(ResponseSource - Sep. 8, 2026) - New government data shows most mothers return to work at six to nine months and more than a third plan to stop or cut back breastfeeding when they do. UK law does not mention expressing milk at all.
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There is no legal requirement for a British employer to provide a breastfeeding mother with anywhere to express milk.

Not a private room. Not a fridge. Not time.

The only duty in law sits in Regulation 25 of the Workplace (Health, Safety and Welfare) Regulations 1992, and it reads, in full: "Suitable facilities shall be provided for any person at work who is a pregnant woman or nursing mother to rest."

The words "expressing" and "breastfeeding" do not appear. As ACAS puts it: "Parliament has not legislated to make breastfeeding/expressing breaks in the workplace a statutory requirement."

Confronted with a working mother, the British statute book imagines somewhere to sit down.

The timing makes it worse

Data published by the Office for Health Improvement and Disparities in July 2026 the first England-wide infant feeding survey since 2010 shows the collision precisely.

More than half of mothers who return to work (56%) do so when their baby is six to nine months old. That is the window when statutory maternity pay has already dropped to a flat rate of GBP 194.32 a week, and before most funded childcare begins.

And around a third (36%) of mothers who intended to return to work planned to stop or reduce breastfeeding when they did.

Not because they wanted to. Because of what returning to work would require of them.

Even the NHS doesn't manage it

Research published in the International Journal of Law and Society in February 2025, surveying nearly 1,000 NHS employees, found that half had no lockable room in which to express, 51% had no fridge to store milk in, and 69% had insufficient time. Only 36% worked somewhere with a breastfeeding policy at all.

Seventy-nine per cent of them were breastfeeding when they went back.

If the health service an employer of midwives, health visitors and lactation consultants cannot reliably provide a door that locks, it is worth asking what a warehouse, a school or a call centre provides.

What the survey asks, and what it can't see

In the same government survey, "returning to work or education" as a reason for having already stopped breastfeeding rises across the first year 1% of mothers at two to five months, 3% at four to seven months, and 6% at eight to ten months.

That last figure looks small. It is worth being careful about what it measures.

It records the reason a mother gives after the fact, and milk supply responds to demand: a mother who cannot express during a working day, because there is nowhere to do it and no time in which to do it, will produce less. Asked later why she stopped, she may reasonably describe that as her body rather than her workplace. Nobody has measured how often that happens, and this release does not claim to know.

What the survey does show directly is the intention: 36% of mothers who planned to return to work intended to stop or cut back breastfeeding when they did.

Not because they wanted to. Because of what going back would require of them.

Laura McGrath, Founder and CEO of LolaandLykke, said:

"I'm Finnish, and I think that's why this stood out to me. Where I'm from, the assumption is that if you want mothers to breastfeed and you want them back at work, you have to make both things physically possible. It isn't a moral position, it's just logistics.

"In Britain there's a great deal of encouragement for mothers to breastfeed for longer, and then almost nothing that makes it possible once she's back at her desk. We talk about a mother's determination. We don't talk about whether there's a room."

What would actually fix it

Very little, and that is the point.

A room that locks. A fridge. Twenty minutes, twice a day, for a few months. No legislation required and almost no cost an employer can do it this week if it decides to.

Set against that: replacing an employee costs several thousand pounds in recruitment alone, before counting the months of lost productivity while someone new gets up to speed. Official ONS figures published in October 2025 show mothers' earnings fall an average of 42% in the five years after a first child.

McGrath added:

"We can make a pump that works quietly and hands-free. What we can't do is create the time, privacy and support a mother needs to use it. That part is up to employers and it's much easier to provide than many think."

About Bloome

LolaandLykke's Bloome wearable breast pump was awarded Gold at the British MadeForMums Tech Awards 2026, named Best Wearable Breast Pump. It combines hands-free wearable pumping with warming technology that maintains warmth during expressing to support milk flow and comfort, and is designed to be worn discreetly at a desk, on a commute, or between meetings.

Bloome is available in the UK from GBP 175 (single) and GBP 319 (double) via lolalykke.com, John Lewis, Amazon UK and TikTok Shop UK.

About LolaandLykke

LolaandLykke is a Finnish maternal health and femtech company founded in 2018, combining Nordic design, maternal health expertise and technology. It has supported more than 100,000 mothers internationally with products, expert-led education and community across breastfeeding, postpartum recovery and maternal wellbeing.

ENDS
Press contact:
Laura McGrath
laura.mcgrath@lolalykke.com
+358 40 5696491

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Notes to editors
Regulation 25(4), Workplace (Health, Safety and Welfare) Regulations 1992 (SI 1992/3004): https://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/1992/3004/regulation/25 full text quoted above. HSE guidance recommends privacy for expressing and somewhere to store milk, but this is guidance, not a legal duty.
Infant Feeding Survey in England 2024, OHID/DHSC, fieldwork by Ipsos, published 21 July 2026. 26,339 mothers invited, 10,168 valid returns. The first England-wide infant feeding survey since 2010; not directly comparable with the 2010 survey due to methodology changes: https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/infant-feeding-survey-in-england-2024/infant-feeding-survey-2024-summary-of-main-findings
Ndzi, Hinchcliffe and Neilson, International Journal of Law and Society, February 2025, survey of ~1,000 NHS employees, via Liverpool John Moores University: https://www.ljmu.ac.uk/about-us/news/articles/2025/2/7/uk-lags-behind-on-breastfeeding-at-work
ONS, The impact of motherhood on monthly employee earnings and employment status, England, 3 October 2025. Linked administrative data, n=249,480: https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/healthandsocialcare/healthandwellbeing/bulletins/theimpactofmotherhoodonmonthlyemployeeearningsandemploymentstatusengland/april2014todecember2022
Statutory maternity pay rate GBP194.32/week from 6 April 2026.
Laura McGrath is available for interview on breastfeeding and the workplace, maternal health innovation, and the practical realities of returning to work.

Press contact:
Laura McGrath
laura.mcgrath@lolalykke.com
+358 40 5696491

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