Employment Rights Bill nears final stage: Key changes for employers
20 June 2025
As previously set out, the Employment Rights Bill is currently in the House of Lords, if it progresses at normal speed, it should receive Royal Assent in July 2025 which means that some parts of the Employment Rights Act 2025 would come into force in October 2025.
The committee stage concluded on 18 June 2025, and it is now scheduled for the report stage following which it will undergo consideration of amendments and await Royal Assent.
As the Bill will be subjected to intense scrutiny at this stage, and it is expected that further amendments will be made to the Bill, whilst it advances through Parliament progressing toward enactment.
As a brief reminder we can expect to see;
- Day one rights to protection from unfair dismissal.
- Statutory sick pay to be payable from day one and the minimum earnings threshold will be removed.
- Extended tribunal time limits from 3 to 6 months for nearly all employment tribunal claims.
- Qualifying workers on zero hours/low hour contracts will gain the right to request and receive guaranteed regular hours.
- Fire and re-hire practices to become automatically unfair.
- ‘All reasonable’ steps must be taken to prevent both sexual and third-party harassment.
- Strengthened protections for pregnant employees and new parents particularly regarding dismissal and redundancy.
- Stronger trade union rights.
For full information on the above topics, please refer to our other recent articles.
Contact our Employment team today to audit your policies and contracts in preparation for the Employment Rights Act 2025.
This article was written by Gabrielle Scriven,
