If the Retained EU Law (Revocation and Reform) Bill comes into force, what does it mean for employment law?
The government has introduced a Retained EU Law (Revocation and Reform) Bill that aims to deliver the “benefits of Brexit”. If passed in its current form, all retained EU law will cease to apply by the end of 2023 and EU law will no longer take priority over UK law. All EU law which overturned UK law, will no longer apply and higher courts can decide to ignore case law impacted or influenced by EU law.
Government ministers have a great deal of power under the Bill and can restate any secondary retained EU law or rewrite it. They can also extend any existing secondary EU law, but not beyond 23 June 2026 (the 10th anniversary of the Brexit referendum).
So what is this likely to mean for employment law?
- TUPE will cease to exist unless renewed and can by amended in any way. We believe it is very likely that TUPE will be renewed, although there may be some amendments of the more difficult aspects of TUPE, such as relaxing the consultation provisions and overturning the ban on post harmonisation of terms and conditions (subject to protections being in place to protect worker’s rights).
- Legislation regarding collective redundancies is primary legislation so will not be overturned. It is likely that we will see changes to collective redundancies in time, but this will require primary legislation.
- Working time regulations will disappear unless reinstated. We believe it will be renewed but amended, for example, to reinstate the UK’s previous law on holiday so that holiday is paid at basic rate only, revert back to no carry over of holiday regardless of the circumstances in which it can’t be taken and removal of the 48-hour limit on a working week. Please note that the 52-week calculation for term time workers decision will still stand as this was decided under UK law. We also think that some of the decisions on working time, in particular on call time, will be amended so that travel time and on call time is not counted as working time.
- Agency Worker regulations will disappear in their entirety.
- Discrimination. All discrimination laws are likely to stay, but we may see compensation for discrimination capped in the future. This will require primary legislation though, so is unlikely to happen soon, and we may see a change in Government with a different view on this matter.
As always, if you have any questions regarding any of the above, please do get in touch with one of the team.
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