Britain votes to leave the EU. David Cameron resigns and there is a lot of uncertainty.
One of the uncertainties remain around Employment law, how will this decision affect rights of workers, will there be changes in employment law?
My view is leaving the EU will not make any immediate difference as we have implemented all EU Directives into Regulations, which remain binding UK regulations.
If the UK has full freedom to repeal all European employment law, I envisage the following:
TUPE
TUPE will remain, however there would be some tweaking such as a relaxation of consultation provision.
Redundancy Consultation
Our 20+ redundancy consultation law derives from an EU Directive. These are not popular with employers and therefore may be subject to change. For example, requiring collective consultation for a more substantial amount of people being made redundant rather than 20.
Working Time Regulations (WTR)
Most of the WTR will remain. Paid holiday will certainly stay. However, legislation will be passed to reverse some of the holiday time cases such as accruing holiday during long term sick leave.
I also consider that a “weeks’ pay” which currently includes commission and overtime following ECJ rulings, will revert back to the position it was a few years ago to just basic salary being paid as holiday pay.
Agency Worker Regulations
These have been unpopular and are likely to be repealed.
Discrimination
We had already legislated to prohibit sex, race and disability discrimination long before Europe required us to do so. Therefore, I do not consider that any of the protected characteristics will be removed. However, discrimination compensation may be capped.
Family-friendly policies
Family-friendly policies such as maternity, paternity and share parental leave are unlikely to be affected. We exceed EU rights considerably: 52 weeks for maternity and shared parental leave.
So, whilst things settle down and we await our new prime minister, keep calm and stay positive!
