Parents of children under the age of 17 gained the right to request, as promised by the government in 2007 and recommended by the Walsh Review in 2008.
On 6 November 2007, the Prime Minister Tony Blair announced that the Government would extend the right to request to parents of older children. He asked Imelda Walsh, HR Director of J Sainsbury plc, to conduct a review of the question of where the age cut-off age should be set. Imelda Walsh made recommendations to the Secretary of State in the spring of 2008.
In addition to considering whether to extend the right to request, and if so, to what age (she considered and rejected up to age 18), Imelda Walsh also considered calls to make the right to request a day one right, in other words, to do away with the requirement that an employee had to have worked for the same employer for at least 26 weeks in order to be able to make a request. She recommended retaining the 26 week qualifying period because, she said, “Employers believe that trust is crucial for flexible working to be a success – and trust is something which can only develop over time. For a sensible conversation about flexible working possibilities to be held, both employer and employee need to have a shared understanding of the role and what is feasible. I do not think such a conversation can be held from the outset of an employee’s period of employment”. p16 Walsh Report