A legal right to ignore emails outside work, zero hours contracts ban, 6-month protection from dismissal for maternity returners. Labour’s early Christmas present to employment lawyers!

This is the last of three posts regarding the government’s plan to increase employee rights with changes they describe as “the biggest reforms to workers’ rights in a generation”, a flagship Labour policy and one of the few we were aware of prior to the election.

In addition to the previously mentioned changes to flexible working, unfair dismissal protection from day one, the banning of ‘fire and rehire’, and increased union powers, they are also proposing the following:

A ‘right to switch off’, which will involve a requirement for employers to have a code of practice that sets out the times classed as working hours when employees are expected to be available, and when employees will be permitted to ignore work emails, calls etc. 

Having worked for several employers that have rampant ‘presenteeism’ and macho cultures where emails and calls are made late at night and, if you want to progress, an expectation to read and respond to them pronto, this seems to be a good proposal as long as there are exceptions included for emergencies and other times where there may be a significant detriment to the organisation of a call or email being ignored until the morning.

The plan to ban zero hour contracts is no surprise. Labour have long said they will do this as they deem them to be ‘exploitative’. 

Clearly there are examples where this is true, and some groups of employees have been treated very unfairly so a degree of change is welcome. However, there are also many examples where zero hour contracts suit both employer and employees, and others where businesses will not be able to survive without the flexibility offered by these contracts so a blanket ban seems unnecessary and more playing to the gallery (well, the unions!) than a necessary step.

The legislation will compel employers to instead issue contracts of employment that reflect the number and pattern of hours the employee regularly works and treat these as core hours that must be paid, along with a requirement to give reasonable notice of any shift changes with suitable compensation if that does not happen.

Clearly these changes will have a big impact on certain sectors e.g. hospitality, that is already struggling significantly. It could easily be the straw that breaks the camel’s back for many small businesses.

Next, in addition to the day one protection from unfair dismissal discussed in our previous post, new employees will also be entitled to sick pay and to take parental leave from day one of employment. Although there will no doubt be some frustrating examples of employees gaming the system, on balance these changes seem to be a good step forward.

Finally, the new legislation will make it unlawful to dismiss a woman who has returned to work after having a baby for 6 months after her return date. There will apparently be some ’exceptions’ and let’s hope these are sensible – changes such as this need to be fair for all, not just the maternity returners.

Whilst I am sure we can all think of examples where maternity returners have been treated disgracefully and therefore should receive such protection from unscrupulous bosses, there are also numerous situations where everyone should be treated equally irrespective of their maternity status. It is basic fairness and, as with zero hour contracts, this is not an area where ‘one size fits all’.

Alot of these changes are linked to discrimination, harassment and bullying so employers should seriously consider training all staff in these areas if you don’t already do so on a regular basis.