Employment Rights Bill

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Employment Rights Bill
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Parliament of the United Kingdom
Long title A Bill to make provision to amend the law relating to employment rights; to make provision about procedure for handling redundancies; to make provision about the treatment of workers involved in the supply of services under certain public contracts; to provide for duties to be imposed on employers in relation to equality; to amend the definition of "employment business" in the Employment Agencies Act 1973; to provide for the establishment of the School Support Staff Negotiating Body and the Social Care Negotiating Bodies; to amend the Seafarers' Wages Act 2023; to make provision for the implementation of international agreements relating to maritime employment; to make provision about trade unions, industrial action, employers’ associations and the functions of the Certification Officer; to make provision about the enforcement of legislation relating to the labour market; and for connected purposes.
Introduced by Jonathan Reynolds, Secretary of State for Business and Trade (Commons)
Baroness Jones of Whitchurch, Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Legislation (Lords)
Territorial extent  Great Britain (most parts)
England and Wales (part 3)
United Kingdom (clause 25 of part 2; parts 5 and 6)
Other legislation
Amends Seafarers Wages Act 2023
Procurement Act 2023
Trade Union Act 2016
Equality Act 2010
Employment Relations Act 1999
Employment Rights Act 1996
Trade Union and Labour Relations (Consolidation) Act 1992
Repeals/revokes Strikes (Minimum Service Levels) Act 2023
Workers (Predictable Terms and Conditions) Act 2023
Status: Pending
History of passage through Parliament

The Employment Rights Bill, also known as the Workers' Rights Bill[ citation needed ] and simply the Employment Bill,[ citation needed ] is a bill of the Government of the United Kingdom introduced to the House of Commons by the Labour government of Keir Starmer in 2024 which aims to modernise employment law and strengthen worker's rights and trade union rights in Scotland, England and Wales. [1] It will ban "exploitative" zero-hour contracts, fire and rehire and create the Fair Work Agency.

Contents

Background

In the United Kingdom, most of the latest major employment laws were passed in the 1980s and 1990s. [2] [3] During this period, the Conservative governments of Margaret Thatcher and John Major introduced new employment and trade union laws to reduce the power and influence of trade unions, with new restrictions on industrial action such as picketing and strikes introduced. [3] [4] Between 2015 and 2024, the Conservatives introduced two major pieces of primary legislation on industrial relations, the Trade Union Act 2016 and the Strikes (Minimum Service Levels) Act 2023. [2] These laws introduced further restrictions on trade unions, particularly their finances and their administrative structures, and also enabled the government to set minimum service levels in cases where strike action occurred in key sectors. [2] These laws have been criticised as among the harshest in Europe and the wider developed world and have been credited with leading to a fall in trade union membership and a reduction of workers' rights in the UK since the 1980s. [4] [3]

Under Thatcher and Major, the Labour Party led by Neil Kinnock pledged to repeal the Conservative employment and trade union laws and replace them with a "Charter of Rights" on workers' rights and industrial relations, which would give workers the legal right to union representation and included other provisions such as the legalisation of secondary picketing. [5] [6] However, this commitment was scrapped by Tony Blair as the party shifted to the centre under his New Labour project. [5] [7] Labour preserved the laws when it served in government from 1997 to 2010, but also introduced new individual workers' rights such as the minimum wage and parental leave. [5] [8]

In 2015, the Labour Party shifted back to the left with the election of Jeremy Corbyn as its leader. Under Corbyn, the party pledged to repeal the Trade Union Act 2016 as well as earlier Conservative laws. [2] Under his leadership, the party drew up a green paper, New Deal for Working People, which provided the framework for a new Employment Rights Bill which the party would introduce if it returned to power. Proposals included the repeal of Conservative anti-trade union legislation, a ban on fire and rehire and zero-hour contracts, the introduction of a single legal status for all workers except for those who are self-employed, and provisions which would enable collective bargaining to settle pay disputes across all economic sectors. [9]

Corbyn was succeeded in 2020 by Keir Starmer, who moved Labour back to the centre. Under Starmer's leadership, Labour abandoned most of Corbyn's policy programme but retained his commitment to introduce a new Employment Rights Bill. However, Labour's proposals for the bill under Starmer were toned down and redeveloped into a new "Plan to Make Work Pay" in partnership with businesses and trade unions in order to promote business confidence ahead of the 2024 general election. [9] [10] The revamped proposals limited the repeal of anti-trade union legislation to the Strikes (Minimum Service Levels) Act 2023 and most, but not all, of the Trade Union Act 2016, while pledges to ban zero-hour contracts and fire and rehire were replaced with promises to introduce restrictions and a minimum hour guarantee. The single legal status for workers was also removed, while collective bargaining was limited to the adult social care and school support staff sectors. [9] The Plan to Make Work Pay was included in Labour's manifesto for the 2024 general election. [11]

Parliamentary passage

After Labour's victory in the 2024 general election, the Starmer government named the implementation of the Employment Rights Bill as one of its top priorities for the coming parliamentary term. [12] In the King's Speech at the 2024 State Opening of Parliament, it was confirmed that the government would introduce the Employment Rights Bill to Parliament within its first 100 days in office, with revived commitments to ban fire and rehire and "exploitative" zero-hour contracts. [13] [14] Deputy prime minister Angela Rayner was given oversight over the contents of the bill and its implementation, with business secretary Jonathan Reynolds tasked with leading the bill's passage through Parliament. [14] [15]

Reynolds introduced the bill for its first reading in the House of Commons on 10 October 2024, which was followed by the publication of the draft bill and a government white paper, Next Steps to Make Work Pay, which explained the government's plans for the bill and its implementation. [16] [17]

In November 2025, the government had to defend their decision to reduce instead of abolish the qualifying period for a worker to claim that they had been sacked unfairly. [18]

Provisions

Scope

The Employment Rights Bill intends to strengthen worker's rights and trade union rights. It was designed to promote flexible working, ensure equality, fair pay and wellbeing for workers, strengthen the enforcement of employment law, and modernise employment and industrial relations law, which the Starmer ministry considers outdated. [1] [11] Alongside the government's Equality (Race and Disability) Bill, the bill will implement the Starmer ministry's Plan to Make Work Pay, which forms one of the main elements of the government's five missions to grow the economy and is designed to improve productivity and living standards while also strengthening job retention and preventing unemployment. [11] [19]

The Employment Rights Bill mostly applies to Great Britain, including England, Scotland and Wales, as employment law in Northern Ireland has been devolved to the Northern Ireland Assembly and Northern Ireland Executive since 1998. [1] [2] It is structured into six parts. [20] Parts 1 and 2 of the bill mainly apply to Great Britain except for clause 25, which covers public sector outsourcing and also includes Northern Ireland. Part 3 of the bill applies to England and Wales, as it covers collective bargaining for the adult social care and school support staff sectors, which have different processes in Scotland and Northern Ireland. [21] Part 4 on trade union law and industrial action applies to Great Britain, while part 5 on labour market enforcement and part 6 on more general provisions apply to the entire United Kingdom. [22]

The bill will repeal the Strikes (Minimum Service Levels) Act 2023, Workers (Predictable Terms and Conditions) Act 2023 and most, but not all, of the Trade Union Act 2016. It will also amend the Seafarers Wages Act 2023, Procurement Act 2023, Equality Act 2010, Employment Relations Act 1999, Employment Rights Act 1996 and Trade Union and Labour Relations (Consolidation) Act 1992. [23]

Part 1: Employment rights

Part 1 of the bill covers employment rights, including provisions on zero-hour contracts, flexible working, statutory sick pay, paid leave, tips and gratuities, protections from workplace harassment and unfair dismissal, including fire and rehire. [20] [24] These include a range of new rights for zero-hour workers and working parents, extensions to statutory sick pay eligibility, new rights against unfair dismissal from day one and new restrictions against harassment in the workplace and fire and rehire practices. [20]

Clauses 1 to 6 and schedule 6 of the bill covers zero-hour contracts. This part of the bill amends the Employment Rights Act 1996 to introduce 25 new sections implementing new rights for workers on zero-hour and low-hour contracts. [25] These include the right to a guaranteed minimum hours contract which reflects the hours regularly worked. [25]

Notes and references

  1. 1 2 3 Race 2024.
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 Brione & Cunningham 2024, p. 6.
  3. 1 2 3 Laybourn 2022.
  4. 1 2 Full Fact Team 2011.
  5. 1 2 3 The Guardian 1996.
  6. ↑ Blackburn 1999, pp. 10–11.
  7. ↑ White 1996.
  8. ↑ Colling & Terry 2010, p. 54.
  9. 1 2 3 Weir 2025.
  10. ↑ Smith 2024.
  11. 1 2 3 Department for Business and Trade 2024.
  12. ↑ Bloom & Dawson 2024.
  13. ↑ Local Government Lawyer 2024.
  14. 1 2 Merrick 2024.
  15. ↑ Smyth 2024.
  16. ↑ Brione & Cunningham 2024, p. 10.
  17. ↑ Parliament of the United Kingdom 2025.
  18. ↑ Seddon 2025.
  19. ↑ Leckey & Tawakley 2025.
  20. 1 2 3 Pigott 2025.
  21. ↑ Brione & Cunningham 2024, p. 85.
  22. ↑ Brione & Cunningham 2024, pp. 1, 85.
  23. ↑ Brione & Cunningham 2024.
  24. ↑ House of Commons 2024.
  25. 1 2 Brione & Cunningham 2024, pp. 3, 12–15.

Bibliography

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