Jenny Willott, the Minister for Employment Relations and Consumer Affairs spoke recently at a seminar organised by the Westminster Employment Forum. She talked about changes to employment law, its impact so far and the next steps.
She updated the audience on what Government has done since 2010 in topics such as zero hours contracts, shared parental leave, flexible working, migration, employment tribunals and whistleblowing. Here is a transcript of the speech on the Gov.uk website. We would welcome any comments you have on the on-going reforms.
5 comments
Comment by Darren Newman posted on
I would be interested to know whether the Minister agrees with her colleague Matthew Hancock MP who told the Federation of Small Businesses on 28 March this year -
"Our tribunal reforms are working. Jobs are up and the number of cases taken to tribunal is down 80%. The only work being hit by our tribunal reform is the workload of employment lawyers"
In particular, does the Minister also regard the 80 per cent fall in ET cases as a good thing?
Comment by Labour Market Team posted on
As mentioned in her speech the Minister has stated the Government’s commitment to review the impact of Employment Tribunal fees and changes to the remission system. However, it has not yet been a full year since these changes and full details of the review are still to be confirmed but we will let people know more as soon as we can. Further data on Employment Tribunal claims is due for release on 12 June (https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/tribunals-statistics) and this will help inform the review.
Comment by Kevin McNerney posted on
Can you stop calling them reforms? Changes would be more accurate.
Comment by C Justin posted on
While there has been some sensible tidying up of employment provisions, the increase in qualifying period for unfair dismissal, the cap on compensation and the introduction of fees (to name but a few) have seriously weakened employment protection for ordinary people. This leads to job insecurity and an unwillingness to spend .
Comment by Labour Market Team posted on
Thanks for your point C Justin. We have listened to businesses and removed unnecessary barriers to employment. But flexibility works both ways – new policy on Shared Parental Leave and the right to request flexible working give people more choice and flexibility so they can fit work around their life. A record number of people are now in work - over 30 million. Businesses are hiring and people are finding work. We are keen to see this trend continue.