The Power of the Private Member

An Employment Bill was expected, indeed was announced in the 2019 Queen’s Speech.?It has never manifested itself.? Such a Bill would have provided an opportunity for the UK Government to meet some of its 2019 Manifesto pledges.

Yet, what is the point of such a Bill when Private Members seem to be doing a lot of the work for them?? Here’s an interesting look at how we need to be aware of so much more than just what comes from UK Government Ministers.??

In the United Kingdom (UK), not all legislation that affects payroll and reward is initiated by the UK Government.? To ensure we are up-to-date, relevant and compliant, we have to look at a number of sources, for example:

• The UK Government themselves, either legislation started in the House of Commons or Lords.? This may result in legislation that applies UK-wide or for England only
• The Scottish Government, for progress through the Scottish Parliament.? This will result in legislation that applies where matters have been devolved from Westminster (e.g. justice) or shared (e.g. Income Tax)
• The Welsh Government, for progress though the Senedd. This will result in legislation that applies where matters have been devolved from Westminster (e.g. education and skills) or shared (e.g. Income Tax)
• The Northern Ireland Executive, for progress though the Legislative Assembly.? This will result in legislation that applies where matters have been devolved from Westminster, most importantly pensions and employment law

Yet, what we sometimes fail to consider is that legislation can result from that introduced by Members of Parliament (MPs) themselves.? These MPs do not have to be members of the party that is in Government.

Simply, in all nations of the UK, a Bill can be introduced by an individual who is not a Government Minister (of the UK, England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland):

• In the UK, England and Northern Ireland, these are known as Private Member’s Bills (PMBs)
• In Scotland and Wales, these are known as Member’s Bills

This means that any politician of any political ‘colour’ can introduce a Bill that may or may not make it though to legislation that receives Royal Assent.

Whilst all legislation in all countries must be monitored for change, this article focuses on the ones that are likely to affect payroll and reward professionals the greatest, namely UK PMBs.? With these, there are three ‘types’:

On selected days in the UK Parliamentary calendar, MPs are given the opportunity to speak for 10 minutes about a Bill they have drafted.? The UK Parliament website says these are the opportunity for a Member to outline their position on a topic, are not a serious attempt to get their Bill passed and, as such, 10-Minute Bills rarely become legislation.

This is where the MP announces the title of the Bill that they are presenting.? They do not get an opportunity to speak in support of it.? For this reason, again, the UK Parliament website says these rarely become law.

There are two House of Parliament:

In the House of Lords, on the first Thursday of a Parliamentary session (in 2022 this was 12 May 2022), all Bill titles are placed into a hat and drawn at random.? The first 25 Lords associated with the Bill can introduce it to this House of Parliament.

The ballot produced 25 Bills , possibly the only ones for consideration by payroll and reward professionals are the Government of Wales (Devolved Powers) Bill (now in the Commons) and the Employment and Trade Union Rights (Dismissal and Re-engagement) Bill (though I am not getting too excited about this).

In the House of Commons, on the second Thursday of a Parliamentary session (in 2022 this was 19 May 2022), all MP’s names are given a number, placed into a hat and drawn at random .? The first 20 are given the opportunity to introduce their Bill on selected days with the first 7 usually having the opportunity to debate in the House for a full day.

On 25 May 2022, the UK Government issued a Press Release that stated three PMBs had been successful and made it into UK legislation:

This was a ballot bill, introduced by Stuart C McDonald (Scottish National Party) who was the first name drawn out of the hat. ?The Act provides for a day 1 right to statutory leave for employees with responsibility for children receiving neonatal care in the first 28 days of life.? Coupled with this is a conditional right for this leave to be paid.

Note that the Act creates these entitlements but secondary legislation is necessary to implement these, expected April 2025.

This was a ballot bill, introduced by Dan Jarvis (Labour Party) who was the second name drawn out of the hat. The Act provides for protection from redundancy during a ‘protected period of pregnancy’ and protection from redundancy and dismissal after periods of maternity, adoption and shared parental leave.

Whilst the Act extends existing provisions, we do need to look for the wording of the legislation that implements them.

This was a ballot bill, introduced by Wendy Chamberlain (Liberal Democrats) who was the tenth name drawn out of the hat. ?The Act creates a new statutory entitlement for employees to unpaid leave in order to provide or arrange care for ‘a dependant’ or a dependant with ‘a long-term care need.’

We do need to look for the secondary legislation that enables this 2023 Act.? This will determine how much leave, which must be at least one week in every 12 months, and when that leave can be taken.

This is very important.

All legislation contains a section entitled ‘extent’ i.e., what parts of the UK are covered by the laws.? All the above insert statutory entitlements into the Employment Rights Act 1996 which applies in Great Britain. This is because these are all employment law-related Bills and employment law is devolved to Northern Ireland.? The equivalent Employment Rights (Northern Ireland) Order 1996 will not contain these new statutory rights.

So, employers, payroll and reward professionals operating UK-wide have another consideration when updating policies and procedures.?