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"content": "Most importantly, the International Labour Organisation (ILO) recognises that adoption leave is important for a worker’s ability to reconcile work and family life. If you go through adoption – I have not gone through the process personally but I have interacted with people who have gone through the process – it is a tedious process. In fact, the way the law is today, even in surrogacy where someone carries your egg and gives birth, you have to go through the adoption process to call that child legally yours. That is how the law is. We have so many women and families suffering out there because you cannot legally adopt your child. Even if you do and you adopt a one day old child, you will not get maternity or paternity leave by law. In fact, if you tell an employer that you plan to adopt a child, they will ask you: “How do we know?” At least when you are going to give birth, they see you pregnant and they know that, of course, in nine months, you will give birth. In terms of adoption, even if you go through the rigorous process the way it is today and an order is granted by the court, you still cannot get a leave by law. In fact, such an individual is at the mercy of the employer. As Sen. Wangari, I may decide that I will be magnanimous and give you a few days. Whether a child is one day, six months or twelve years, whatever the age, you do not get even a single day by law. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, this Bill, therefore, seeks to correct this problem. We recognise that in the last five years, we have completed about 1,000 adoptions. As we were doing our public participation, we visited one adoption agency. The statistics from the adoption agency; Thomas Barnado’s Children’s Home along Lang’ata Road, show that there were about 100 or 200 successful adoptions. Others, of course, are in the process and others are still going through verifications. That, therefore, means that if we have five fully registered adoption agencies in the country, we are talking about say, 1000 adoptions every year. These children will need care from their adoptive parents. We even spoke to parents who are going through this process and you cannot imagine what they are going through because employers just quote The Employment Act and say that you do not have a right and you cannot demand for it because you have not given birth. That is what we need to correct because the Constitution does not segregate children. When it says that children must be taken care of, it does not matter whether you gave birth to them or you adopted them. It means they need the necessary care and guidance at whatever age in order to become productive members of the community and society. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, several issues arose as we went through this Bill. I know we will be deliberating on them at the Committee Stage, so, I do not want to preempt debate. One of the issues that was thoroughly canvassed--- In fact, the way this Bill is, we had indicated that the amount and number of days that you get as maternity or paternity leave depend on the age of the child. The thinking was, initially when we look at biological parents, the granted maternity leave by law is three months after birth. At that time, we tend to assume that all a child needs is breastfeeding. However, we have come to realise that you need more of that connection than just breastfeeding. You will be in a situation where you adopt a child who is one or two months old. By the time they start speaking, probably at two years of age, they call the house-girl “mum” and you “auntie.” Those are the situations we are living with. That The electronic version of the Senate Hansard Report is for information purposes"
}