The Employment Rights Bill and supporting Factsheets and Consultations
24 October 2024
The recently published Employment Rights Bill (“the Bill”) is being promoted by Government as legislation which will “update and modernise the legislative framework in relation to employment rights”.
The content of the Bill will be subject to consultation on its journey through parliament. Once it passes as an Act, statutory instruments will be published, which will provide more detail and the process for introduction and enactment. Government states they will begin to consult on these reforms throughout 2024 but consider the majority of reforms won’t take effect earlier than 2026.
Some of the key changes are summarised below:
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Current position |
Proposals for change |
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Employees must have at least two years’ service to bring an unfair dismissal claim (exceptions apply) |
Removal of the two-year qualifying period. |
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No current legislation prohibiting dismissal and re-engagement (“fire and rehire”) |
Automatically unfair to dismiss an employee for refusing a contract variation unless the employer can demonstrate financial difficulties. |
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Zero hours workers have no statutory right to guaranteed hours and no protection for cancelled shifts |
Right to guaranteed hours if workers undertake regular hours over a reference period. New obligations for employers to give notice of cancelled shifts, as well as payment |
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There is a three-day waiting period for statutory sick pay and eligibility criteria must be met (Lower Earnings Limit (“LEL”) – currently £123 per week) |
Removal of the three-day waiting period and LEL |
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See our news item regarding the sexual harassment changes here |
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Factsheets
Government has published 10 factsheets about different aspects of the Bill, including the following topics;
- Overview of the Bill
- Fire and rehire
- Unfair dismissal
- Zero hours contracts
- Bereavement, paternity and unpaid parental leave
- Statutory sick pay
- Trade unions
- Fair work agency
Consultations
- Government has launched a consultation on the percentage replacement rate for those earning below the current rate of Statutory Sick Pay (“SSP”). For those with weekly earnings lower than the flat rate for SSP (which is currently £116.75 per week), the Bill proposes to set SSP payments as a “prescribed percentage of the employee’s normal weekly earnings”.
- Another Government consultation seeks views on strengthening remedies against the abuse of rules on collective redundancy fire and rehire. The Bill proposes making it automatically unfair to “fire and rehire” unless the business is in significant financial difficulties.
- The Bill includes a guaranteed hours provision for zero hours workers that reflects the number of hours regularly worked. The provisions announced in the Bill do not extend to agency workers and so, the Government has published a consultation seeking views on the extension of the provisions to agency workers.