Yesterday saw the first King’s Speech under the new Labour government, which set out the priorities and legislative agenda for the year ahead.
 
As we know, during the general election campaign, Labour promised to deliver extensive employment law reform, if it came to power, so it came as no surprise to see these plans feature within the Speech. (You can read our analysis of Labour’s employment plans here).
 
So, what more did we learn fro the Speech?
 
The Plan to Make Work Pay
 
Firstly, it was confirmed in the Speech that the new government is ‘…committed to making work pay and will legislate to introduce a new deal for working people to ban exploitative practices and enhance employment rights’.
 
Briefing notes, released with the Speech, reaffirm previous statements that a new Employment Rights Bill will be introduced within the government’s first 100 days to ‘deliver on policies set out in ’ Labour’s ‘Plan to Make Work Pay’ (MWP). The briefing notes then go on to specifically list some (but not all) of the policies in MWP, including banning exploitative zero-hour contracts, ending the practices of ‘fire and rehire’ and ‘fire and replace’ and making certain employment rights available from day one (including, importantly, protection from unfair dismissal).
 
At the risk of sounding overly lawyerly (!), the briefing notes do not say that the Bill will deliver on all policies in MWP so we might find that the complete set of policies contained in MWP may be delivered in tranches. And this would make sense – we know, for example, that the Labour government understands that its proposal to create a single status of ‘worker’ is a complex and nuanced area and one it has indicated it will need to consult on in detail.
 
Separate to its Employment Rights Bill, Labour has also confirmed (in line with proposals set out in MWP) that it will deliver a genuine living wage that accounts for the cost of living and that it will remove the National Minimum Wage age bands to ensure every adult worker benefits.

Extension of the right to equal pay
 
Elsewhere in the Speech, delivering on a manifesto pledge, it was confirmed that an Equality (Race and Disability) Bill will be published in draft to enshrine in law the right to equal pay for ethnic minorities and disabled people and to introduce mandatory ethnicity and disability pay gap reporting for employers with more than 250 employees. Interestingly, there was no mention in the Speech or the briefing notes of Labour’s manifesto commitments to strengthen protections against dual discrimination and menopause discrimination (albeit MWP did reference the need for larger employers to produce Menopause Action Plans).
 
Immigration and skills

On immigration, Labour made commitments in its manifesto to reform the points-based immigration system to ensure that it is fair and properly managed, has appropriate restrictions on visas and links immigration and skills policy. While the Speech expressed a commitment to introduce a Bill to ‘modernise the asylum and immigration system’, the briefing notes confirm that the focus of that Bill will be border security and the asylum system. The proposed Skills England Bill (also mentioned in the Speech) is likely to be more relevant to business immigration, with the briefing notes confirming that it is intended to deliver on Labour’s manifesto commitment to ensure the supply of skills needed for the economy, in part by creating a formal link between migration data and skills policy.

Apprenticeship Levy

A final point from the Speech of note for employers and which will be welcomed by many is a commitment to reform the Apprenticeship Levy.
 
So, where does this leave us?
 
Well, we know that the government intends to bring forward an Employment Rights Bill within its first 100 days delivering policies from MWP. However, we don’t know precisely which policies will make it into the Bill (albeit the full bulleted list from the briefing notes is likely to give a good indication) nor do we yet know the anticipated timeframes for implementing what will be some pretty significant changes for employers. In the briefing notes, the government does provide some reassurance by reconfirming its commitment to work in close partnership with both trade unions and business to deliver its New Deal and to invite views on how best it can put its plans into practice.
 
We also know that there will be a draft Equality (Race and Disability) Bill but we don’t know the timeframe for this – it is unlikely to be immediate.
 
Plenty of change will be in the offing, of that we can be sure, but for now we watch and wait. Rest assured that we will keep you updated on any further developments.