The Bill on Amendments to the Social Services Law and Certain Other Laws has been adopted and enacted by the General Assembly of the Grand National Assembly of Türkiye.
The new amendments to maternity leave provisions
introduced by the law are as follows:
- Under the current regulation, maternity leave for female employees is 16 weeks in total, consisting of 8 weeks before birth and 8 weeks after birth. Following the said amendment, this period has been extended to 24 weeks in total, comprising 8 weeks before birth and 16 weeks after birth. While the pre-birth leave period remains unchanged, the post-birth leave period has been increased by 8 weeks.
-Regarding work during the pre-birth period, under the previous regulation, employees could work up until the last 3 weeks before childbirth upon certification of medical fitness by a doctor’s report. Under the new regulation, this period has been reduced to 2 weeks. With this change, the portion of leave that can be transferred to the postnatal period has been increased.
- For those who had given birth on the date the law entered into force, whose current maternity leave had already ended but who had not yet completed the 24-week period from the date of birth, an additional maternity leave of up to 8 weeks will be granted upon request.
- For private sector employees, paternity leave granted in the event of a spouse’s childbirth, which was previously 5 days, has been increased to 10 days under the new regulation, aligning it with the entitlement of civil servants.
- For civil servants, a provision has been introduced granting 10 days of leave upon request following the placement of a child with foster families.
In the explanatory memorandum of the bill, the purpose of extending maternity leave is stated as protecting the mother and child during the postnatal period, supporting the mother’s physical recovery process, ensuring the healthy continuation of breastfeeding, and strengthening the early-stage care of the child.
Within the same law, amendments have also been introduced to Law Nr. 5651 on the Regulation of Publications Made on the Internet and Combating Crimes Committed Through Such Publications, as follows:
- The definitions section of Law Nr. 5651 has been amended by adding the terms “game,” “game provider,” and “game distributor,” thereby bringing the digital gaming ecosystem within the scope of regulation.
- Social network providers have been required not to offer services to children under the age of 15 and to implement necessary measures, including age verification, to ensure compliance. In addition, they are obliged to take the necessary steps to provide separate, age-appropriate services for children aged 15 and above.
- Social network providers have been made obliged to offer parental control tools. These tools are required to include mechanisms such as control of account settings, parental approval for paid transactions, and monitoring and/or limiting usage time.
- For social network providers with more than 10 million daily access users from Türkiye, a new rule has been introduced requiring immediate compliance with urgent decisions issued under Article 8/A of Law Nr. 5651, and in any case within a maximum of one hour.
- For social network providers with more than 10 million daily users from Türkiye, an obligation has been introduced to take necessary measures to prevent the re-publication on the platform of content that has previously been subject to removal and/or access blocking decisions.
- The timeframe for providing information and documents requested by the Information and Communication Technologies Authority (BTK) from social network providers has been revised to “immediately and within a period not exceeding 15 days, as determined by the Authority.”
- Game providers are required to rate games according to age criteria, while game distributors are obliged to provide parental control tools. It has also been stipulated that games not classified according to age criteria may only be offered provided that they are assigned the highest applicable age rating.
- For foreign-based game distributors with more than 100 thousand daily users from Türkiye, an obligation has been introduced to appoint a local representative in Türkiye and notify the Authority. In the event of non-compliance, a graduated set of sanctions is foreseen, including administrative fines and, subsequently, bandwidth restriction measures.
- In addition, social network providers and certain game distributors are required to conduct a “risk assessment” for services offered to Türkiye and report it to the Authority. It has also been stipulated that the Authority may request corrective measures where necessary, and that non-compliance may result in administrative fines and bandwidth restriction sanctions.
In this context, social network providers have been required to develop age verification and protective mechanisms for services directed at children, and obligations regarding the protection of users under the age of 15 have been strengthened. In addition, the responsibilities of platforms in content removal and access blocking procedures have been expanded, and the regulatory framework aimed at protecting children from harmful content in the digital environment has been reinforced.
Source: https://www.tbmm.gov.tr/Yasama/KanunTeklifi/5f9ced52-3776-46e4-be23-019cb8da2666
