On 21 May 2012 the Report on Employment Law was published. The submission was made to government by Conservative donor Mr Adrian Beecroft and commissioned by the Department of BIS to provide thoughts on areas of employment law which could have the potential for further improvement or simplification to help business.
The concept of 'compensated no-fault dismissal' for smaller businesses was one proposal, as well as a call on evidence. Through this, the government is seeking to help increase understanding of the current dismissal system and make it more accessible. The objective of a compensated no-fault dismissal is to strike the right balance between providing flexibility for the employer and ensuring protection for the employee.
The Employment Law Review Annual Update aims to reduce the employment law burdens on business to give greater confidence to grow. The Employer's Charter which was produced in January 2011, has now been refreshed with further pointers on sickness absence and recruitment. It has been designed to give clarity to employers about what can be done already to deal with staff issues in the workplace. Read more here.
There are reported concerns amongst some business chiefs regarding the apparent reluctance of the C goverment to back plans put forward by Mr Beecroft to amend Britain
In his report, Mr Beecroft urged the government to remove 'gold-plated' Tupe provisions that bar companies from firing workers or reducing wages if they take over a service contract. Mr Beecroft propsed that private sector employers should be able to cut the wages and pensions of all staff who move out of the public sector after one year. His report claimed restrictions prevented employers easily hiring and firing staff and were holding back thousands of firms from taking on new employees.
One employment lawyer has questioned whether the Beecroft proposals on Tupe would even be achievable, suggesting that such a move would be difficult to implement because the Tupe clauses on outsourcing services are enshrined in European as well as UK law.
As yet the government has not offered any explanation as to why it now proposes to slash statutory compensation levels when even Mr Beecroft described existing compensation levels as 'reasonable'.