April – Busy Month for Employment Law

April sees plenty of changes to employment law for small employers

Among the headlines are:

• a moratorium exempting micro and start-up businesses from new domestic regulation for three years from 1 April 2011;

• the planned extension to the right to request flexible working is being abandoned;

• dual discrimination provisions of the Equality Act 2010 (s.14) is not commencing this month (the government are still intending to introduce this, but are considering how this can best be implemented

• in their Plan for Growth, the Government announced (at page 53) that it will “consult to remove the unworkable requirement in the Equality Act for businesses to take reasonable steps to prevent persistent harassment of their staff by third parties”;

• paternity rules are changing from 3 April, allowing fathers to take six months off work during their baby’s first year;

• the default retirement age is phased out from 6 April – employers cannot use retirement as a reason for dismissal, unless this can be justified;

• the Government’s Red Tape Challenge kicks off, with the employment laws category showing 151 regulations  (although of course, employment is much more complicated than that, and is regularly changing!).

Plenty of things to keep employers & Employment Law Clinic busy, and we’ll certainly update the site when more details become available & these issues develop.

Filed under: General News, Laws & Regulations by Employment Law Clinic           Post created on: April 1st, 2011