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Employment Rights Bill 2024: Key Provisions14 October 2024

The UK’s eagerly anticipated Employment Rights Bill (the “Bill”) was unveiled on 10 October 2024, with the Labour government fulfilling its promise to lay such a bill before Parliament within its first 100 days. The details of many of the new measures are still uncertain, with secondary legislation required which will be followed by a period of consultation. As such, the reforms are unlikely to take effect until at least 2026.

"The details of many of the new measures are still uncertain, with secondary legislation required which will be followed by a period of consultation. As such, the reforms are unlikely to take effect until at least 2026."

Briefly, we have set out below some of the key aspects of the Bill along with some of the further reforms to employment law that the government will look to implement in the future:

unfair dismissal will become a ‘day one’ right with the removal of the two-year qualifying period. This will be subject to a statutory probation period which is to be consulted on further, but the government has stated its preference is nine months;
further ‘day one’ rights include rights to paternity, parental and bereavement leave;
statutory sick pay (SSP) will become payable from day one of sickness and the lower earnings limit for SSP will also be removed;
those on zero and low hour contracts will gain the right to a guaranteed hours contract if they work regular hours over a defined period;
new automatic unfair dismissal rights for employees who are dismissed for refusing to agree changes to their employment contract unless the employer can show evidence of serious financial difficulties such that the dismissal was unavoidable;
when rejecting a flexible working request, employers will also need to show that their refusal on one or more of the existing statutory grounds is “reasonable”; and
the duty to prevent sexual harassment will be extended to the duty to take “all” reasonable steps and employers will become liable for third party harassment in the course of employment. Whistleblowing protection for those reporting sexual harassment will also be introduced.

Next Steps

The government has also published a Next Steps document which outlines future reforms. These include:

a ‘right to switch off’, providing workers with the right to disconnect outside of working hours and not be contacted by their employer except in exceptional circumstances; and
a move towards a single status of “worker” and simpler two-part framework for employment status.

We will monitor and update our clients on the development of the proposed reforms and as further details emerge.

London Trainee Kate McMahon also contributed to this article.

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