The Employment Rights Bill - what are the implications for employers?

Employees will also be entitled to parental leave, sick pay and protection from unfair dismissal from day-one. The measures will also see the establishment of a new Single Enforcement Body to strengthen the enforcement of workplace rights.

As outlined by the government in the King’s Speech:

The Employment Rights Bill, to be introduced within the first one hundred days, is a significant step towards delivering this ambition and represents the biggest upgrade to workers’ rights in a generation.

● In addition to this Bill, we will deliver a genuine living wage that accounts for the cost of living and we will remove the discriminatory age bands to ensure every adult worker benefits. These changes will improve the lives of working people across the country.

● We will work in close partnership with trade unions and business to deliver our New Deal and invite their views on how best we can put our plans into practice.

What exactly will the bill do?

The Plan includes commitments to the following:

- Banning exploitative zero-hour contracts, ensuring workers have a right to a contract that reflects the number of hours they regularly work and that all workers get reasonable notice of any changes in shift with proportionate compensation for any shifts cancelled or curtailed. This will end ‘one sided’ flexibility, ensuring all jobs provide a baseline level of security and predictability.

- Ending the scourges of ‘fire and rehire’ and ‘fire and replace’ by reforming the law to provide effective remedies and replacing the previous government’s statutory code.

- Making parental leave, sick pay and protection from unfair dismissal available from day-one on the job for all workers. The government will continue to ensure employers can operate probationary periods to assess new hires.

-  Strengthening Statutory Sick Pay by removing the lower earnings limit to make it available to all workers as well as the waiting period.

- Making flexible working the default from day-one for all workers, with employers required to accommodate this as far as is reasonable, to reflect the modern workplace.

- Strengthening protections for new mothers by making it unlawful to dismiss a woman who has had a baby for six months after her return to work, except in specific circumstances.

- Establishing a new Single Enforcement Body, also known as a Fair Work Agency, to strengthen enforcement of workplace rights.  

-  Updating trade union legislation so it is fit for a modern economy, removing unnecessary restrictions on trade union activity – including the previous government’s approach to minimum service levels – and ensuring industrial relations are based around good faith negotiation and bargaining.

- Simplifying the process of statutory recognition and introducing a regulated route to ensure workers and union members have a reasonable right to access a union within workplaces.

Published On: 25/07/2024 13:25:41

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