RICHARD GROGAN, SOLICITOR AND EMPLOYMENT LAW SPECIALIST Women will be the "collateral damage" of the Covid-19 crisis with new mums among the hardest hit, an employment expert has warned. While problems around maternity rights are already “endemic” in Ireland, women are now being “abandoned in their droves” by both employers and government, he says. His practice has seen a huge increase in calls from women on maternity leave who are not being taken back to work due to the coronavirus crisis - one major problem is that the Government's temporary wage subsidy scheme is not available to those who were on maternity leave when it was introduced.