Employment Rights Bill amendments

Last week, the government published proposed amendments to the Employment Rights Bill, alongside its responses to the various consultations issued towards the end of last year. There are a significant number of amendments including new record-keeping requirements for employers in relation to holiday entitlement and pay, the extension of the protections relating to zero and low hours contracts to agency workers and several industrial relations changes.

Three of the key proposed amendments are:

• Increasing the cap on the protective award that is payable when an employer breaches its obligation to collectively consult in a redundancy scenario. The current cap is 90 days’ pay per employee and the government proposes to increase this to 180 days’ pay per employee.
• Reinstating the wording ‘at one establishment’ in the trigger for collective redundancy consultation. However, the amendments also include a new second trigger for the duty to collective consult which appears to aggregate redundancies taking place across more than one establishment. Detail on how this second trigger would operate (including the number of redundancies that would need to be proposed for the trigger to be met) would be set out in secondary legislation.
• Introducing significant additional powers for the Secretary of State (likely through the Fair Work Agency) to a) issue notices of underpayment for holiday pay, SSP and national minimum wage; b) to issue penalties for underpayment; and c) to bring proceedings in the employment tribunal in place of the worker.

For more detail on the amendments published last week, check our briefing below.

Our Employers’ Handbook to the Employment Rights Bill and Beyond (which is available here) provides an overview of all the key reforms that are included in the Bill and elsewhere. We are currently updating the handbook to reflect the latest amendments to the Bill, and we will continue to update it on a regular basis as the legislation progresses.

Remote and hybrid working

A House of Lords Select Committee has launched a call for evidence into the effects and future development of remote and hybrid working in the UK. The call for evidence, which you can access via the link below, includes a series of questions for respondents to consider in their submissions. These questions include:

1. What are the challenges and opportunities of remote and hybrid working for employers, including concerning recruitment and retention, the potential for collaboration and creativity, management, worker attitudes and expectations, and use of office space?
2. How can employer and worker needs be balanced within the context of remote and hybrid working, to ensure mutually beneficial employment arrangements?

The Committee is keen to hear from a range of respondents, including individuals and organisations. The deadline for submissions is Friday 25 April 2025, and the Committee is expected to report on its findings by the end of November this year.

Webinar on-demand: Navigating redundancy and restructuring programmes – a practical guide for employers

Our recent webinar is now available on-demand. In the webinar, we explain how to manage a redundancy programme and guide you through the process, offering practical examples throughout.

Redundancy: top 10 tips

Recent polling suggests that the number of employers thinking about making redundancies is the highest it has been in recent years. No organisation wants to let people go, but if you find yourself contemplating redundancies, it’s important to make sure you are up to speed with the key legal and practical issues involved. In this article for People Management, James Edmonds shares his ten tips to help you stay on track.

If you are interested in further guidance on this topic, our on-demand webinar ‘Navigating redundancy and restructuring programmes’ (linked in the Events section above) is a must-watch.

Diversity and inclusion in financial services

Yesterday, the FCA and PRA wrote to the Treasury Select Committee confirming that they do not currently plan to publish new rules on diversity and inclusion. In his latest blog post, James Green provides an update on the regulators’ proposals.