On 10 October, the government published its Employment Rights Bill, outlining its proposals for employment law reform. Our “at a glance” guide provides a summary of the main points.
The government said that it expected to begin consulting on these reforms in 2025, but this week it has published what can only be described as four slightly random and unrelated consultation documents, inviting views on such things as what information should be included in a trade union ballot notice, to the rate of Statutory Sick Pay (SSP) that should apply to low earners. None of these consultations deal with the “big” issues unveiled in the Bill itself and the only common thread seems to be that responses to them may inform changes to the Bill before it is finally passed – not least to fill in some of the obvious gaps in the current drafting. All the consultation exercises will close in early December. Brief details of what they cover are set out in this guide.
In the “at a glance” guide referred to above, one of our key suggestions for employers was that they ought to “engage loudly and comprehensively with any consultation exercises…”. It is fair to say that when we wrote that, we weren’t expecting that the first consultations issued would deal with such niche points of law. As such, they may not be of universal interest and perhaps the “engaging loudly” may come later, when we get to the bigger issues. However, the esoteric nature of these consultations is indicative of the somewhat haphazard approach the government is taking to addressing the legislative promises made in its manifesto and absolutely confirms our comment that “the way in which the government proposes to implement some of the changes will inevitably make things more complicated for employers.” Even keeping up with the numerous changes will be a challenge, as will understanding when and how it might be appropriate to engage with the numerous consultation processes that will follow. With this in mind, we will be scheduling a series of roundtables focussing on key proposals, to help clients navigate these changes. Look out for further details of these in due course.
