Debate contribution: Good Jobs Employment Rights Consultation

Debate contribution by Mr Conor Murphy on 1 July 2024.

MLA

Mr Conor Murphy

Party at the time

Sinn Féin

Date

1 July 2024

Type

Debate contribution (made as a minister)

Business

Ministerial Statements

Heading

Good Jobs Employment Rights Consultation

Assembly identifier

Official Report component 4498804

Read the official Assembly record

Text

In February, I outlined four key objectives for the economy, one of which is to increase the proportion of the working-age population in good jobs. Ensuring that workers and their families can rely on a decent and secure income is important in its own right. Good jobs also help to attract and retain people in the workforce, thereby reducing our high level of economic inactivity, and there is compelling evidence that good jobs boost workers' productivity and health. Today, I am launching a consultation on how to ensure that our employment framework supports good jobs. The consultation seeks views on four aspects of a good job as defined by the Carnegie framework. The first theme is "terms of employment". Over recent years, we have seen a growth in insecure and precarious forms of employment. An extreme example is zero-hours contracts, which do not guarantee the worker any hours at all. Some businesses have a genuine need for short-term or emergency cover. However, zero-hours contracts deny workers many of the rights provided by a regular employment contract. They do not ensure a stable income for workers and their families, nor do they provide workers with certainty over when and how many hours they will work so that they can plan their finances and their family responsibilities. The consultation therefore seeks views on how to ensure that flexible contracts meet the interests of the employee as well as the employer. There are potential lessons in that from the South of Ireland. Legislation there restricts the use of zero-hours contracts to very specific circumstances where work is of a casual nature, done in emergency circumstances or needed to cover routine absences of staff. People who regularly work more than their contracted hours can be placed on a contract with a band of hours that reflects their actual working pattern. People are paid compensation when they are called into work but do not receive their expected hours or if they are required to be available but are not called into work. I am seeking the public's view on those and other potential ways of tackling the problems associated with zero-hours contracts. I also want views on tackling bogus self-employment. That refers to a situation where a person is, to all intents and purposes, a worker but is contracted on a self-employed basis. That miscategorisation denies the worker basic protections such as holiday pay, the national minimum wage, family-related leave and pay and redundancy rights. The consultation seeks evidence on the sectors where that is a problem and on the best way to deal with it.

Members should be aware that this is a complicated issue, which interacts with tax law, including reserved matters, so the cooperation of the British Government may be necessary. Agency workers are another category of people who are often called upon to fill short-term absences or to react to peaks in demand. The casual nature of that employment relationship means that it is important to have checks and balances in place. My Department is seeking views on closing the so-called Swedish derogation. That is a legal loophole that permits agency workers to be paid less than their permanent counterparts, even after 12 weeks on the job. The consultation invites submissions on how to strengthen the enforcement powers of the Employment Agency Standards Inspectorate (EAS), which regulates the private recruitment sector. Members will be familiar with the disgraceful practice of fire and rehire. Some employers use that tactic to put pressure on workers to accept reduced terms and conditions in order to keep their jobs. I want to hear views on what action could be taken to combat that practice here. The second theme is pay and benefits. Minimum wage legislation is currently reserved in London. In preparation for that power being transferred to the Assembly, I have commissioned research into how it could be used to promote the living wage. In terms of our existing powers, I am consulting on legislation that will ensure that tips are passed on to workers in full. Calculating holiday pay entitlements can be complex, particularly for people who work irregular hours or seasonally. That creates a risk that individuals will not receive their correct entitlement. The calculation of holiday pay has been the subject of several high-profile court cases over recent years. I am therefore seeking views on how to make it easier for employers and workers to calculate holiday pay. While remote working has many benefits, it has muddied the line between when someone is working and when they are not working. It is important that people can properly switch off outside their working hours and get proper rest and relaxation. I am therefore consulting on how to strengthen workers' right to disconnect. The chapter of the consultation on voice and representation seeks views on how to ensure that workers have a voice in the decisions that affect them. Trade unions play a critical role in articulating the interests of workers and in ensuring that workers share in the benefits of economic growth alongside employers and society as a whole. However, various outdated restrictions make it difficult for labour to organise, so the consultation seeks views on lowering the bar on trade union recognition from 21 to 11 workers, making it easier for trade unions to enter workplaces and reducing the notice period for industrial action from seven to five days. In addition, trade unions can currently use only postal ballots to survey their members. Therefore, I am consulting on allowing trade unions to ballot their members using modern technology. The fourth theme of the consultation is promoting a healthy work-life balance. A good job allows an individual to balance their work with their family and private life. The consultation seeks views on allowing a statutory request for flexible working to be made on the first day of employment, rather than having to wait 26 weeks, and to enable two statutory flexible working requests to be made in a rolling 12-month period. It also asks how we can support workers who need to take time off to care for a loved one. The consultation proposes giving carers the right to take up to one week of unpaid leave per year. It is also my goal to ensure that carers can avail themselves of paid leave. My officials estimate that, initially, that could cost £6 million for the HMRC system-change costs and an annual administration fee payable to HMRC to administer the statutory payment, plus up to £60 million a year in payments, which would have to be funded from our block grant. That would be a significant level of funding in the context of the financial constraints imposed on the Executive. I am committed to working with my Executive colleagues to make sure that we find the best way to support carers. The consultation will therefore be used to seek further views on the role that carer's leave could play in a wider support than the Executive can offer carers. Currently, there is no distinct right to leave and/or statutory pay for working parents whose newborn requires neonatal care. The consultation proposes to give working parents of newborns admitted to neonatal care an additional week of statutory leave and/or pay for each week that their child is in hospital, up to a maximum of 12 weeks. The leave element would be a day-1 right. The consultation proposes stronger protections for pregnant women against redundancy, as well as extending the current protected period from the date when a woman returns to work from maternity leave to 18 months after giving birth. It proposes similar protections for parents taking adoption leave or shared parental leave. Before making any such employee redundant, an employer would be required to offer a suitable alternative vacancy where possible. Under current law, employees can take one or two consecutive weeks of paid paternity leave within the first eight weeks of their child's life or adoption placement. That leave must be taken in a single block and cannot be split.

The consultation proposes to allow paternity leave to be split into non-consecutive weeks of leave so that it can be used in a way that best serves the needs of the parents. It also proposes to abolish the 26-week qualifying period and to make paternity leave a day-1 right. The package of measures promotes good jobs through the comprehensive modernisation of employment law, which includes tackling zero-hours contracts; protection for agency workers; proper holiday pay; the right to disconnect; better trade union representation; more flexible working; and better leave entitlements for carers and parents whose newborns are in neonatal care. Those changes and others that are in the consultation document will benefit workers, businesses and society as a whole. In implementing the changes, we need to be mindful that micro and small businesses, many of which operate on tight margins, make up the vast majority of our businesses. My Department will therefore use the consultation period to assess the impact of changes on smaller businesses in order to ensure that they can continue to thrive as part of a good economy with good jobs. Given the wide range and detailed nature of the package, I have extended the consultation period from the standard eight weeks to 13 weeks. It is important to note, however, that we have only two and a half years left in this mandate, so my Department, the Committee and the Assembly will have to work at pace to ensure that the Bill is delivered within the available time. The purpose of my good jobs agenda is to ensure that working people can provide their families with a decent and secure income and meet their family and caring responsibilities. The consultation will help us to draft a Bill that furthers that good jobs economy. I look forward to working with Members, the business community and trade unions as we design and implement this important Bill.

I thank the Member for her remarks about the overall piece of work, and I am very much looking forward to getting it out there and getting responses back to it. If there are disparities, I am very happy for them to become part of the consultation so that we can tease them out. We in the Department certainly recognise that we have to deal with HMRC. You have to pay for anything that is outside what it currently provides, and you have an ongoing administrative charge with it. There is an estimation of what the cost may be, but this measure is demand-led, so these are estimates of the potential cost to the Executive. It is my ambition to have paid carer's leave, but, clearly, we recognise the financial constraints that we are in and that we have to wait to see what the consultation throws up to us. That is an ambition that we have, and we will have to work with Executive colleagues on the back of the consultation to see how we can develop that.

1,836 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.

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