The New Employment Rights Bill Is Published

One of the Labour Party's key manifesto pledges was to make sweeping changes to rights at work and to "Make Work Pay". They asserted that the changes would be published within 100 days, and today, 98 days into their first 100 days, the Employment Rights Bill has been published.

Much of the detail of the legislation is as expected from the manifesto, but the particularities and the question of when it will be implemented, are still outstanding. Many reports suggest that due to the time involved in consulting and implementing the significant changes, they are unlikely to be in force before Autumn 2026.

The key provisions are:

• unfair dismissal protection to become a day one right with the removal of the qualifying period although subject to a probationary period the length of which is still to be determined through consultation;