2024 is expected to be an exceptionally busy year for new employment law legislation. To help you keep track of the changes, we will update this note once a month with any developments.
1 April 2024
This is the earliest date when irregular hours and part-year workers may see changes to their annual leave entitlements, accrual methods and holiday pay because the new rules for these workers apply from their first holiday year commencing on or after 1 April. See our detailed update on the new rules.
6 April 2024
Flexible Working
The right to request flexible working becomes a right from day one of employment on 6 April 2024 (Flexible Working (Amendment) Regulations 2023). The Employment Relations (Flexible Working) Act 2023 will also come into force and make the following changes to the flexible working regime:
- Employees will be entitled to make two requests a year
- Employees will no longer have to explain in their request what effect their requested change may have on the employer and how any such effect might be dealt with
- Employers must consult the employee before refusing their request
- Employers will have two months to make a decision on a request (subject to agreeing a longer decision period)
Unpaid carers leave
The Carer’s Leave Regulations 2024 (currently available in draft form) are expected to come into force on 6 April 2024. They introduce a new statutory right to one week’s unpaid carer’s leave for eligible employees in England, Wales and Scotland. In summary:
- An employee may take one week’s unpaid leave to provide or arrange care for a dependant with a long-term care need in each rolling 12-month period.
- A ‘dependant’ is defined to include a spouse, civil partner, child or parent, someone living in the same household (who is not a boarder, employee, lodger or tenant), or anyone who reasonably relies on the employee to provide or arrange care.
- The dependant will have a ‘long-term care need’ if they are disabled (using the Equality Act 2010 definition), require care due to old age, or have an illness or injury (whether physical or mental) that requires, or is likely to require, care for more than three months.
- The carers leave may be taken in either individual full or half days, up to a block of one week.
- The employee must give the employer whichever is the greater of: (a) twice as many days’ notice as the period of leave required; or (b) three days. The notice does not need to be in writing and an employer cannot require evidence in relation to the request before granting the leave.
Extended redundancy protection during/after pregnancy, adoption leave and SPL
The Maternity Leave, Adoption Leave and Shared Parental Leave (Amendment) Regulations 2024 (currently available in draft form) are expected to come into force on 6 April 2024. In summary:
- A mother will benefit from additional redundancy protection during her pregnancy, maternity leave, and for 18 months after childbirth (regardless of whether she returns to work earlier). Where the protected period covers pregnancy, the new rules would apply where the employee notifies their employer of their pregnancy on or after 6 April 2024. The new rules apply to maternity leave ending on or after 6 April 2024.
- There are similar provisions for:
- Adoption leave ending on or after 6 April 2024 – the additional protection ends the day after a period of 18 months beginning with the day the child is placed with the employee for adoption (or enters GB from overseas if an adoption from abroad).
- Shared parental leave of six weeks or more starting on or after 6 April 2024 – for those taking six or more consecutive weeks of shared parental leave, who have not taken a period of maternity or adoption leave, the additional protected period ends 18 months after the date of the child’s birth or placement, or date they enter GB.
- An employee benefiting from this extended protection is not excluded from being selected for redundancy. However, if there are any suitable and appropriate vacancies, the employer must offer them to the protected individual before they are offered to other employees who have been selected for redundancy. Failure to do so renders the dismissal automatically unfair.
Paternity leave
The Paternity Leave (Amendment) Regulations 2024 (currently available in draft form) are expected to come into force on 8 March 2024, but will apply from 6 April 2024. In summary:
- Fathers/partners will be able to take paternity leave at any point in the first year after birth/adoption and to break their two-week paternity leave entitlement into two one-week blocks if they wish.
- The notice requirements are relaxed for birth cases, so that only 28 days’ notice of a block of paternity leave (or a variation of start date) is required.
- In birth cases, the new rules apply for babies with an expected week of childbirth after 6 April. In adoption cases, the new rules apply of the expected date of placement (or child’s entry into GB for adoption) is on or after 6 April.
9 May 2024
Check of in the public sector
The government is introducing public sector restrictions on trade union check-off from 9 May 2024. Check-off is a system whereby trade union membership subscriptions are deducted from the salaries of members by their employers and paid over to the relevant trade unions. The practice is particularly widespread across the public sector. The Trade Union Act 2016 contains provisions designed to introduce restrictions on check-off in the public sector, but so far these had not been brought into force. The government intends to bring these restrictions into force on 9 Mary 2024. To facilitate this, the government has recently passed commencement regulations. In summary, from 9 May 2024, relevant public sector employers will only be able to operate check-off systems as long as both:
- Affected workers have the option to pay their trade union subscriptions by another means; and
- Arrangements have been made for the union to make a reasonable payment to the employer in respect of its operation of the check-off system.
The government has also laid the Trade Union (Deduction of Union Subscriptions from Wages in the Public Sector) Regulations 2023 (available in draft form here) before parliament, which also come into force on 9 May 2024. These:
- Specify relevant public sector employers; and
- Provide that an employment contract or collective agreement which, immediately before 9 May 2024, contained a provision permitting or requiring a specified relevant public sector employer to make deductions from its workers’ wages in respect of trade union subscriptions is to be treated as if it prohibited any deduction from workers’ wages in respect of trade union subscriptions otherwise than in accordance with the new rules.
1 July 2024
TUPE consultation duties relaxed
The Employment Rights (Amendment, Revocation and Transitional Provision) Regulations 2023 make changes to the Transfer of Undertakings (Protection of Employment) Regulations 2006 (TUPE) to reform the consultation requirements for smaller businesses for transfers taking place on or after 1st July 2024.
The circumstances in which employers can inform and consult directly with employees where no existing employee representatives are in place, will be extended and the requirement to elect employee representatives will not apply if:
- The employer employs fewer than 50 employees; or
- There are fewer than 10 employees who are to be (or are likely to be) transferred.
Fair and transparent distribution of tips, gratuities and service charges
It is anticipated that Employment (Allocation of Tips) Act 2023 may possibly be brought into force on 1 July 2024, to coincide with the introduction of the new statutory code of practice for the fair and transparent distribution of tips, gratuities and service charges. See our update on the public consultation on the draft code of practice here.
September 2024
Workers will have new right to request a predictable work pattern
The Workers (Predictable Terms and Conditions) Act 2023 is expected to come into force around September 2024. Workers and agency workers will have a new right to request a predictable work pattern if they meet the following criteria:
- Minimum length of service: the minimum length of service will be specified in regulations, but the stated intention is for this to be 26 weeks’ continuous service.
- Lack of predictability: if there is a lack of predictability as regards any part of the worker’s work pattern (eg if they are on a zero hours’ contract and do not have a guaranteed number of hours). Fixed term contracts of 12 months or less are presumed to lack predictability.
- Work pattern: the requested change relates to their ‘work pattern’, such as the number of hours the worker works, the days of the week and times the worker works and the length of the worker’s contract.
- Purpose of request: the worker’s purpose in applying is to have a more predictable work pattern.
- Number of requests: the worker has made no more than two applications in the last year (this limit includes any flexible working applications asking for a change in terms and conditions which would have the effect of delivering a more predictable working pattern).
In a similar approach to the flexible working regime, the employer (or in the case of an agency worker, either the temporary work agency or the hirer under whose supervision and direction they are working) will be able to reject the worker’s application on statutory grounds. A worker will be able to bring a claim relating to the employer’s procedural failings and/or if they suffer a detriment or are dismissed because of their request.
October 2024
New duty to prevent sexual harassment in the workplace
The Worker Protection (Amendment of Equality Act 2010) Act 2023 is expected to come into force on 26 October 2024. This will:
- Place employers under a new mandatory duty to take ‘reasonable steps’ to prevent sexual harassment of their employees in the course of their employment; and
- Give employment tribunals the power to uplift sexual harassment compensation by up to 25% where an employer is found to have breached the new duty to prevent sexual harassment.
It is anticipated that the EHRC will update its technical guidance on sexual harassment and its Employment Code of Practice in advance of these changes coming into force.
For further information, please contact:
Emma Ahmed, Hill Dickinson
emma.ahmed@hilldickinson.com
