At the very end of last year, my wife gave birth to our little boy. My own experience of fatherhood only echoes what I’ve heard from so many listeners on my LBC show: that we need to make it far, far easier for dads to be more involved in their children’s lives.

That is very difficult right now, because the UK’s paternity rights system is a disgrace. In fact, new dads in this country get less generous paternity leave than those in any other European country. In Sweden, for example, new fathers get a guaranteed 90 days off work. In Spain, dads get 16 weeks off at full pay. In Germany, they can take up to three full years of parental leave (though not all of it is paid). In France, the minimum paternity leave allowed by law is four weeks.

Contrast that with the UK, where new fathers are allowed just two weeks off work, and even then only if certain conditions apply. While almost a third of UK employers now choose to offer more than the statutory minimum, most do not – creating a major mismatch based purely on an employer’s whims. I have male friends who were able to take a full year off; others who had to go back to work after a week, even while their partners were still recovering from traumatic births.

Even with the legal allowance so limited, many men still don’t take advantage of what little they are entitled to. Because statutory paternity pay is so low – at just £187.18 a........

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