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Recap 2022

After what felt like forever, 2019, ‘20 and ‘21 came and gone, and we finally saw the light at the end of a very long period of lockdown and pandemic restrictions. On 24 February 2022, the Legal restrictions relating to Covid, including the requirement to self-isolate, were removed in England. Routine contact tracing ended, and Self-isolation payments for those on a low income.

Then on 15 March 2022, the controversial decision that required mandatory vaccination for those working in care homes and within health and social care was revoked. On 17 March 2022, The SSP rebate scheme for covid-related sickness closed, followed by the COVID-19 provisions within the Statutory Sick Pay and Employment and Support Allowance.

1 April 2022 saw National minimum wage rates increase and Fit notes no longer having to be signed by a doctor. Following this, on 3 April 2022, Family-friendly payment rates increased, including SMP, SAP, SHPP, SPP and SPBP, a sign that we had moved on from lockdown.

On 6 April 2022, the lower earnings limit increased for the first time in two years to £123, and the SSP rate, Compensation limits, statutory guarantee pay and weekly redundancy payments all increased and National insurance contributions increased by 1.25% to support NHS.

6 April 2022, back to Brexit and the ability to manually check the status of those with a biometric residence card, permit, or frontier work permit was removed. From that point, only online checks were possible.

From 1 July 2022, more medical professionals could now certify fit notes, including nurses, occupational therapists, pharmacists, and physiotherapists, where they work in a general practice or hospital setting.

20 July 2022 saw a milestone hearing, Harpur Trust v Brazel, issued by the Supreme Court changed how we calculate holidays.

The case confirms that part-year workers should not have their holiday pro-rata in accordance with the weeks they have worked; they are entitled to a full 5.6 every year.

The judgment also rejected using 12.07% of hours worked in calculating leave and pay entitlement. Impacting those employers using ‘rolled-up holiday pay’, and holidays should be based on a 52 working week average.

On 21 July 2022, legislation preventing employers from engaging temporary workers to undertake duties usually performed by striking workers was repealed, making it easier for employers to reduce the impact of industrial action.

1 October 2022, a permanent system of digital right-to-work checks replaced all temporary covid measures.

6 November 2022, repeal of health and social care levy, the 1.25% NI contribution increase brought in on 6 April 2022 was reversed.

5 December 2022, a ban on exclusivity clauses was extended to employees on contracts with a guaranteed weekly income below or equivalent to the Lower Earnings Limit (LEL).

In Summary 2022, as we exited a very long period of uncertainty, the most significant change to employing people came from the cultural shift of employees expecting more from employers. This included laterally the cost of living crisis and more hybrid and home working. In most cases, employers responded without considering the consequences and, as a result, struggled to hire and gain the engagement and commitment that they had from their employees before the pandemic.

As a business, Best HR supported our clients this year by asking employees for commitment in return for rewards and took this approach with bonuses, benefits and policies that only allow employees to gain benefits if conditions and criteria are met.

 

National Minimum wage increase – 1st April 2023

 

Tip Allocation – Date TBC

Current legislation allows employers to take a percentage of tips earned by staff, and proposed changes will impact and benefit over one million workers.

The Employment (Allocation of Tips) Bill proposes to make it unlawful for employers not to provide employees with 100% of the tips left by customers.

It is proposed that tips will be distributed fairly and transparently so that employees are paid what they have earned. This will likely be accompanied by a Code of Practice, which will offer more guidance on which workers benefit from the tips in different situations.

Enforcement of these obligations still needs to be clarified. It is proposed that employers will have to record tips and show how they have been allocated. Records will need to be kept for a minimum period, and workers will have a right to request to see these records.

We will provide further guidance on these changes as and when they are confirmed.

The Retained EU Law (Revocation and Reform) Bill – TBC

By the end of this year, the Retained EU Law (Revocation and Reform) Bill aims to abolish all EU law that is not specifically reinstated or replaced. Affecting a number of EU-derived secondary legislation, including the Working Time Regulations, Agency Worker Regulations and TUPE.

A significant change for Employers and Employees. However, like other EU changes, this has the possibility of delay. We will provide further guidance on these changes as and when they are confirmed.

Flexible Working – TBC

The current position is that an employee must have worked for 26 weeks before they can make a statutory flexible working request, a request can only be made once per year, and the employer must notify the outcome within a three-month decision period.

The new measures are to include making this a day one right, a new requirement for employers to consult with employees when they intend to reject the request, allowing two statutory requests a year, providing a decision period of two months and removing the existing requirement for an employee to explain what effect, if any, the change applied would have on the employer and how that effect might be dealt with.

We will provide further guidance on these changes as and when they are confirmed.

Carer’s Leave Bill – TBC

By The Carer’s Leave Bill proposed the introduction of a day one right for up to five working days of unpaid leave for employees with long-term caring responsibilities of a dependant, either arranging or providing care.

Dependants include partners, children, parents, people living in the same house as the employee and people who reasonably rely on the employee.

The employee will be required to give notice twice the length of the leave and can take the time as partial or full days and can be taken flexibly at different times to suit their caring responsibilities. Proof is not needed to show how the leave has been used.

If the Bill becomes law, employees will be protected from dismissal or detriment due to taking this leave. If an employer dismisses an employee because of this leave, it will be automatically unfair dismissal.

We will provide further guidance on these changes as and when they are confirmed.

Neonatal Care (Leave and Pay) Bill – TBC

The Government has confirmed they will introduce a new right for parents to take up to 12 weeks of paid leave, in addition to other leave entitlements, if their baby is in neonatal care.

This will be a ‘Day 1’ right to take leave, but to also receive pay for the leave, an employee must have a minimum of 26 weeks of service with their employer and earn more than the ‘lower earnings limit’ (which is currently at least £123 per week).

We will provide further guidance on these changes as and when they are confirmed.

Redundancy Protection for Pregnancy and Family Leave – TBC

As the law currently stands, in a redundancy process, an employer must offer those on maternity leave, adoption leave or shared parental leave suitable alternative employment (if it exists) as a priority over other employees provisionally selected for redundancy. Failure to do so is automatically unfair.

The Protection from Redundancy (Pregnancy and Family Leave) Bill proposes to increase this protection to extend to the point from which the employee tells their employer they are pregnant/ will be taking adoption or shared parental leave and also after they have returned to work, potentially for a period of up to 18 months after the child’s birth/ adoption.

We will provide further guidance on these changes as and when they are confirmed.

The Worker Protection (Amendment of Equality Act 2010) Bill – TBC

The Bill introduces a positive duty to ‘take all reasonable steps’ to prevent sexual harassment in the workplace. It would also make employers potentially liable for the harassment of staff by third parties, such as clients or customers, if they have failed to take all reasonable steps to prevent such harassment.

An employment tribunal would have the power to apply an uplift of up to 25% on tribunal awards where the duty to prevent harassment had not been complied with.

We will provide further guidance on these changes as and when they are confirmed.

A statutory Code of Practice on “fire and rehire” – TBC

In March 2022, the Government announced that a new Statutory Code of Practice would be published on the use of “fire and rehire” practices to bring about changes to employees’ terms and conditions.

The Government has recently confirmed it intends to publish the draft Statutory Code of Practice on dismissal and re-engagement.

We will provide further guidance on these changes as and when they are confirmed.

Anti-Strike bill – Coming soon

The government has announced a new Anti-Strike Bill – which is due to go through Parliament in the coming weeks. It will impact six key public services and see trade unions “bound to follow” the legislation in a bid to ensure minimum service levels and avoid a complete shutdown.

The Government stated that those who do not comply would be at risk of the employer bringing an injunction to prevent the strike from taking place or seeking damages after the event if strikers and unions do not stick to their obligations.

We will provide further guidance on these changes as and when they are confirmed.

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