Bill to enhance workers’ rights fails to pass through Parliament

The Workers (Definition and Rights) Bill 2017-2019, which intended to amend the legal definition of a “worker” and radically update workers’ rights, failed to pass its second reading in the House of Commons last week.

Although this Private Members Bill was opposed and will therefore make no further progress through Parliament, it put forward a number of fundamental changes to the current legal provisions surrounding workers, including: 

• Merging the definition of ‘employee’ and ‘worker’ so that both are afforded the same legal protection.
• Putting an obligation on employers to provide “reasonable notice” of shifts (at least seven days) to workers on zero-hour contracts.
• Where a worker has accepted a shift that has later been cancelled, requiring employers to pay the worker 200% of the rate they would have been paid for that shift, as well as a sum for any other monetary loss suffered as a result of the cancellation.

This is not the first time we have seen a desire for legislative reform in this area. Workers’ rights were one of the main issues highlighted by the 2017 Taylor Review, which recommended that the Government should provide a clearer outline of the tests for employment status, with revised primary legislation setting out the key principles and secondary legislation and guidance to provide supplementary detail.

In the ‘Good Work Plan’, the Government’s 2018 response to the Taylor review, they pledged to bring forward legislation to improve clarity on employment status to reflect modern working practices. Therefore, whilst the Workers Bill was unsuccessful on this occasion, it appears that the legal position of workers is still on the Government’s agenda. Indeed, the Government has recently held consultation on establishing a new single enforcement body to improve the enforcement of employment rights for businesses and workers.

We will keep you updated on any further developments.