The government is expected to announce their bill on increased employee rights later this month, with changes they describe as “the biggest reforms to workers’ rights in a generation”. This is a flagship Labour policy that is being spearheaded by the deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner.
One of the main proposals is to increase the rights of all employees to be granted flexible working from day one of employment.
Whereas employees can already request flexible working and raise a discrimination or harasment claim if the request is denied unreasonably, the new law will raise the bar for employers considering such requests, requiring them to agree to flexible working from as early as day one of employment unless the request is ‘not reasonably feasible’. Currently employers are only required to deal with such requests in a ‘reasonable manner’, and many are legitimately declined due to business needs.
This subtle but important change to the wording means that the balance of power will shift considerably towards employees and it will be harder for employers to refuse a flexible working request. Many employer organisations and employment lawyers are predicting a significant increase in tribunals as a result.
The planned changes also include a ‘right to demand’ a four-day working week, where normal full time contractual hours would not reduce, but would be compressed into four longer working days each week. Again, employers can reject the application if the request is ‘not reasonably feasible’ but as with the above, this is quite a high bar.
The government argues that this change will benefit employers by increasing productivity, and lead to various benefits for employees including increased time with family and reduced childcare costs.
To clarify, this four-day week proposal is not an extension of the practice of several Labour run councils to offer a four-day week where employees only work eighty percent of their hours but are paid in full, it is simply compressing the current contractual hours into four days.
Employers are understandably nervous about these changes, which will lead to them needing to spend significantly more time considering requests and taking advice as to whether they can legitimately decline them.
In practice, frustratingly, we will likely need to wait until the first few tribunals are heard before having a good idea as to how the new rules are interpreted by judges and ergo, the types of flexible working requests that should now be accepted / those that may still be legitimately declined.
Ben Willmott, head of public policy for the CIPD has urged the government to delay the introduction of these changes, not least because employers are still adapting to the changes introduced by the previous government as recently as April this year.
Clearly there needs to be a reasonable balance between the rights of employees and employers, we will just need to wait and see how this pans out. Workers’ rights is a key policy area for the government and I very much doubt they will either delay or water down their proposals.
Later this week I will give more detail regarding the new government’s other proposed changes to workers’ rights. If you are a business owner or manager you may wish to pour a stiff drink!
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wow!! 49Unfair dismissal rights from day one, increased union powers, and banning ‘fire and rehire’. The government is not hanging around on employment law!
Absolutely! Some of the changes seem fair but there are alot of of challenges for employers in there too. Let’s hope the changes are done in a way that is fair to all.