Protected rights meaning

ARCHIVED: This Flowchart has been archived and is not maintained. Retained EU law is a concept introduced by the European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018 (EU(W)A 2018) as part of Brexit preparations, establishing a new category of domestic legislation. It denotes the collection of EU‑derived rules preserved and converted into UK law under the EU(W)A 2018 (as amended) at the end of the post‑Brexit transition period (IP completion day). For background on the transition period, and what it means for retained EU law, see: In the context of Brexit, what is meant by the ‘transition or implementation period’? For further background reading on the underlying legislation, see: Practice Note: Brexit—key legislation explained News Analysis: What does IP completion day mean for the status of EU law in the UK? What is retained EU law? Retained EU law is a broad, complex legal term defined by the EU(W)A 2018. It covers anything that continues to form part of domestic law on or...

This is a Checklist of the main issues that an employer will need to consider when seeking a medical report on a prospective employee during the recruitment process: For what reason is the report required? Refer to Practice Note: Medical reports—data protection issues and AMRA 1988—Purposes of medical report Why must health details be collected, and what grounds justify requesting a medical report—is there a particular aspect of the post that demands it, or is it to gauge overall fitness for a challenging senior position? What scope should the report have—what does the prospective employer actually need to know, steering clear of intrusion where it is unnecessary or irrelevant? Could the employer limit the health data it handles by engaging an occupational health (OH) service or specialist? Who will have access to the report, at what stage, and for what use? Has an employment offer already been made? If not, does the aim of the report sit within the allowed situations under section...

This is a Checklist of the main issues that an employer will need to consider when seeking a medical report on a current employee during the employee’s employment: Clarify the objective of the report clearly. See Practice Note: Medical reports—data protection issues and AMRA 1988—Purposes of medical report. Explain why health information is required and set out the grounds for requesting a medical report—is there a defined element of the role that necessitates it, or is the aim to evaluate overall health, eg for a physically demanding post? Set the scope of the report—identify precisely what the employer needs to know, avoiding intrusion where it is not needed or relevant. Consider whether involving an occupational health (OH) professional or service could limit the volume of health data the employer processes. Specify who will have sight of the report, when they will see it, and for what purpose they will use it. Confirm who will prepare the report. ...

This Flowchart explains what the requirements are for industrial action to qualify for statutory immunity under the Trade Union and Labour Relations (Consolidation) Act 1992 (TULR(C)A 1992), as amended by the Employment Rights Act 2025 English law confers no positive entitlement to organise or take part in industrial action. As a matter of common law, such action is ordinarily unlawful. A trade union that calls industrial action will typically commit one or more of the so‑called economic or industrial torts. Individuals who join the action will frequently breach their contracts of employment. Statute nevertheless intervenes to grant a union immunity from tortious liability when organising industrial action, but that protection is bounded by substantial and intricate statutory requirements. Industrial action that satisfies those requirements is treated as protected. Where statutory immunity does not arise, or is lost, the action is unprotected. The ramifications for a union of initiating industrial action that lacks statutory immunity can be significant, with the possibility of damages being awarded against it and/or...

In this issue: Horizon scanning Directors Status and worker categories Cross-border, international and jurisdictional issues Recruitment Protected characteristics Prohibited Conduct (discrimination etc) Diversity and gender pay gap Maternity, parents and carers Financial services and banking: employment issues Data protection and employee information Bribery, modern slavery, tax evasion and fraud Employment Tribunals Scotland Ireland LexTalk®Employment: a Lexis®Nexis community Dates for your diary Trackers New Q&As Employment resources on Lexis+® Daily and weekly news alerts Horizon scanning BTC launches call for evidence on Employment Rights Bill The Business and Trade Committee (BTC) has opened its first request for evidence for a new inquiry into the Employment Rights Bill (ERB). The inquiry will collect written and oral submissions to steer the Bill’s subsequent passage through Parliament and to gauge whether it is set to meet its stated aims. Written evidence should be submitted by Friday...

In this issue: Employment Rights Act 2025 Benefits Protected characteristics Confidentiality, duties and restrictions: enforcement Europe-EU New and updated content Dates for your diary Trackers Employment resources on Lexis+® LexTalk®Employment: a Lexis®Nexis community Daily and weekly news alerts Employment Rights Act 2025 Welsh Government consults on establishment of a Social Care Negotiating Body The Welsh Government has opened a consultation on creating a Social Care Negotiating Body (SCNB) using powers in the Employment Rights Act 2025 (ERA 2025). The SCNB would be responsible for setting Fair Pay Agreements for Wales’s social care workforce. Feedback is invited on the organisation’s design, role and anticipated effects. Responses will inform the government’s understanding of sector perspectives on the SCNB, including the bargaining approach, who and what it should cover, dispute resolution, roll-out, as well as compliance and enforcement. The consultation closes on 28 April 2026. The exercise does not invite comments on the specifics...

Birmingham City Council v Persons Unknown (Re Protests in Support of the Bin Workers’ Strike) [2026] EWHC 373 (KB) What are the practical implications of this case? The ruling confirms that public bodies may secure protest injunctions against ‘persons unknown’ when there is cogent proof of mounting, intentional disruption, provided procedural protections are scrupulously followed. By declining to waive service, the court emphasised that CPR 6.16 demands truly exceptional circumstances. Accordingly, claimants should implement robust alternative notification measures and adhere closely to CPR 6.15, with explicit provisions on deemed service and liberty to apply. Injunction terms should be bounded by time and geography, and supported by precise evidence addressing trespass, private nuisance and public nuisance. On substance, the decision clearly distinguishes peaceful assembly from intentional blockage of access or critical services. Although Articles 10 and 11 are in play, persistent, targeted interference with public services is unlikely to sit at the heart of the protected rights...

The public sector equality duty (PSED) Set out in Part 11 of the Equality Act 2010 (ss 149–159), the public sector equality duty (PSED) comprises a general equality duty applying UK-wide to public bodies listed in Schedule 19 of the EqA 2010, alongside specific duties intended to support delivery of the general duty and enhance transparency. Although the general duty is identical across England, Wales and Scotland, the specific duties made under EqA 2010, s 153 vary. In Wales, listed public bodies must meet particular specific duties that sit alongside the UK-wide general duty. These specific duties bind listed Welsh bodies only. They do not extend to non-devolved public authorities operating in Wales. Under EqA 2010, s 149, the general duty requires public authorities and those exercising public functions to have 'due regard' to the need to: eliminate discrimination, harassment, victimisation, and any other behaviour prohibited by or under the EqA 2010 advance equality of opportunity between people who share a relevant protected characteristic and...

Practice Note This Practice Note explores what amounts to a protected disclosure for the whistleblowing protections in the Employment Rights Act 1996 (ERA 1996), into which the relevant provisions of the Public Interest Disclosure Act 1998 (PIDA 1998) have been incorporated. It addresses the general features of disclosures, when they qualify as qualifying disclosures, the need for a whistleblower to hold a reasonable belief that a relevant category of wrongdoing has occurred, and that the disclosure serves the public interest, where appropriate and necessary. It further considers when qualifying disclosures obtain protection and identifies the prescribed persons (people) to whom a disclosure may properly be directed. In addition, the Practice Note summarises the reporting obligations placed on certain prescribed persons to produce an annual written report concerning the workers’ disclosures received by them...

This Practice Note provides an overview of the legal framework and practical context for whistleblowing under the Employment Rights Act 1996 (ERA 1996). It offers high-level guidance for organisations and supports the drafting of your whistleblowing policy and procedures. It is not a handbook for managing whistleblowing claims, which is an employment law issue. What is whistleblowing? Whistleblowing refers to a worker disclosing information about wrongdoing (ie making a disclosure), usually—though not always—arising in the workplace. For whistleblowing protections to apply, the worker must reasonably believe they are acting in the public interest and that the disclosure points to past, current, or likely future wrongdoing within one or more of these categories: criminal offences (eg fraud) failure to meet a legal obligation miscarriages of justice risks to someone’s health and safety damage to the environment from 6 April 2026, sexual harassment concealment of wrongdoing in these categories Whistleblowing legislation is contained in the ERA 1996, as...

[ Insert in para 6.1 of response form ET3: ] It is accepted that the Claimant is an agency worker with the First Respondent. It is accepted that she began an assignment with the Second Respondent on [ insert date ]...

Insert in para 8.2 of claim form ET1: Engaged by the First Respondent, a temporary work agency, the Claimant is an agency worker. He began assignment with the Second Respondent on [ insert date ]...

Instructions: please read all of this before filling in the form Throughout this form, when we refer to: the ‘child’, we mean the child (including an unborn child) for whom you intend to take shared parental leave/pay; and the ‘Mother’, we mean that child’s mother or expectant mother. To take shared parental leave and/or claim shared parental pay, you must be: the child’s father; and/or married to the Mother; or the Mother’s civil partner; or the Mother’s ‘partner’. In this form, ‘partner’ means someone who lives with the Mother and will live with the child in an ‘enduring family relationship’, but is not the Mother’s child, parent (including adoptive or former adoptive parents), grandchild, grandparent, brother, sister, half-brother, half-sister, aunt, uncle, niece or nephew. Provided you fall into one or more of the categories above, every reference in this form to the ‘Father or Partner’ is a reference to you...

Employment Rights Act 1996 (Coronavirus, Calculation of a Week’s Pay) Regulations 2020 (Week’s Pay Amendment Regs 2020), SI 2020/814 For broader guidance on SI 2020/814, see Practice Note: Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme—right to statutory redundancy and other termination payments [Archived]. This resource provides general context on the Employment Rights Act 1996 (Coronavirus, Calculation of a Week’s Pay) Regulations 2020 and their application... The Week’s Pay Amendment Regs 2020, SI 2020/814, prescribe how to determine a week’s pay for an employee who is, or has previously been, furloughed under the CJRS. The rules apply when calculating specified payments, including an employee’s entitlement to payment under section 88 or 89 of the Employment Rights Act 1996 (ERA 1996). In effect, the instrument clarifies the approach to weekly pay where furlough is relevant, ensuring the correct basis is used for these statutory sums linked to notice or other termination-related payments as identified under the ERA 1996...

Weekly rest periods Under the Working Time Regulations 1998 (WTR 1998), SI 1998/1833, reg 11(1), an adult worker has a right to an unbroken rest period of at least 24 hours in each seven-day period during which they work for their employer. Alternatively, within any 14-day window, the employer can provide either two 24-hour rest periods, or one 48-hour rest period. The Health & Safety Executive is tasked with enforcing the maximum weekly working time, limits on night work and health assessments for night work, but it does not police time off, paid annual leave or rest break entitlements. These rights are instead enforced by workers through a complaint under WTR 1998, SI 1998/1833, reg 30, alleging that the employer has failed to allow the exercise of the relevant entitlement. For further detail, see the section of the Practice Note: Hours of work and working time titled ‘Weekly rest periods’. The drafting of WTR 1998, SI 1998/1833, reg 11 is couched in terms of entitlement rather than obligation; ie...

The Finance Act 2004 (FA 2004) sets conditions for pensions and lump sums to be authorised payments. Under FA 2004, a member’s pension from a registered pension scheme must not begin before they reach the normal minimum pension age, unless the ill-health condition is met. In the same way, most lump sums are not payable before that age. The normal minimum pension age was 50 when FA 2004 took effect on 6 April 2006, rose to 55 from 6 April 2010, and will increase to 57 from 6 April 2028, excluding uniformed services pension schemes (army, navy, air force, police and firefighters). Transitional provisions preserve members’ subsisting rights to draw scheme benefits before age 55; this is referred to as a protection pension age. The Pensions Tax Manual confirms that, to hold a protected pension age, the member must have an unqualified right to receive benefits before the normal minimum pension age, i.e. not dependent on another person’s consent (PTM062210)...