Employment Rights Bill clears last parliamentary hurdle

Labour’s flagship workers’ rights bill has passed its final hurdle in parliament and is expected to become law before Christmas.

Conservative peer shadow business and trade secretary Lord Sharpe had tabled an amendment to the Employment Rights Bill in the final stage of parliamentary ping-pong in the House of Lords.

However, after a short discussion, he withdrew the amendment and removed the last obstacle to the bill’s adoption.

Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer said the development was a “major victory for working people up and down the country”.

“We have just delivered the biggest improvement to workers’ rights in a generation… Today our plans passed parliament and will soon become law,” he said.

Many of the measures in the bill will require secondary legislation before taking effect.

The bill applies to England, Scotland and Wales but not Northern Ireland.

This legislation will give workers access to sick pay and paternity leave from the first day on the job, and includes new protections for pregnant women and new mothers.

In November, Labor backtracked on a plan to give all workers the right to claim unfair dismissal from their first day of employment. However, the government will introduce increased protections regarding the six-month working period, which is the most important measure of the bill.

It is expected to receive royal approval this week.

Sharon Graham, general secretary of the Unite union, said the bill must now be implemented “without further dilution or delay”.

“Labour needs to stop being embarrassed by these new laws for workers. The bill has already been watered down too much, not least the failures to ban fire, the rehire ban and zero-hours contracts,” he said.

Trades Union Congress (TUC) general secretary Paul Nowak said it was a “historic day and an early Christmas present for working people across the country”.

“In the end, thanks to this bill, workers will have greater safety, better pay and dignity in the workplace,” he said, repeating Unite’s call for the laws to be implemented “swiftly”.

But the Conservatives said it was “ironic that Labour’s job-destroying unemployment bill passes on the same day as official figures confirm that unemployment has risen every month this government has been in office.”

He was talking about the party Figures announced on Tuesday It shows that unemployment in the UK rose to 5.1% in the three months to October, from 4.3% the previous year.

Shadow business secretary Andrew Griffith said: “[The bill] “It will push the costs onto small businesses, freeze hiring and ultimately leave young people and job seekers paying the price for Labour’s capitulation to union paymasters.”

In a joint statement on Monday, ahead of the end of the impasse, business groups, including the British Chambers of Commerce and the Federation of Small Businesses, said they remained concerned about some of the changes in the bill.

However, they said the law to maintain the six-month period for unfair dismissal should be passed as it is now.