As Brexit negotiators resume trade talks this week all the newspapers are telling us that this is going to be a decisive week of talks with large differences still remaining between the EU and UK negotiators.
Any deal that might be reached has still to be ratified by both the EU and the UK. That ratification process takes some time.
So what about employment laws if we crash out and don’t manage to reach a deal with the EU after all?
Joan Pettingill, head of employment law and HR services at Wake Smith Solicitors looks at whether employment laws will become more business friendly after Brexit?
Joan said: “We are currently in a transition period which ends on 31 December 2020. The transition period can’t be extended because the deadline for having an extension has expired.
“No one knows for sure what would happen if we crash out. In the short term little would probably change and things may continue as now.
“The EU withdrawal legislation doesn’t leave us in a hole with no legislation or rules to follow.
“It would depend whether the Government at the relevant time wanted to maintain worker’s rights or scrap certain rights despite reassurances that rights would not reduce.
“No political parties are pinning their colours to making any changes and in fact some statements have been made previously that there wouldn’t be any changes to workers’ rights in the event of a no deal Brexit.
“If we crash out the default position would be EU cases are binding and EU directives continue to affect us until the government changes the law.”
Will the UK agree to uphold existing laws as part of any trade deal reached?
“Statements made before Covid, confirming that a “level playing field” of employment rights would stay, have since been deleted from the withdrawal agreement after the 2019 election.
“In this update we give our best guess as to what might happen longer term if we crash out. The important thing for employers will be to stay up to date which you can do by subscribing to our free Wake Smith’s WorkSmart employment updates. To subscribe click here [insert link].”
So, what might change?
Agency worker regulations
These regulations provide agency workers with comparable pay and benefits after the worker has been on any single placement for over 12 weeks. This rule is universally disliked as workers get moved onto other placements at the end of the 12 weeks, the agency gets less profit if they don’t move the worker and the engaging business loses the worker and has to start all over again with another worker.
Consultation rules
TUPE, the Transfer of Undertakings (Protection of Employment) Regulations are likely to be kept. These come from the EU and are entrenched in our laws. However some aspects of TUPE might change such as the extent of consultations required where there is a transfer of a business or an undertaking so that consultations become less onerous. Businesses might also get more clarity on the circumstances in which contracts of employment might be harmonised as currently the rules around this can seem over complex.
Similarly there could be simplification of rules about collective redundancy consultation. In situations where 20 or more staff need to be consulted on possible redundancies there is a requirement to consult with appropriate union or elected representatives. Some commentators think employers that recognise unions will consult with unions anyway and that employers who don’t recognise unions may no longer need to have elected representatives unless they are particularly large employers. In other words, that larger groups of employees might have their roles made redundant without the same kind of collective consultation procedure being required that we currently have.
Working time rules
Commuting time for some workers counts towards their working time. Working time rules could well change following a no deal Brexit such that workers who travel to different sites from home each day but don’t have a fixed workplace would no longer have their first and last journeys of the day counted towards their working time. There will likely be far reaching changes to holiday pay rules (again) and the much ignored requirement to have workers sign an opt out if they regularly work more than 48 hours a week could also be ditched.
Others
Our discrimination laws are unlikely to change much if at all. Similarly our family friendly laws are already much more favourable than minimum EU laws i.e. our rules on maternity pay so there are unlikely to be changes here.
Alternatively, now we are into the era of Covid and the government has the support of former “Red Wall” constituencies, it may consider it too risky to make these kinds of changes too soon.
For further information about employment law and HR or any of the issues raised, contact Joan at [email protected] or call 0114 224 2087.
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