The Employment Bill has finally been given royal assent.
The Employment
Act includes provisions for new maternity, paternity and adoption
leave rights, the right to request flexible working, changes to employment
tribunal procedure, and (most controversially) new minimum statutory
disciplinary and grievance procedures. However, most of these provisions
require regulations to implement them. Draft regulations have been
published covering the family friendly provisions, but these are subject
to consultation and may change. No draft regulations have been published
in relation to the statutory procedures.
We will be providing further details of the changes made by the Act in
due course, but the important point to note at this stage is that none
of the changes are due to come into force this calendar year. The
statutory disciplinary and grievance procedures are not expected to be
