The new Labour government has pledged to make significant changes to our employment legislation over the coming months with the introduction of a new Employment Rights Bill. Consultant Karen South examines what employers and employees can expect under the new legislation, which the government has promised to introduce within 100 days of taking office.
In the King’s Speech on the opening of the new parliament, Labour promised “a new deal for working people”. This will include “banning exploitative practices and enhancing employment rights”. What this is likely to mean in practice can be gleaned from the background notes to the King’s Speech and the pledges set out in Labour’s pre-election manifesto.
What “exploitative practices” will be banned?
The headline change is the banning of ‘zero-hours’ contracts to ensure workers have rights to a contract reflecting the average hours worked. They will also be given more security over the scheduling of their shifts. This will include the right to be given reasonable notice of any changes in shifts with proportionate compensation for shifts curtailed or cancelled.
The new law will also end the practice of ‘fire and rehire’ or ‘fire and replace’ by introducing effective remedies and replacing the previous statutory code, which the new government has described as “inadequate”.
New employment rights
The right to protection from unfair dismissal, parental leave and sick pay will become day one rights, although employers will retain the right to operate probationary periods to assess new employees. Flexible working will also be the default from day one, with employers required to accommodate this so far as reasonable.
The new law will likely strengthen statutory sick pay by removing the lower earnings limit and allowing claims within the first three days of sickness. Around 1.5m people in the UK earn below the current lower earnings limit of £123 per week.
It will also become unlawful for new mothers to be dismissed within six months of returning to work (note: not within six months of having their baby), although there will be exceptions.
New statutory bodies and agreements
A new body, the Fair Work Agency, will be set up to monitor and strengthen the enforcement of workplace rights.
A Fair Pay Agreement will be created for adult social care workers. This will then be assessed to see if it can be rolled out to other sectors.
The school support staff negotiating body will be reinstated to create national terms and conditions, career progression and unfair pay rights for teachers and other school staff.
The new Act will update trade union legislation to “remove unnecessary restrictions on trade union activity”. It will also simplify the process of statutory recognition of unions to ensure workers and union members have a reasonable right to access a union in workplace.
Equality (Race and Disability) Bill
The government is also planning to bring in a new law giving ethnic minorities and those with disabilities the full right to equal pay. It will also introduce mandatory ethnicity and disability payment reporting for employers with at least 250 employees.
How quickly are these new laws likely to come in?
The government has said the Employment Rights Bill will be introduced within its first 100 days, which would mean being put before parliament by 12 October 2024. It is likely to be subject to revision and fine-tuning and would then need to be passed by both houses of parliament. So, it will probably not come into law before 2025 or even 2026.
Clearly, we will see many proposed employment law changes over the coming months and will keep you updated as more information arrives.
If you have any queries about the above or any employment issues, please contact Karen South at ks@portner.co.uk.
Disclaimer: The above is merely general guidance and should not be relied on as formal advice. We suggest you take professional legal advice before taking any action in relation to the issues discussed above.
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