The GetUp! organisation presented MsMacklin with the stack of papers at Parliament House, with seven-month-old Thomas Muldoon closely watching.

Thomas's mother, Rebecca Muldoon, an employee in the Commonwealth Public Service, received three months' paid maternity leave when she had Thomas and said it had given her the financial freedom to make the choice to have a child.

But the mother who handed Ms Macklin the petitions, Marka Selmes, is a casual teacher who received no paid maternity leave and whose husband had to take on a more highly paid job to cover her lost income when she had two children.

''Not having paid maternity leave meant my husband had to take a job which requires him to travel, so not having it does have an impact not only on our family budget but on how much time my children get to spend with their father,'' she said.

''It is too late for me, but I want paid maternity leave available for other women.''

Ms Macklin was noncommittal on the Government's intention to introduce a paid maternity leave scheme in the May 12 budget. While Australia and the United States are the only developed nations without a paid maternity leave scheme, Ms Macklin said the Government was ''giving very careful consideration'' to the recommendations in the Productivity Commission's paid maternity leave report, which proposes a scheme that would pay new mothers the minimum weekly wage of $543.78 for 18 weeks.

With an estimated cost of $450 million to Government and $74 million for business, the Australian Council of Trade Unions has proposed the Government phase the scheme in over a number of years if the budget can't accommodate it because of the financial crisis.

Ms Macklin refused to comment on Labor backbenchers' increasingly vocal calls for paid maternity leave. ''We do understand just how important it is, especially for mothers, to be able take some time off after the birth to recover from the birth, to bond with the baby,'' she said. ''We also understand how important it is to parents, particularly mothers, in relation to their work.''

She said the Government would respond soon to the Productivity Commission report.