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Gordon Brown has announced in his first Queen's Speech as prime minister that he intends to extend the rights of parents to request flexible working, in order to help them achieve a better work-life balance.

Since 2003, parents of children under the age of six and those with disabled children have had the right to request flexible working.

Now, it is proposed that the right to request flexible working be expanded to include parents of older children. Imelda Walsh, human resources director at Sainsbury's, will head up a review into which parents should qualify.

Speaking to the BBC, cabinet minister Ed Miliband says: 'We introduced the right to request flexible working for parents with children under six and that has been quite successful for those parents who've been able to request it.

'We now want to extend that further up the age range to older children and we're going to look at how we do that working with business and others.'

The government is under pressure from the Conservatives in this regard, after David Cameron announced earlier this year that all parents with children under 18 would have the right to request flexible work under a Tory government.

Currently 50 per cent of new mothers work flexible hours, up from less than one fifth in 2002. Extending the right to all parents would leave 7.3 million families eligible for flexible work.

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