeding for two years and beyond. Evidence based research has established that while breastfeeding is the primary source of nutrition during the first 12 months, it takes between two and six years for a child's immune system to mature fully and breast milk continues to complement and boost the immune system for as long as it is offered.

We call on the government to remove the time constraint in the definition of ‘maternity’ in order to protect a mother’s right to breastfeed her child irrespective of its age, for the benefit of the child’s health and to encourage greater social acceptance of the important and natural practice of breastfeeding. Not to remove this cut-off point of 52 weeks would amount to a declaration by the Government that there is no value in breastfeeding beyond 12 months, which is readily refuted.

We ask the Government to use the new legislation to protect the rights of breastfeeding mothers in the workplace and to implement Objective 4 of the Breastfeeding Manifesto to work with employers to create a supportive environment for breastfeeding mothers. Current Health and Safety Executive legislation leaves many mothers unprotected.

The recent infant feeding survey (2005), commissioned by the Government, found that only 14% of mothers said their employers offered facilities for them to express breast milk and that, from four months, returning to work was the second most common reason given for stopping breastfeeding. In order to increase breastfeeding rates among working mothers and to protect child health, better protection and support of breastfeeding at work is required.

Employees who continue to breastfeed when they return to the workplace have fewer absences than those who do not breastfeed because breastfed babies have fewer incidences of illness than formula fed infants. It is therefore in everyone’s interests to provide the necessary facilities and opportunities to express breast milk that allow the employee to continue breastfeeding once she is back at work.

I do hope that you will consider these points. Please do not hesitate to contact me if you would like me to provide references for the research to which I have referred.

I look forward to hearing from you

Yours sincerely

Barbara Higham for La Leche League Great Britain