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The government have now published their long-awaited Employment Rights Bill. This has some sweeping powers included but it should be noted that there is no implementation date on any of the proposals yet, and councils should abide by existing legislation until such changes are implemented. These proposals affect you as an employer and employee.

The headlines of the Bill are:

• Right to claim unfair dismissal from day one. As long as you have started work you will be covered, but not if a contract is withdrawn before the start date. There is to be a consultation on a probation period – 9 months has been in the press for the probation period to last. A possibility is that there could be a “dismissal during probation period” procedure that appears following the consultation.
• Ending “fire and rehire”. In future if the principal reason is because the employee has not agreed a variation to their contract this will make the dismissal automatically unfair
• Ending “exploitative” zero hours contracts. This means that if the worker is under a zero hours contract, the employer will be obliged to offer a “guaranteed hours contract” which reflects the number of hours they worked in the previous reference period, which is, as yet, not decided
• Flexible working to be the default for all employees, unless the employer can prove that this is unreasonable
• Paternity leave and pay to become day one rights
• Extended protection for pregnancy and new mothers. Further details of this proposal are awaited; and
• Statutory Sick Pay to be paid from the first day of sickness, rather than the fourth day now
• The Lower Earnings Limit to be removed in eligibility for sick pay. The figure for the LEL is currently £123 per week and this will mean more cost to employers for additional sick pay and with the current employees falling into the category who will be paid who are not at the moment.

There will be a period of consultation on these so do not expect any changes yet, but this is an indication of the clear direction of travel for working rights.