Family-friendly science
We need to encourage working fathers to take on more childcare responsibilities
As a society, we remain very far from equality in terms of parental and caring responsibilities. Although there is UK legislation for shared parental leave, the current take-up among fathers is shockingly low. Indeed, the 2017 Royal Society of Chemistry pay and reward survey showed that amongst members, of all those taking leave for childcare of any sort, 95% were women and only 5% were men. National UK surveys also show that on average, women spend more than twice as much time providing childcare than men, and the data also indicate that women take on the majority of other caring roles, such as for elderly or sick relatives, as well as doing 60% more housework than men.