A total of 2,750 women and 540 men took advantage of family friendly measures in the public sector in 2009, Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi said this morning.

Addressing a party round table conference as part of the party's worker's day celebrations at The Palace in Sliema, the Prime Minister said that amounted to close to 10 per cent of public sector.

The government, he said, aimed to increase this number for more people to strike a balance between work and family life.

The conference is discussing the effectiveness of family friendly measures in striking this balance between work and family life.

The public sector offered several such measures, including tele-working, career breaks, reduced hours, child care centres and adoption leave. The government was proposing to increase the latter from the present five to 14 weeks.

Dr Gonzi said that since 2007, 7,521 women returned to work and saved €7.5 million through a one year income tax holiday for every child.

With the changes which society was going through at the moment and with more people working and children being brought up by grandparents, there was a chance that the value of childhood would be lost, he said.

So family friendly measures had to make it easier for parents to find a work family balance and for childhood not to be lost.