In the world of employment, and more particularly employment law, changes keep coming. In this post I’ve highlighted a few things to be aware of, or look out for in 2021.
Immigration
Free movement for EU citizens has ended and from 1 January a new set of immigration laws are in place. With the exception of Irish nationals (as the Common Travel Area remains in place) all foreign nationals now need to seek to enter the UK for work in the same way, with many expected to use the “Skilled Worker Route”. To be able to work in the UK legally under the “Skilled Worker Route”, foreign nationals must meet specified criteria in order to earn at least 70 points. Crucially, this involves being offered a job from an approved sponsor.
I wrote about this in a previous blog – importantly, employers who have not yet applied to be an approved sponsor of foreign workers should do so as soon as possible.
The abolition of the Resident Labour Market Test has been welcomed but the latest guidance states that when advertising for a role that will be filled by a sponsored worker, employers must include specific prescribed information in the job advert, keep a record of where the job was advertised and retain specified documentation from the recruitment process. For the full guidance click HERE.
Gender Pay Gap Reporting
The requirement to produce gender pay gap reports was temporarily paused last year due to Covid but it returns this year and so, as before, organisations with at least 250 employees by the relevant ‘snapshot’ date will have to produce a report. For public sector companies, this was 30 March 2020 and for private sector companies this was 5 April 2020. If employees were furloughed on these dates they will not need to be included in the report unless the employer topped up their wages to 100%. This means that the figures companies end up publishing may not be fully representative of the actual situation, so they should ensure this is clearly outlined in their accompanying narrative.
The deadline for publication is 4 April 2021.
The Furlough Scheme
Like many others, I’ve written lots about this and so won’t repeat it here. However, it seems highly likely that the scheme will end this year and I simply remind employers that they should start to plan for this eventuality. There are some previous blogs that may be of interest if, unfortunately, this is likely to result in redundancies:
Psychological and Practical Support in Redundancy
IR35
Originally due to be implemented in April last year, from April 2021 eligible large and medium sized organisations engaging contractors through intermediary companies will also be responsible for assessing the employment status of those contractors. Under the new rules, where workers are engaged through their own companies, responsibility to apply IR35, and to pay any associated tax and National Insurance contributions will fall to the private company, agency or other third party paying the worker’s company.
The Employment Bill
We are likely to see updates on other important employment issues which come under the Employment Bill. These include:
- A possible extension to redundancy protection for pregnant employees.
- A code of practice regarding tips in the hospitality sector.
- The right to unpaid leave for carers.
- The right for those on zero-hour contracts to request more predictable working hours.
- Extended leave for parents who have children in neonatal care.
Watch this space!
As ever, if there is anything in this blog post you would like to discuss do please get in touch.