What Labour’s manifesto said about day one protection from unfair dismissal
This is what Labour’s manifesto said about the employment rights bill, and day one protection from unfair dismissal.
Labour will stop the chaos and turn the page to create a partnership between business and trade unions, by implementing ‘Labour’s Plan to Make Work Pay: Delivering a New Deal for Working People’ in full – introducing legislation within 100 days. We will consult fully with businesses, workers, and civil society on how to put our plans into practice before legislation is passed. This will include banning exploitative zero hours contracts; ending fire and rehire; and introducing basic rights from day one to parental leave, sick pay, and protection from unfair dismissal.
The Labour Plan to Make Work Pay said: “Our New Deal will include basic individual rights from day one for all workers, ending the current arbitrary system that leaves workers waiting up to two years to access basic rights of protection against unfair dismissal, parental leave and sick pay.”
Any normal person reading the Labour manifesto would conclude that the party was making a firm promise to introduce day one protection from unfair dismissal. Peter Kyle’s argument that it does not say this (see 8.51am) is based on the claim that the commitment to consultating somehow over-rides the more specific unfair dismissal point. This is quite a tenuous claim. But it does highlight the fact that whoever drafted the manifesto used language that created some potential ambiguity about what was being promised – perhaps mindful that compromises would have to be made at some point in the future.
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Bridget Phillipson rejects interviewer’s jibe about Labour manifesto being ‘fiction’ after workers’ rights bill U-turn
In interviews this morning, Bridget Phillipson, the education secretary, also rejected claims that the employment rights bill U-turn contradicted Labour’s manifesto. (See 9.30am.) She told Sky News:
In the manifesto, what we said was that we would work with trade unions, with business, with civil society, in consulting on those protections that we’d be bringing forward.
So, there are both parts to that, within the manifesto, the important rights and the consultation.
She also said that, without the U-turn, there was a “very real prospect” that the whole bill would be delayed. She said:
The employment rights bill is the biggest upgrade to workers’ rights in a generation … The risk here was that if we didn’t make progress, those important rights wouldn’t come into force from April next year.
In an interview on LBC, asked if the Labour manifesto was “fact or fiction”, Phillipson replied:
I am really proud that we have delivered already so many of the manifesto commitments that we made, whether that’s in education or around employment rights and much, much more besides.
From April next year, millions of workers and lots and lots of your listeners will have access to sick pay that they wouldn’t otherwise have. That is a really big, important step.
ShareWhat Labour’s manifesto said about day one protection from unfair dismissal
This is what Labour’s manifesto said about the employment rights bill, and day one protection from unfair dismissal.
Labour will stop the chaos and turn the page to create a partnership between business and trade unions, by implementing ‘Labour’s Plan to Make Work Pay: Delivering a New Deal for Working People’ in full – introducing legislation within 100 days. We will consult fully with businesses, workers, and civil society on how to put our plans into practice before legislation is passed. This will include banning exploitative zero hours contracts; ending fire and rehire; and introducing basic rights from day one to parental leave, sick pay, and protection from unfair dismissal.
The Labour Plan to Make Work Pay said: “Our New Deal will include basic individual rights from day one for all workers, ending the current arbitrary system that leaves workers waiting up to two years to access basic rights of protection against unfair dismissal, parental leave and sick pay.”
Any normal person reading the Labour manifesto would conclude that the party was making a firm promise to introduce day one protection from unfair dismissal. Peter Kyle’s argument that it does not say this (see 8.51am) is based on the claim that the commitment to consultating somehow over-rides the more specific unfair dismissal point. This is quite a tenuous claim. But it does highlight the fact that whoever drafted the manifesto used language that created some potential ambiguity about what was being promised – perhaps mindful that compromises would have to be made at some point in the future.
ShareBadenoch says ‘humiliating U-turn’ on workers’ rights bill shows Labour causing too much ‘uncertainty’ for business
Kemi Badenoch, the Conservative leader, has issued an ‘I told you so’ comment about what she calls Labour’s “humiliating U-turn” on the employment rights bill. She said:
On Monday, I told a conference of Britain’s biggest businesses that Labour’s day one employment rights policy would destroy jobs and drag our country backwards. Four days later, and in the aftermath of their disastrous budget, Starmer and Reeves have finally woken up to just how bad these policies actually are.
This is yet another humiliating u-turn. Labour talk about stability but govern in chaos. No company can plan, invest or hire with this level of uncertainty hanging over them.
Referring to the plan for day one protection from unfair dismissal, Badenoch told the CBI on Monday.
Under this bill, a new hire can turn up at nine in the morning and lodge a claim with an employment tribunal, before they’ve even worked out where the toilets are!
ShareBusiness secretary Peter Kyle claims workers’ rights bill U-turn doesn’t breach Labour’s manifesto
Good morning. Keir Starmer and Rachel Reeves spent yesterday denying that Labour broke a manifesto promise with its tax-raising budget. Given that Reeves had been expected to freeze income tax thresholds for weeks, it was a rather stale argument that did not go anywhere new. Then, late yesterday afternoon, the government opened up another broken manifesto argument with a surprise announcement about a U-turn on the employment rights bill.
Here is our overnight story by Jessica Elgot and Richard Partington.
It is not hard to see why ministers agreed to the concession. Day one protection from unfair dismissal was very unpopular with employers, who said it would deter firms from hiring new workers. With unemployment rising, and the hospitality sector in particular alarmed about the implication of some of the measures in the budget, this is a concession that will significantly ease business concerns about the legislation. And most unions seem willing to accept the climbdown as the price for getting the bill into law quickly.
But it still came as a surprise. On Monday No 10 was telling journalists “we will overturn all attempts to scupper [the employment rights bill plans] including watering down day one protection from unfair dismissal”. Governments regularly make concessions when legislation is going through the House of Lords, but this bill is at the “ping-pong’” stage and MPs have already overturned the Lords amendments blocking day one protection from unfair dismissal twice. This is a Labour manifesto commitment; by convention, the Lords was obliged to back down. But there is evidence it is becoming increasingly belligerent (on other bills too), and ministers decided a compromise and swift passage to royal assent would be better than a prolonged battle.
The news has already provoked a Labour backlash. But we may have to wait for the most significant Labour reaction – which will come from Angela Rayner, the former deputy PM. Rayner was overseeing the bill until she resigned and, in a speech earlier this month, she strongly defended day one protection from unfair dismissal. She said:
The last Conservative government shamefully doubled the qualification period against unfair dismissal to two years and stripped workers of protections at the stroke of a pen, and now they are at it again. Government members believe that workers deserve fairness, dignity and respect at work, and they deserve it from day one on the job. Opposition members say that these rights against unfair dismissal will slow down hiring, so let me be clear that employers can absolutely still have probation periods for their new staff; they just will not be able to fire them unfairly at will, for no good reason.
Rayner is still seen as a strong candidate to replace Starmer before the next election, and she will have to decide if she wants to use this issue to further her potential leadership ambitions. As our story says, she is planning to take soundings from MPs before speaking in public about her reaction to the U-turn.
Here are some of the key develepments in this story this morning.
We also promised in the manifesto that we would bring people together, that this would not be legislation that pits one side against another …
The manifesto committed to day one rights. We are committing to day one rights. The manifesto committed us to finding compromise … and we are delivering on that.
Sharon Graham, leader of Unite, one of the two biggest unions in Britain and a major donor to Labour, has denounced the U-turn. She said:
The employment rights bill is a shell of its former self.
With fire and rehire and zero hours contracts not being banned, the Bill is already unrecognisable.
These constant row backs will only damage workers’ confidence that the protections promised will be worth the wait. Labour needs to keep its promises.
She has been hinting for months that her union could disaffiliate from Labour (which would also lead to it withdrawing financial support), and this U-turn must make that a bit more likely.
Some Labour MPs have condemned the U-turn, with one calling it a “sellout”. This is from Andy McDonald, a former shadow cabinet minister.
We can all read the manifesto ourselves and, and it says that we’ll deliver day one rights and that includes unfair dismissal.
We’re no longer doing it, so we’re doing something completely inconsistent what was in the manifesto.
And this is from Justin Madders, who was employment rights minister until he was sacked in the mini-reshuffle following Rayner’s resignation.
It might be a compromise
It might even be necessary to get the Bill passed asap
But it most definitely is a manifesto breach
And this is from John McDonnell, shadow chancellor when Jeremy Corbyn was Labour leader.
Is this a sellout? Yes it certainly is. If it’s unfair to sack someone, it’s unfair whenever it occurs whether it’s day one or after 6 months. The principle is fairness.
Bridget Phillipson, the education secretary, has rejected claims this is a U-turn. She has been doing the interview round this morning, and, in an interview with BBC Breakfast, when it was put to her that this was a U-turn, she replied:
I don’t accept that characterisation, I’m afraid. The employment rights bill represents the biggest upgrade to workers’ rights in a generation.
We will have a lot more on this as the day goes on.
There is not a lot on the agenda, but we are getting a No 10 lobby briefing at 11.30am.
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Updated at 04.31 EST