Australia's first woman Prime Minister, Julia Gillard, recently made it clear in an interview that she felt the only way she could achieve her professional goals was by not having children.

She said: "I am full of admiration for women who can mix it together, working and having kids, but I'm not sure I could have risen to the top... there's something in me that's focused and single-minded and if I'm going to have a family I'm not sure I could have done this [have a political career]."

Family over career is the awkward choice many women have to make, and an increasing number are going down this path in the hope of putting what they have learnt into practice. However, there are many other high-flying, career-focused women who still want to be mothers, but are faced with a dire challenge.

The choice is hard enough as it is, but when the business community uses its clout in an attempt to bully authorities into not accepting the EU's proposal for increased maternity leave, the alternatives are narrowed further.

Maternity leave is set at 14 weeks while paternity leave consists of just two days. The EU is proposing extending paid maternity leave to 20 weeks and paternal leave to two weeks in a bid to share the responsibility of raising a newborn.

The Malta Business Bureau reacted to this by presenting a study that showed that if this proposal was introduced in Malta it would cost the economy more than €12 million a year.

Using all its weight it came down heavily on this proposal, restricting women's choices with a not-so-veiled threat: "The proposed changes... would render women less competitive in the marketplace for jobs and... there was also a serious risk that the wage discrepancies that exist between female and male employees may widen as employers factor in the potentially increased burden of employing a woman."

It is interesting to see how businesses refer to women as an "increased burden" at a time when the government is the driving force behind campaigns encouraging women to return to the working world - Malta holds the unenviable title of having the lowest employment rate of women in the EU at 38 per cent.

It is understandable that smaller businesses will struggle, especially in the current economic climate, by implementing these changes. But their arguments are myopic.

The Malta Confederation of Women's Organisations retorted that this directive "should not be seen from the narrow economic lens but should be analysed from a much broader perspective". Employment rates for women increased, rather than decreased, in countries with longer maternity leave, it said.

Business analyst John Cassar White too believes entrepreneurs are overlooking a very important social cost - a plummeting birth rate and broken families who cannot find an adequate work-private life balance. The businesses also seem to forget that losing an experienced employee will cost more in the long-term and so will recruiting and training the replacement.

The government has welcomed the proposal but expressed concern over its possible effect and urged that any move should be gradual to minimise the impact on employers.

The way forward in this debate is providing working couples with shared parental leave to eliminate the prejudices women face in the workplace.

Women need to have choices. If they want to stay home and raise their children so be it; but if they want to put their ambition to good use and pursue a high-flying career, yet still become a mother, the option should be there too - without the threat of being unattractive to an employer.