Law and Labour » Flexible working

Employment Rights Bill update

Law and Labour — Sun, 23 Mar 2025 12:20:27 +0000

The Employment Rights Bill will bring sweeping changes to many areas of employment law once its provisions come into force. Its reforms will affect unfair dismissal, flexible working, statutory sick pay (SSP), family leave, fire and rehire, zero hours contracts and trade union law.

Between October and December 2024, the government consulted on four areas of the Bill: zero hours contracts, fire and rehire, trade unions and SSP. In March 2025, the government published its response to those consultations and also announced a series of amendments to the Bill.

The amendments include:

Zero hours contracts – the right to request contracts with guaranteed hours will apply to agency workers. Employers will have a duty to provide workers with a range of information about their right to guaranteed hours. Flexible working – there will be a new requirement for any refusal of a flexible working request on one of the statutory grounds to be reasonable. Employers will also have to explain their reason for refusal. SSP – low paid workers will no longer need to earn above the lower earnings limit to qualify for SSP. They will receive either 80% of their average weekly earnings or the current rate of SSP, whichever is lower. SSP will be payable from the first day of sickness absence. Workplace harassment – employers will have a duty to take all reasonable steps to prevent harassment of their employees by third parties. Employers could face civil claims for harassment where they have failed to take such steps. Redundancy collective consultation – the maximum period of the protective award will increase from 90 days to 180 days. Trade unions – there will be a series of changes to trade union and strike rules, such as changing the current notice period for industrial action from 7 to 10 days. Industrial action mandates will expire after 12 months instead of after 6 months.

We continue to monitor for further amendments.

Photograph: “people-400818_1280”.

Employment rights get an uplift from new Labour Government

Law and Labour — Thu, 18 Jul 2024 15:21:53 +0000

One of the key elements of the Labour Party’s manifesto for the 2024 general election was its “Plan to Make Work Pay”. Among the promises in the Plan were that the Party, if elected, would deliver a “genuine living wage”, ban “exploitative zero hours contracts” and end fire and rehire practices. In Labour’s first King’s Speech since being elected to government, it sought to make good on those promises.

The government plans to introduce significant changes to some key areas of employment law, primarily through the new Employment Rights Bill. The content of the Bill is not yet known, but a briefing note from the government sets out the main proposals.

They are to:

make parental leave, sick pay and protection from unfair dismissal “day 1 rights”, subject to probationary periods; ban zero hours contracts; end fire and rehire and fire and replace practices; strengthen statutory sick pay by removing the three-day waiting period and the lower earnings limit; make flexible working a day 1 right; make it unlawful to dismiss a woman within 6 months of her return to work from maternity leave, except in specific circumstances; establish a new body called the Fair Work Agency to aid in the enforcement of workplace rights; establish a Fair Pay Agreement in the adult social care sector; reinstate the School Support Staff Negotiating Body; remove certain restrictions on trade union activity, including minimum service levels; and simplify the route to statutory recognition.

The government says these changes will be introduced within its first 100 days of taking office, so the draft bill is anticipated shortly. The bill will apply to England, Scotland and Wales.

In addition, the government also announced a new Equality (Race and Disability) Bill which intends to “enshrine the full right to equal pay in law” for persons from ethnic minorities and disabled persons. This bill proposes mandatory ethnicity and disability pay gap reporting. We await further details as to how such reporting will work in practice.

Photograph: “Pedestrians” by Pixabay user Brian Merrill used under Pixabay content licence

A new beast – the ‘employee-owner’

Law and Labour — Sun, 02 Dec 2012 17:52:32 +0000

George Osborne, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, recently announced the introduction of a new form of employee – the “employee-owner”.

Much like mythological creature the minotaur – who was part-man, part-bull – this new entity will be neither one thing nor the other. Instead, familiar and recognisable parts of the employee will be sacrificed to create a new hybrid.

It is proposed that the employee will give up statutory rights on unfair dismissal, redundancy, the right to request flexible working, and the right to request training.

However, in return the employer will grant the employee shares in its company, worth from £2,000 to £50,000. These shares will be exempt from capital gains tax. Sounds great. But is it?

Osborne’s proposals are primarily aimed at smaller, fast-growing companies that want to utilise a flexible employment arrangement. But such firms might be put off by the complicated shareholding agreements and tax breaks the arrangement will require.

Employees should think carefully before discarding statutory rights developed over decades in return for shares whose value may be uncertain. In a worst-case scenario if the company were to fail they might be left with worthless shares and no redundancy pay.

The proposed changes span a raft of contractual and employment law, which the Government must consider and amend in order to give life to the employee-owner arrangement. The scope of these changes might prove too extensive to implement.

The minotaur met an untimely end after having languished in a dungeon for the majority of its brief life. It seems likely that the Government’s hybrid creation might suffer a similar fate if its implementation is not properly thought through.

Details of how the employee-owner arrangement will work in practice are yet to be fleshed out, but the Government is rushing to introduce the entity by April 2013.

Photo: Dagrappler, Minotaur at Athens Archaeological Museum

Flexible working proposed changes

Law and Labour — Mon, 26 Nov 2012 19:51:07 +0000

On 13 November 2012, the Government announced proposals to extend the right to request flexible working to all employees. This right is currently only available for parents or carers.

The Government also intends to remove the current statutory procedure for considering requests.

However, submitting a request is no guarantee that the employee will be granted a flexible working arrangement. Employers will have a duty to consider all requests in a reasonable manner and they will be able to refuse requests on business grounds.

The Government has yet to announce a date for the implementation of this proposal.