In its pre-election manifesto, Labour’s Plan to Make Work Pay, Labour promised to review the parental leave system within the first year of government to ensure proper support for working families, and to make flexible working the default. As a start, the Employment Rights Bill includes a number of provisions that expand the scope of existing family leave entitlements and entrench the right to request flexible working.
Bereavement Leave
Currently, only parents who lose a child aged under 18 have a statutory right to take bereavement leave. The Bill builds on the existing statutory right to Parental Bereavement Leave by providing for a wider entitlement to Bereavement Leave. This is described in the Government’s Factsheet as a “day one right to protected time off for employees to grieve the loss of a loved one.”
Details of who will be able to take this leave through their relationship to the deceased, and how the leave can be taken, will be opened up for consultation on draft regulations yet to be published.
Leave for losing a child will remain as the current period of two weeks whereas all other Bereavement Leave will be set as one week. Bereaved employees will be able to take leave at any time during the period of 56 days after the death.
Paternity Leave
As promised in the manifesto, paternity leave will become a day one right and may also be taken in addition to and following Shared Parental Leave. In practice, that means employees will be able to give the required notice of their intention to take leave from their first day in a new job.
Unpaid Parental Leave
The right for an employee to take up to 18 weeks’ unpaid leave during the period up to their child’s 18th birthday is very rarely used. This will however become a day one right under the Bill.
Flexible Working
Earlier this year, the right to request flexible working became a day one right, enabling employees to request changes to their working arrangements twice a year. Employers are required to handle requests in a “reasonable manner” and must only reject requests for one of eight specified reasons. The current framework allows for a broad interpretation of “reasonableness” provided one of the eight statutory grounds for rejection is met.
Labour’s pre-election promise that flexible working would become the “default” is reflected in the Employment Rights Bill, in the form of a more onerous obligation on employers to justify their rejection of a flexible working request.
Employers may still (and must only) reject requests for one or more of the eight statutory reasons however they will also need to explain why they consider it reasonable to refuse the request based on these grounds. Employers are essentially being asked to show their working out and provide contemporaneous justification for the refusal.
For example, if an employer refuses a flexible working request because it would lead to a “burden of additional costs,” the employer will need to explain the specific nature of those costs and why they consider those costs unreasonable in the context of their business.
The penalty for a breach of the flexible working provisions will remain unchanged at 8 weeks’ pay.
For more information about these issues, please contact Ciara Scanlon – ciara.scanlon@pannonecorporate.com