In this newsletter we provide an update on the Employment Rights Bill, the new Statutory Pay Rates, look at recent case law judgements / employment tribunal claims, and look at last year’s Supreme Court ruling defining "sex" as biological in the Equality Act.

NEW SERVICE – ‘Document Resource Centre’.  We now offer a stand-alone service where we provide you with web access to around 170 template HR letters and forms covering a wide range of HR aspects (these are constantly reviewed and updated to ensure compliance with legislation).  The cost of this service is £240 (+vat) for a year’s subscription.  If this is something you would be interested in or would like more details, please contact us.

From basic Contracts of Employment to a fully Outsourced HR service we can help.  If you would like to know more about any of our support, consultancy, and training services, and see how we can help you, please visit our website or contact us at info@connectivebusiness.co.uk to arrange a Free no-obligation consultation.

Legislation Updates

Employment Rights Bill

The following changes are now in place

• The rules regarding 'minimum service levels for strikes have been removed, and the ACAS Early Conciliation Period increased to 12 weeks

• Paternity is a 'day one right'
• Parental leave is a 'day one right'
• The restriction on taking paternity leave after shared parental leave is removed.
• Statutory Sick Pay (SSP) is paid from the first day of illness and the lower earnings limit is removed

• The maximum 'protective award' for failure to consult in collective redundancy is 180 days' pay.

• Sexual harassment is a 'qualifying disclosure' under whistleblowing law.
• Dismissal for taking part in industrial action is 'automatically unfair'
• The following changes apply to trade union activity
  • the time needed to give notice of industrial action is 10 days
  • unions need a simple majority to vote for industrial action
  • picket supervisors are not required
  • industrial action mandates will last for 12 months
  • industrial action and ballot notices are simplified
  • political fund rules have changed
  • rules how a trade union can gain recognition in a workplace have been simplified
  • trade union members can vote electronically

Changes to Statutory Pay Rates April 2026

National Minimum Wage

Aged 21 and above                                        £12.71 per hour

18 to 20 years old                                           £10.85 per hour

16 to 17 years old                                           £8.00 per hour

Apprentices under 19                                     £8.00 per hour

Apprentices 19 and over in their 1st year      £8.00 per hour

Statutory sick pay

£123.25 per week

Statutory family-related leave

Statutory maternity pay or adoption pay for the first six weeks is 90% of average weekly earnings per week.

Statutory maternity pay or adoption pay for the remaining weeks is the lower of 90% of average weekly earnings or £194.32 per week.

Statutory paternity pay, shared parental pay, neonatal care pay, and parental bereavement pay is the lower of 90% of average weekly earnings or £194.32 per week.

Case Law Updates

Former employee settles claim for £65k after male boss sexually harassed her

During a shift, 'B', who was 17 at the time, was slapped on the bottom by a male supervisor. Following the incident, on the same day, B made a report to her manager and was told that CCTV had captured the incident.  However, the supervisor was allowed to continue to work alongside her for the rest of the shift.  B said he approached her twice during that time to talk to her and apologised for what he had done, explaining that it was "muscle memory".  Despite raising a complaint of sexual harassment, B claimed that while she made a written statement, she was not formally interviewed about her experience and she felt upset and distressed that her employer failed to offer her support after the incident, using annual leave to take time away from her job. Upon her return, she said no return-to-work meeting was arranged.  B said she was not updated about the investigation or outcome of her complaint.  B also believed that her personal information relating to the incident was seen by other staff on a manager's computer, and experienced further embarrassment during a staff training session when an example involving a woman being slapped on the bottom by a supervisor was discussed which she felt certain the example referred to her own experience.  B later resigned from her job.

Sacked Employee has Unfair Dismissal, Discrimination and Harassment claims denied

A was summarily dismissed for gross misconduct after his employer concluded he sent an anonymous hostile email to a colleague and then breached confidentiality in a further email to managers. A forensic check of his work emails did not identify the sender, but in making their decision the employer relied on the content and surrounding facts.  A’s claims to an Employment Tribunal (‘ET’) for unfair dismissal, discrimination and harassment were rejected, the ET finding there was a genuine belief in guilt, reasonable grounds and that there had been a reasonable investigation.  A appealed to an Employment Appeal Tribunal (‘EAT’) who dismissed the appeal, stating there is no absolute requirement to provide interview transcripts where the employer is not relying on those transcripts in making their decision, and that the employee was provided with enough information at the formal hearings to be able to provide a defence.  Furthermore, an HR provided “script” for the Chair of the formal hearings did not show any predetermination with regards to a decision and that the Chair had reached an independent decision.  Key to this case were the records of the formal hearings, including what material the Chair of the formal hearings actually considered and what they relied on in making their decision.

Training

 

Operational Managers are key to a Company’s success, and how they work with and manage their teams is an essential part of this.  Failing to provide them with the essential training they require will lead to more issues within the workplace.

We run a number of ‘1 to 1 HR Coaching for Managers’ modules, all of which are delivered remotely via Microsoft Teams and takes around 1½ to 2 hours:

• Being an Effective Manager / Responsibilities of a Manager;
• Dealing with Misconduct (Discipline), Poor Performance (Capability) and Grievances;
• Managing Attendance / Sickness Absence;
• Managing Performance / Developing People;
• Dealing With Conflict;
• Managing Recruitment;
• Managing Investigations.

More details on all of the above can be found on our website.

Supreme Court ruling defining "sex" as biological in the Equality Act

In April of last year, a landmark case saw the Supreme Court rule that "sex" in the Equality Act 2010 means biological sex, impacting single-sex spaces.  While biological sex is now legally defined, transgender people remain protected under the "gender reassignment" characteristic in the Equality Act.

As a result of this ruling, the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) issued interim advice including that

• trans women shouldn't use women's facilities.  In practice, if a single-sex space, like a toilet or changing room, is women-only, biological males who identify as women should not use it.
• trans people shouldn't be left without facilities. 

However, whilst businesses ‘can’ make such exclusions as that detailed above, it seems they are not necessarily obliged to do so.

The EHRC withdrew their interim advice last October and are still working on updating their code of practice focusing on how businesses should handle single-sex provisions and gender reassignment.

It is hoped new guidance will be available at some point soon to answer all the questions as for many businesses it is still unclear as to what the Supreme Court’s ruling fully means in practice and what they need to do / should do. 

The EHRC current ‘advice’ is that, until a new code of practice is in place, businesses should seek specific legal advice for their circumstances, emphasising consideration of proportionality for any exclusions.

Partner Services

We have long-term partnerships with key providers which enables us to provide other recommended services to our clients.

Our partnerships include:

• Financial Services;
• Legal Services via Howells Solicitors;
• Health Insurance and Staff Healthcare Benefits via Western Provident Association (WPA);
• Health and Safety via Sure Safety;
• Workplace Wellbeing via Wellfinite;
• Cloud based HR Software via WorkSmarter.

Visit our website to see full information on our partners and their services.