Get Ready For Employment Law Changes

The Queen’s parliamentary speech last month unveiled the proposed laws put forward by the new Conservative Secretary of State for Business, Sajid Javid.

These new plans include greater restriction on strike action and controversial amendments to zero hours contracts. Read on for information on some of the key changes.

Laws for strike action

Under the new guidelines, striking actions will now need to have the approval of at least 50% of the staff eligible for the strike before any action can be taken.

If a proposed strike should impact upon an area of public service that will have immediate detrimental affect to the general public there are plans to administer even more vigorous striking conditions, which includes the need of backing from 40% of all eligible union members. Services that full under these new rules will likely include the health, transport, education and emergency service industries.

Agency workers

The new Conservative government is also allegedly considering whether to end the ban on employers being allowed to hire agency workers to fill a void left in the workforce by striking employees. The government defends this plan on the grounds that it will supposedly “tackle the intimidation” that many non-striking workers feel when they refuse to strike alongside their peers.

The new government has also revealed plans to limit the amount of paid leave given to union representatives undertaking union duties.

Zero Hours Contracts

Banning the clause in zero-hours contracts which state that employees should be employed exclusively for one company was an idea originally devised by the outgoing coalition government last year as part of the Small Business, Enterprise and Employment Act 2015; a legislation that came into affect on 2nd June 2015.

Although the basic intention of this law is widely praised, the plan to scrap the exclusivity clause says has been criticised by many legal representatives due to its tenuous nature, because although it means that employers can no longer enforce exclusivity as part of a zero-hours contract, there is nothing preventing them from reducing or simply not offering future hours to an employee who has found work elsewhere.

The Unite union has also expressed concern that the new law allowing workers to be employed by more than one zero-hours position will do nothing to guarantee their existing role is safe.

Moreover, the new legislation of such contracts does not necessarily ensure a minimum number of working hours per week, and that the generally negotiable quality of zero-hours contracts will be exploited by many employers in order to avoid fair employment opportunities for workers.

Paid Volunteering Leave

Another new area of legislation is that employees of large companies within the public sector must grant employees the right of having three days of paid leave in order to undertake volunteering duties should they wish to.

Performing voluntary work at a trade union is not permitted as part of this new law, but the chance to volunteer for a political organisation has not yet been ruled out.

Gender pay law

One much anticipated area of employment law that has finally been brought to fruition is the need for employers with a staff of at least 250 to reveal the difference in pay between their male and female employees. The Conservatives originally dismissed this idea when the Labour Party proposed it in 2010, but it was finally ratified with support from the Liberal Democrats earlier this year during the final months of the coalition government.