The much anticipated Employment Rights Bill 2024 was published by the government yesterday. The Bill will introduce 28 key reforms to employment law in the UK.
The most significant change is the removal of the two year qualifying period for unfair dismissal. Instead, the government has announced its intention to create statutory probationary periods. The government has confirmed they will consult on this but have expressed a preference for this to be a maximum of nine months. The details of this have, as yet, not been clarified but it is expected that there will be a lower bar for dismissal within the statutory probationary period allowing employers to assess the employee’s suitability for a role.
Another significant move is that harassment of employees by third parties (for example clients or customers) will be expressly unlawful where the employer has failed to take all reasonable steps to prevent them from doing so.
It had been stated that the Bill would make flexible working the default position where practical, but the details included in the Bill represent quite a minor change to existing law. A refusal of a flexible working request must now be reasonable based on the existing reasons for refusal. The Bill states that employers will need to explain why the refusal is reasonable.
The Bill will seek to end “exploitative” zero-hour contracts. The specifics of this include a right to guaranteed hours, a right to reasonable notice of shifts, and payment for cancellation of shifts at short notice.
In relation to fire and rehire, the Bill has set out that it will be automatically unfair to dismiss an employee for refusing a contract variation. There will be exceptions to this but they will be very limited and based on a genuine need to avoid financial issues that threaten the future of the employer.
The Bill also removes the lower earnings limit for Statutory Sick Pay (SSP) and eliminates the 3-day waiting period before SSP becomes payable.
Parental Bereavement Leave will be changed so that the word ‘parental’ is removed, effectively creating a form of statutory compassionate leave that will apply to all staff who have suffered a bereavement.
It has been announced that the Bill will have its second reading in the House of Commons on 21 October where the proposals will be debated. It is important to note that we are at the very early stages and these changes will not be in force for some time (it is rumoured to be October 2026).
The government has now published a ‘Next Steps’ document which outlines further reforms to employment law that it will look to implement in the future. We will continue to provide updates on this as and when more details emerge.
If you have any questions on any issues raised in the above article, please contact Natalia Milne