As 2023 came to a close, so did the supremacy of EU law and all directly effective EU rights. Now it will be for the Retained EU Law (Revocation and Reform) Act 2023 to set out how EU derived case law and legislation will be used in the UK moving forward in 2024.
However, post-BREXIT employment reform is only one of a number of areas of change in 2024 that employers need to be aware of. From a day one right to flexible working requests, proactively preventing sexual harassment, statutory leave for carers, to the largest ever cash increase in the national minimum wage, 2024 will see many changes for employers and employees. Below is our summary of what this year will bring in employment law together with key dates to note and links to the legislation.
January 2024
The Employment Rights (Amendment, Revocation and Transitional Provision) Regulations 2023
Changes effective on or after 1 January 2024
From 1 January 2024, the following principles relating to the carryover of annual leave will apply:
- Workers can normally carry over a maximum of eight days into the next leave year, with the agreement of their employer.
- If a worker gets more than 28 days’ leave, their employer may allow them to carry over any additional untaken leave.
- If any worker is unable to take some or all of their statutory holiday entitlement as a result of taking a period of maternity or other family-related leave, then they will be entitled to carry forward up to 28 days of their untaken leave into the following leave year.
- If a worker working regular hours all year-round is unable to take some or all of their statutory holiday entitlement as a result of being off sick, then the worker will be entitled to carry forward up to 20 days of their untaken leave into the following leave year, provided it is then taken by the end of the period of 18 months starting from the end of the leave year in which it was accrued. These 20 days should be paid at the “normal” rate.
- An irregular-hours worker or part-year worker will be entitled to carry over up to 28 days of leave in these circumstances. The worker would need to use that leave they have carried over within 18 months starting from the end of the leave year in which it accrued.
- An employer must allow a worker who is unable to take their statutory holiday entitlement as they are on maternity or other family related leave to carry over all their holiday entitlement to the following leave year.
From 1 January 2024, employees will no longer be able to carry over up to four weeks of annual leave where it had not been reasonably practicable for them to take annual leave because of the effects of COVID-19. Any employees who have any COVID-19 carry over leave must use it by 31 March 2024.
Normal Remuneration
With effect from 1 January 2024, normal remuneration for the purposes of holiday pay in the four weeks of normal holiday pay under Regulation 13 of the Working Time Regulations should include:
- Payments, including commission payments, intrinsically linked to the performance of tasks which a worker is contractually obliged to carry out;
- Payments relating to professional or personal status relating to length of service, seniority or professional qualifications; and
- Other payments, such as overtime payments, which have been regularly paid to a worker in the 52 weeks preceding the calculation date.
Read the Employment Rights (Amendment, Revocation and Transitional Provision) Regulations 2023.
Equality Act 2010 (Amendment Regulations) 2023
Changes in force from 1 January 2024.
The Amendment Regulations reenact EU-derived laws relating to pregnancy and maternity discrimination, discrimination by association and equal pay such to enable the continuation of protections currently in place. The Amendment Regulations provide the following amendments to the act.
Direct Discrimination
- Adds the word “maternity” into the act to protect against maternity discrimination.
- Amends unlawful discrimination to include treating a woman less favourably at work because they are breastfeeding.
- Adds a new provision to the act to prohibit discriminatory statements made to the public, or a section of the public, about whom to offer employment at any time and not limited to an active recruitment process.
Indirect Associative Discrimination
- The “single source test” will be confirmed for establishing an equal pay comparator, and a further provision will be included in the act, whereby workers governed by the same collective agreement can also be included as comparators.
Definition of Disability
- The reference to normal day-to-day activities will be extended to include a person’s ability to participate fully and effectively in working life on an equal basis with other workers.
Read the Equality Act 2010 (Amendment) Regulations 2023.
March 2024
Gender Pay Gap Reporting
The gender pay gap reporting deadline for public authority employees is on 30 March 2024, using a snapshot date of 31 March 2023.
April2024
National Minimum Wage
Coming into force 1 April 2024.
The regulations amended the National Minimum Wage Regulations 2015 to change the hourly rates of the national minimum wage and national living wage with effect on 1 April 2024.
The age threshold for the national living wage is lowered to apply to workers aged 21 and over, rather than 23 and over.
The national living wage and national minimum wage rate will increase as follows:
- The national living wage (for those aged 21 or older) will increase from £10.42 to £11.44 per hour.
- The national minimum wage (for those aged 18-20) will increase from £7.49 to £8.60 per hour.
- The national minimum wage for those aged 16-17 and for apprentices under 19, or over 19 and in the first year of the apprenticeship, will increase from £5.28 to £6.40 per hour.
From 6 April 2024, the rate of statutory sick pay will increase to £116.75 for seven days.
From 7 April 2024, statutory weekly rate for maternity, paternity, shared parental, adoption and parental bereavement pay are proposed to increase to £184.03 per week or 90% of the employees average weekly earnings – whichever is the lower.
Read the Statutory Maternity, Paternity, Adoption, Shared Parental and Parental Bereavement document.
The Employment Rights (Amendment, Revocation and Transitional Provision) Regulations 2023
Changes effective on or after 1 April 2024.
The regulations introduce the following changes to holiday rules:
- For annual leave years starting on or after 1 April 2024, holiday entitlement for irregular hours workers and part-year workers will be calculated as 12.07% of actual hours worked in a pay period.
- For leave years beginning on or after 1 April 2024, employers can use rolled-up holiday pay as an additional method for calculating holiday pay for irregular hour and part-year workers only. Employers using rolled-up holiday pay should:
› Calculate it based on a worker’s total pay in a pay period;
› Inform the workers that they intend to start using rolled-up holiday pay (check if this will entail a variation of the workers’ contract); and
› Ensure holiday pay is paid at the same time as the worker is paid for the work done in each pay period and that this payment is clearly marked as a separate item on the pay slip.
Read the guidance on holiday pay and entitlement reforms.
Gender Pay Gap Reporting
The gender pay gap reporting deadline for private companies and voluntary organisations with 250 or more staff is on 4 April 2024, using a snapshot date of 5 April 2023.
Employment Relations (Flexible Working) Act 2023 & Flexible Working (Amendment) Regulations 2023
Coming into force 6 April 2024.
The act and regulations will make changes to the right to request flexible working so that:
- The right to request flexible working will become a day one right (there will no longer be a requirement for a qualifying period of 26 weeks continuous employment).
- Employees will no longer have to explain what effect their requested change may have on the employer and how any such effect might be dealt with.
- Employees will be entitled to make two requests (instead of one) in any 12-month period.
- Employers will not be able to refuse a request unless the employee has been consulted.
- Employers will have to make a decision in two months (reduced from three months), subject to agreeing to a longer decision period.
Read the Flexible Working (Amendment) Regulations 2023.
The Protection from Redundancy (Pregnancy and Family Leave) Act 2023
Coming into force 6 April 2024.
Employees who are pregnant or returning from maternity, adoption or shared parental leave will receive an extension to the period of special protection in a redundancy situation (i.e. the right to be offered suitable alternative vacancy, if one is available, before being made redundant). The extension will apply during pregnancy and for a period of up to 18 months following the birth or placement for adoption of a child.
The extension to include protection during pregnancy will apply where the employer has been informed of the pregnancy on or after 6 April 2024. The extension of the protected period will apply to any maternity and adoption leave ending on or after 6 April 2024.
For those taking shared parental leave who have not taken maternity or adoption leave, the extension of protection will cover 18 months from birth provided that a six-week threshold of continuous shared parental leave is taken.
Read the Protection from Redundancy (Pregnancy and Family Leave) Act 2023.
Paternity Leave (Amendment) Regulations 2024
Changes will apply to all cases where the expected week of childbirth is on or after 6 April 2024.
The amended regulations will allow eligible employees to take their two weeks of paternity leave in two separate blocks of a week at any time during the first 12 months following birth or adoption. (Previously eligible employees had to take either two consecutive weeks or one week in total and the leave had to be taken within 56 days of the birth.)
Notice provisions have also been changed so that employees will now only need to give 28 days of their intention to take paternity leave.
Read the Paternity Leave (Amendment) Regulations 2024.
Carer’s Leave Act 2023
Coming into force 6 April 2024.
From 6 April 2024, employees will have a statutory right to one week (five working days) unpaid carer’s leave in each rolling 12-month period to care for a dependant with a long-term care need.
- Carer’s leave is a day one right and there is no minimum service requirement before an employee can request a period of leave.
- Carer’s leave will apply to employees and is intended to allow the individual to provide or arrange care for a dependant with a long-term care need.
- The definition of “dependant” includes a spouse, civil partner, child, parent, a person who lives in the same household as the employee (other than by reason of them being their employee, tenant, lodger or boarder) or the wider catch-all provision of a person who reasonably relies on the employee for care.
- “Long term care” is defined as illness or injury (physical or mental) that requires or is likely to require care for more than three months, a disability under the Equality Act 2010 or issues related to old age.
- The leave may be taken in either individual days or half days, for up to a block of one week. There is no requirement to use the leave on consecutive days.
- The required notice period (which does not need to be in writing) is either twice as many days as the period of leave required or three days, whichever is greater.
- An employer cannot require evidence before granting the leave but may request an employee to self-certify that they meet the legal definition of a carer and will be using the leave to provide care for a dependant.
- Employees are entitled to return to the same job they were doing immediately before they took carer’s leave.
- Dismissal of an employee for a reason connected with their taking carer’s leave will be automatically unfair. An employee will also be protected from detriment attributable to the fact that they took or sought to take carer’s leave.
- An employee can bring an employment tribunal claim against their employer if they consider that their request has been unreasonably postponed or they have been prevented from taking their leave. The employment tribunal can make a declaration and award compensation.
Read the Carer’s Leave Act 2023.
May 2024
Trade Union Act 2016 (Commencement No 6) Regulation 2023
Coming into force 9 May 2024.
The regulations will bring into force a restriction on trade union “check-off” in the public sector. The utilisation of check-offs by trade unions to collect union dues will now be subject to more stringent control ‒ namely a requirement for written consent or contractual approval by the employee.
Read the Trade Union Act 2016 (Commencement No. 6) Regulations 2023.
July 2024
Employment (Allocation of Tips) Act 2023
Expected to come into force 1 July 2024.
The Employment (Allocation of Tips) Act 2023 will apply to all workers and provides new rules to ensure the fair and transparent allocation of all tips, gratuities and service charges amongst workers.
Employers will also be required to:
- Maintain a written policy on how tips are dealt with at their place of business and ensure this policy is made available to all their workers; and
- Maintain a record of all tips paid at their place of business and their allocation and distribution between each worker, to which workers have the right to request access.
Read the draft of the Code of Practice on Fair and Transparent Distribution of Tips, published 15 December 2023. Employers must regard the code when designing and implementing their tipping policies and practices.
Read the Employment (Allocation of Tips) Act 2023.
The Employment Rights (Amendment, Revocation and Transitional Provision) Regulations 2023
Changes effective on or after 1 July 2024.
For transfers taking place on or after 1 July 2024, there will be changes to Transfer of Undertakings Protection of Employment (TUPE) consultation obligations which will allow small businesses (fewer than 50 workers) undertaking a TUPE transfer, and small transfers (involving fewer than 10 workers) of any size of business, to consult directly with the workers rather than electing representatives. This will be subject to there being no existing trade union or other employee representatives in place.
September 2024
Workers (Predictable Terms and Conditions) Act 2023
Coming into force September 2024.
The Workers (Predictable Terms and Conditions) Act 2023 will give workers and agency workers a statutory right to request more predictable terms and conditions of work where there is a lack of predictability with regard to any part of their work pattern, i.e. zero hours or fixed term contracts of less than 12 months.
- The worker can make two applications in a 12-month period – this may include a flexible working request if the request would have the effect of providing a more predictable working pattern.
- The worker may request changes to their working patterns such as the hours, days, and times the worker works to obtain a more predictable work pattern.
- The employer will be able to reject a workers application on statutory grounds. These will be specified in regulations due to come out later in 2024.
- The minimum service requirement to access the right to request a more predictable working pattern is expected to be 26 weeks. This is due to be confirmed in the regulations expected later in 2024.
Whilst we await the regulations providing further detail of the act, ACAS has published a consultation on a draft Code of Practice on handling requests under the act that will close on 17 January 2024.
Read the Workers (Predictable Terms and Conditions) Act 2023.
October 2024
Worker Protection (Amendment of Equality Act) Act 2023
Coming into force October 2024.
The Worker Protection (Amendment of Equality Act) Act 2023 introduces a positive duty on employers to take reasonable steps to prevent sexual harassment of their employees.
When a complaint of sexual harassment is made to an employment tribunal, and it is found that the employer has failed to take reasonable steps, compensation may be increased by up to 25%.
Read the Worker Protection (Amendment of Equality Act 2010) Act 2023.
Future Effective Dates to be Confirmed
Neonatal Care (Leave and Pay) Act 2023
Expected in 2025 but potentially at the end of 2024.
The Neonatal Care (Leave and Pay) Act 2023 creates a statutory right to statutory paid neonatal care leave for employees with a parental or other personal relationship with children receiving neonatal care in addition to other family leave.
- The right to neonatal care leave will be a day one right.
- There will be a minimum entitlement to one week of neonatal leave up to a maximum of 12 weeks.
- The right to neonatal care leave pay will require 26 weeks of service and earnings of at least £123 per week.
- Neonatal pay will be at the lower of either a statutory flat rate in line with other family leave pay, or 90% of the employee’s average earnings.
- Neonatal leave must be taken within the first 68 weeks following the child’s birth.
- Neonatal leave will be taken at the end of any other parental leave entitlement.
Read the Neonatal Care (Leave and Pay) Act 2023.
Pensions (Extension of Automatic Enrolment) Act 2023
Date to be confirmed.
The Pensions (Extension of Automatic Enrolment) Act 2023 will reduce the age that eligible workers will be automatically enrolled in a workplace pension from age 22 to age 18. The lower earnings limit for qualifying earnings will also be removed so contributions will apply from the first £1 of earnings.
Read the Pensions (Extension of Automatic Enrolment) Act 2023.