Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull should step in to ease restrictions preventing female jockeys from accessing paid parental leave which is driving women out of the industry, the national jockeys body says.

Mr Turnbull phoned Michelle Payne to congratulate her on becoming the first woman jockey to win the Melbourne Cup and the Australian Jockeys Association wants him to sort out the anomaly affecting female riders.

"Female jockeys should not be penalised because of the anomaly in the legislation," AJA chief executive Paul Innes said.

"It's unfair and it could be done pretty quickly."

Health and safety rules mean women jockeys can't ride after their first trimester, yet paid parental leave rules require women to have worked at least 10 of the 13 months before they give birth.

"We understand why they can't ride after three months but it doesn't fit in with the government's paid parental leave system," Mr Innes said.

Unions NSW says the rules are forcing women jockeys to leave the industry and Payne's historic Cup win should be the catalyst to change rules that stop them from getting the paid maternity leave most other working women enjoy.

"There's no flexibility on that work test for professions like jockeys," Unions NSW assistant secretary Emma Maiden told AAP on Wednesday.

Ms Maiden said 96 per cent of women jockeys were aged under 40, in their prime child-bearing years.

"This is a pressing issue for the industry. As a first step that work test should be relaxed," she said.

When teamed with the ban on riding beyond the first trimester, the rules mean every single woman jockey is denied paid parental leave.

As a result many leave the industry, or delay having children, Ms Maiden said.

Ms Maiden said Payne's speech after winning the Cup had put the entire industry on notice that women jockeys were not going to stay quiet on workplace discrimination.

"When you've got a situation where only four women have ever ridden in the Melbourne Cup it's a little bit more than unconscious bias, and you have out and out discrimination," she said.