2024 brought employers more employment law changes than we’ve seen in a long time. And from what the Government have said, employers should expect many more changes to come. HR teams across the land were asked to update their processes from the first day of 2024.
1 January 2024
The requirement to keep records of daily working time was removed. The effect of emergency Covid legislation on annual leave carry over ended. The case law position on a weeks’ pay and annual leave carryover during sickness and statutory leave was committed to law.
13 February 2024
Fines payable by employers who employ illegal workers increased. The fine for a first breach increased to £45,000 per illegal worker. For repeated breaches, the fine increased to £60,000.
1 April 2024
The National Living Wage threshold was lowered to include 21-year-olds.
A new method was put in place to calculate holiday entitlement for irregular hour workers and part year workers. Rolled up holiday pay became lawful again.
6 April 2024
Under the Carer’s Leave Act 2023, employees with defined caring responsibilities were given the right to one working week of unpaid leave per 12 months in relation to those responsibilities.
Employment Relations (Flexible Working) Act 2023, changed to allow employees to make a flexible working request from the first day of employment. Other changes including an increase in the number of requests per 12 month period from one to two, and a reduction in the timeframe to conclude the process from three months to two months, also came into effect.
Under the Protection from Redundancy (Pregnancy and Family Leave) Act 2023, pregnant employees were also given enhanced rights when faced with redundancy which continue until 18 months after the birth. The enhanced treatment will also apply to adoption and shared parental leave arrangements.
Under the Paternity Leave (Amendment) Regulations 2024, the paternity leave system will become more flexible. Employees are now able to take two separate weeks of leave within a year of the birth/adoption and will only need to give 28 days’ notice of taking leave.
Statutory Sick Pay (SSP) increased, as did Statutory Maternity, Paternity, Shared Parental, Adoption and Parental Bereavement pay.
The maximum week’s pay for redundancy pay purposes also increased and the maximum unfair dismissal compensatory award increased.
1 July
The requirement to consult with elected representatives during tupe, where none exist, on a transfer for businesses with fewer than 50 employees, and for businesses of any size when a transfer affects fewer than 10 employees, was removed.
18 July
A new statutory code of practice on “fire and re-hire” was introduced, setting out the expected procedure for employers to follow, when contemplating dismissals for employees who do not agree to changes to their terms and conditions.
1 October
Hospitality, leisure and service employers, under the Employment (Allocation of Tips) Act 2023, were now required to fairly allocate tips to staff in line with a statutory code of practice, and have a policy explaining their tips allocation.
26 October
A new duty requiring employers to take “reasonable steps” to proactively prevent sexual harassment was introduced. Employers now have to take measures to prevent sexual harassment in their organisation.
