On 5th July 2024, the UK’s Government changed hands.
Following 14 years of Conservative rule, Labour won the General Election with a large majority, giving them a mandate to govern the country.
So what is this likely to mean for the UK’s labour market, employees and employers?
We have put a handy summary together for you below.
Labour has long argued that Zero hours contracts give opportunities for employers to exploit workers and employees.
They are planning to replace the current law with fixed hours across a twelve-week reference period.
This provides more certainty for employees that they will be offered work and roughly how many hours that will be. This is likely to affect the hospitality and retail sectors the most.
This update will aim to outlaw the practice of compulsorily making employees redundant and immediately re-hiring them on lesser contractual terms and benefits.
This could impact any size of business but is more likely to impact medium—to large Companies where the workforce is numerous, and the benefits to the employer are significant. This change would not stop the normal redundancy process because the role is no longer available or the place of work is changing.
This change aims to abolish the current 2-year rule and would give all employees the right to make Unfair, Wrongful, and Constructive Dismissal claims from day one of their employment.
It would also change the waiting period for Maternity and Paternity leave and the 3-day waiting period before Statutory Sick Pay is paid.
These are significant changes which will affect all employers.
Our advice is to ensure that you have robust processes in place when you recruit to ensure any new employees have the right attitude and behaviours and possess the ability to carry out the role.
We also suggest that every employee has a minimum probation period of six months to ensure that you have enough time to assess their suitability.
Management of the probation period will become imperative if these changes are made.
There are currently three forms of status in the UK: employee, Worker, and Self-Employed.
Labour’s plan is to simplify these categories.
We think they will try to merge the Employee and worker categories to form one status.
In our view, this would be a positive change, as the current system is confusing to employers when trying to determine whether someone is Self-Employed or employed.
Labour plans to update and strengthen the whistleblowing protections afforded by the current law, particularly focusing on women against sexual harassment in the workplace.
Labour says that it wants to improve upon the current requirements when engaging self-employed people.
The proposed changes include a right to a written contract, tackling late payments, and improving the health and safety requirements for self-employed workers.
Labour claims that strengthening the links with Unions will benefit the self-employed.
Labour wants to change the current rules surrounding the number of people required in order to make consultation compulsory for affected employees from a workplace limit to a workforce limit.
The new approach is to build on the most recent changes in the Flexible Request Laws.
This is expected to centre around using technological advances to allow people to work more flexibly and using flexi-time arrangements to help parents deal with education terms and holiday periods.
The outgoing Government already made changes to the law regarding Carers’ leave in 2024, giving anyone in this category the right to one week of unpaid leave per annum.
Labour is going to review this to see if paid leave would bring further benefits to carers and businesses.
Many of the areas being considered in Labour’s 100-day plan are intended to build on what the Conservative Government had already implemented.
However, more employee-focused changes are inevitably coming in the next few months, which all employers will have to be aware of and manage.
We understand your challenges as a business, and we understand how to manage changes such as those above.
If you have any concerns or questions, please contact Jon at jon@hrmartuk.com or call us on 01903 754107.
See a full copy of Labour’s document.
