The Secretary of State for the Division for Enterprise and Commerce, Kemi Badenoch MP, has immediately issued a written assertion saying that the Authorities will change the present sundown within the Retained EU Legislation Invoice with an inventory of the retained EU legal guidelines that it intends to revoke below the Invoice on the finish of 2023. Different legal guidelines will stay on the statute books till there may be time for correct evaluation and session.
Ms Badenoch MP has additionally introduced that the primary in a collection of reform packages geared toward ‘leveraging post-Brexit regulatory freedoms’ will tackle employment legislation ‘the place there is a chance to enhance regulation following our departure from the EU, while sustaining UK labour requirements that are among the highest on the earth’.
The coverage paper right here units out the next proposals; laws might be launched ‘when Parliamentary time permits’.
Non-compete clauses
The Authorities proposes limiting the size of non-compete clauses to three months. The coverage paper states that this won’t intervene with the flexibility of employers to make use of (paid) discover durations or backyard depart, non-solicitation clauses or confidentiality clauses (although it doesn’t point out non-dealing clauses). This follows a session on a broader vary of doable reforms in 2020-2021 (see our weblog publish right here). With so little element obtainable, there are significantly extra questions than solutions at this stage (for instance, to what extent will it apply retrospectively to present contracts, will backyard depart must be set-off in opposition to the three month interval, will the Authorities prioritise pushing this reform by means of …) – however it’s definitely one to look at given the possibly very vital influence on employers in sectors the place 6 or 12 month non-competes are market follow.
TUPE
Presently employers with no applicable worker representatives can solely inform and seek the advice of workers immediately in relation to a TUPE switch the place they make use of fewer than 10 workers in complete. The Authorities will seek the advice of on broadening the exemption to small companies (with fewer than 50 workers in complete) the place the switch impacts fewer than 10 workers.
Working Time Rules
The Authorities intends to reform the Working Time Rules this 12 months and might be consulting on proposals to
- take away the requirement for employers to maintain information of all people’ working hours. This obligation is derived from EU case-law (see our weblog publish right here); the UK laws solely expressly require ‘sufficient information’ to indicate whether or not the weekly working closing dates (save for individuals who have opted out) and evening work limits are being complied with. We aren’t conscious of the HSE having modified its enforcement strategy to mirror the EU case-law, so many employers won’t have modified their follow to mirror the case-law anyway, however reform would a minimum of take away any considerations.
- decreasing the executive burden and complexity of calculating vacation pay by (i) introducing rolled-up vacation pay (one other follow that some employers have continued to make use of on the idea that it was essentially the most sensible answer for atypical employees, regardless of being illegal below EU case-law), and (ii) merging the present 4 weeks EU-derived annual depart entitlement with the extra 1.6 weeks statutory annual depart, presumably in order that each sorts can be handled constantly by way of pay in lieu, carry-over, and so on.
To debate the implications of those proposals additional please do get in contact together with your normal HSF contact.
