TUPE Rules Included In Employment Law Review

The government has announced new areas it will consider reforming as part of its ongoing review of employment red tape, including the rules protecting employees’ terms and conditions of employment when a business changes hands.

Employment Relations Minister Edward Davey, who outlined the plans on 11 May, said:  “The areas we are reviewing are priorities for employers. We want to make it easier for businesses to take on staff and grow.

“We will be looking carefully at the arguments for reform. Fairness for individuals will not be compromised – but where we can make legislation easier to understand, improve efficiency and reduce unnecessary bureaucracy we will.”  The new areas to be considered for reform are:

• compensation for discrimination: with unlimited levels of compensation for cases of discrimination, the government says that employers worry that high awards may encourage people to take weak, speculative or vexatious cases in the hope of a large payout, which can lead to employers settling such cases before they reach a tribunal;


• collective redundancy rules: the government says employers are concerned that the current requirement that consultation over collective redundancy runs for a minimum period of 90 days is hindering their ability to restructure efficiently and retain a flexible workforce, with employers in financial difficulty worrying about how long they need to keep paying staff after it has become clear that they need to let them go;


• TUPE (Transfer Undertakings Protection of Employment Regulations)rules, which protect employees’ terms and conditions of employment when a business is transferred from one owner to another. The government says some businesses believe that they are overly bureaucratic.

The government will start reviewing these areas this year.

LINK: Employment law review