Described as ‘the biggest upgrade of workers’ rights in a generation’ by UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer in Parliament yesterday, the UK Government has today published its Employment Rights Bill.
The 158 page bill covers a total of 28 workplace reforms. The following are they notable changes;
- Flexible Working: yes ‘default’ where practical
The default position on Flexible Working Requests is to be set at ‘yes’. However, an employer could legitimately refuse the request if it can prove ‘reasonable grounds, such as; a burden of additional cost; detrimental effect on its ability to meet customer demand; an inability to re-organise work among existing staff; an inability to recruit additional staff; a detrimental impact on quality; a detrimental impact on performance; insufficiency of work during the periods the employee proposes to work; planned structural changes.
Flexible working could include starting work later to enable a parent to take children to school or other childcare obligations; working longer hours over fewer days of the week; working from home.
- Increased Protection from Unfair Dismissal:
The current 2-year qualifying period for protections from unfair dismissal will be removed. However, workers can still be subject to a 9-month probation period during which their employment can still be terminated without a formal process.
However, it is unclear whether an employee can make a claim for unfair dismissal if their employment is terminated during their probation period.
- ‘Day One’ rights
Many of the changes provide for the introduction of ‘day one’ rights to employees – where qualifying periods currently exist before entitlement applies. This will include; Statutory Sick Pay, Paternity Leave and Unpaid
- Notable Omissions
The Bill has some some notable omissions from the Government’s pre-election “new deal for working people” document, including:
- Employees’ right to switch off i.e. from being contacted out of hours – other than in exceptional circumstances.
- Legislation to end pay discrimination. This is expected to follow separately in a draft bill that will include measures to make it mandatory for large employers to report their ethnicity and disability pay gaps.
- Industry Reaction
Many large employers have responded by saying that they already apply most of the proposed changes through their own workplace practices and policies.
However, the UK Federation of Small Businesses, whose members employ up to 250 workers described the new bill as “rushed, clumsy, chaotic and poorly planned”.
- Speed of Change
Most of the planned changes will not take effect for at least two years and will firstly be subject to widespread consultations with employer representative organisations and trade unions.
For further details and guidance on how these changes may affect your workforce and policies, please email us at: mail@orsasaiwai.com