LEGISLATION UPDATE: Employment Rights Bill

Last week (5 March) further amendments were proposed to the Employment Rights Bill, which included a number of government amendments that are likely to be incorporated and were a reflection of their consultation response also published last week (Make Work Pay - GOV.UK).  

The new proposals include: 

• Doubling the protective award for failure to collectively consult from 90 days' to 180 days' pay.
• Extending the provisions on zero and low hours contracts to agency workers.
• Increasing statutory sick pay (SSP) entitlement to the lower of 80% of salary or the standard SSP rate
• Making changes regarding industrial action, such as trade union recognition and the regulation of "access agreements", regulating how union officials are entitled to access workers.
• Introducing stronger regulation of umbrella companies

In addition, several other amendments, including: 

• Abandoning plans to remove the "at one establishment" wording relevant to collective consultation obligations under the Trade Union and Labour Relations (Consolidation) Act 1992. Instead, collective consultation obligations will be triggered either if there are 20 or more redundancies at one establishment or if the number of redundancies meets a "threshold number" (yet to be specified).
• Strengthening the powers to be allocated to the Fair Work Agency, which will be permitted to issue notices of underpayment, pursue tribunal proceedings for workers and provide legal assistance for employment claims. It will also be able to enforce underpayments of certain statutory payments, such as sick pay and holiday pay, and to recover enforcement costs.
• Strengthening anti-avoidance measures for zero and low hours provisions, and introducing a new ability to contract out of these measures using a collective agreement. 
• Introducing obligations to retain records of compliance with annual leave obligations. 

Further government amendments clarify the proposals on flexible working and increased regulations for dismissals during and after pregnancy, but the right to switch off has been abandoned. 

 Finally, a further amendment is expected to be approved to extend bereavement leave and pay in respect of pre-24 week pregnancy loss. 

It is important to follow the progress of this legislation and we will share further updates in due course – please contact us if you need any assistance with this or any area of employment law