🆕⏰ Buckle up, employees! ⚠️🗣️
Lots of new UK employment laws taking effect in 2024 that expand your rights and protections at work. 📝 As your advocate for workplace rights, we're pumped about the expanded protections and benefits coming our way! 🥳
🗓️ Equality Act 2010 updates - Important changes for inclusion!
From 1 January 2024, significant European Court of Justice decisions get formally encoded into the Equality Act 2010, cementing progressive interpretations like:
✔️Scope to claim “associative discrimination” when disadvantaged because a relative has a protected characteristic
✔️Supporting positive action in hiring/promotion processes
✔️Broadening disability definitions to match EU guidance on conditions like addiction and chronic illnesses.
With precedents now legally binding domestically, employers lose wiggle room to resist adjustments or mitigation measures. Litigation likelihood rises.
🗓️ The Carer's Leave Act - Right To Unpaid Care Leave Arrives
Taking effect probably in Spring 2024, this grants all employees the right to take unpaid time off for caring responsibilities for seriously ill or disabled dependent children or adults. You'll have access if employed for at least 26 weeks. While unpaid, it can help balance work-life pressures.
🗓️ Working Time Regulations- Holiday Pay Calculations Finally Modernised
Effective 1 January 2024, outdated annual leave entitlement methodology gets revamped at last for the growing cohort of staff without normal working hours. This long-sought adjustment will finally calculate paid annual leave for irregular hours/part-year staff on a proportional basis using a 12-month lookback, rather than the usual 12.07% flat rate which has disadvantaged those without set schedules. Each employer must develop new conversion models this year. Those with irregular schedules can expect much fairer pro-rated allowances reflecting their actual contribution.
It formalises obligations around holiday carryover as well, permitting staff to carry unused leave into the next 2 leave years due to sickness or maternity. Clarity has been lacking so the new regulations are welcome.
🗓️ TUPE ( Transfer of Undertakings and Protection of Employees) - The Government intends to proceed with its proposals to amend TUPE consultation requirements, for transfers taking place on or after 1 July 2024.
Employers with no appropriate employee representatives in place will be allowed to inform and consult affected employees directly where (i) they employ fewer than 50 employees in total, or (ii) there are, or are likely to be, fewer than 10 transferring employees (whatever size the employer is).
🗓️ Protection from Redundancy (Pregnancy and Family Leave) Act will be fleshed out and brought into force by (yet to be published) regulations, likely to be April 2024 or later.
The former Act will extend the current redundancy protection for employees on family leave (a right to be offered a suitable alternative vacancy, if available, before being made redundant) to pregnant employees, those who have recently suffered a miscarriage and those who have recently returned from family leave.
🗓️ The Worker (Predictable Terms and Conditions) Act will introduce a new right for workers and agency workers to request more predictable working pattern, expected in force in September/October 2024. Huge for agency workers and those engaged on precarious zero-hour contracts for over 26 continuous weeks, who will gain the power to formally request a transition to more fixed hours that better enable financial planning and security.
Within 28 days, employers must respond to requests for less variable start/end times. Whilst companies can propose compromises or justify declining, this still cedes significant influence to temporary staff vulnerable to unstable incomes week-to-week. Should help with financial planning and childcare.
🗓️ The Employment Relations (Flexible Working) Bill received Royal Assent on 20 July 2023. It requires regulations to be implemented, but once in force will:
- allow employees to make two (rather than one) flexible working requests in any 12 month period (but there can only be one live application at a time),
- require employers to consult before refusing a request,
- require employers to make their decision within two rather than three months (unless an extension is agreed), and
- remove the requirement that the employee must explain in the statutory request what effect the change would have on the employer and how that might be dealt with.
Currently the right is subject to a 26 week service requirement. The Act does not include an amendment to make this a ‘day one’ right but it is understood that the Government intends to implement this change in the regulations.
A statutory flexible working request can relate to a change to hours, times or location of work (permanent or temporary).
🗓️The Worker Protection (Amendment of Equality Act 2010) Act will come into force on 26 October 2024 and introduce a new proactive duty on employers to take reasonable steps to prevent sexual harassment in the workplace. This represents an unprecedented and watershed moment in UK law, imposing affirmative action onto companies, specifically to combat endemic misconduct revealed by #MeToo.
Perhaps most radically, this forthcoming obligation mandates concrete organisational action to combat workplace sexual harassment before issues manifest. All organisations must implement adequate protocols and mechanisms for reporting, investigating and responding to not only harassment between co-workers but also abuses carried out by third parties like customers, contractors, vendors etc against workers.
Mandatory regular training and strict policies are a given, as employers face a heavy compliance burden here with their duty spanning staff, contractors, temps, trainees and interns alike.
Plus other possible changes like more flexible paternity leave, better whistleblower protections, statutory curbs on restrictive contract clauses...lots in the pipeline!
You deserve to work securely and succeed unimpeded by unfair barriers, whether physical or attitudinal. In such challenging times, Your HR Friend extends a steadfast hand as your confidante and ally.
We stands ready to offer bespoke counsel, guiding you on the meticulous documentation and construction of a compelling case. With our tailored coaching, you can navigate the intricate nuances of the situation, secure in the knowledge that your rights will be safeguarded at every turn.
Solitude need not be your companion in this journey. Allow us to redress the balance, to be the force that levels the playing field on your behalf. We understand the profound importance of feeling respected and valued in the workplace, and we are steadfast in our commitment to making it a reality for you.
Take that crucial first step by initiating contact with Your HR Friend – your unwavering companion in the labyrinth of workplace intricacies. Do not miss out on our free introductory consultation, our regular discount offers or contemplate the unparalleled value of our one-year subscription, ensuring continual support and empowerment.
Previewing Major 2024 Employment Law Reforms