Employment Rights Act 2025 for UK Employers

The Bill is now the Employment Rights Act 2025

The Employment Rights Bill received Royal Assent on 18 December 2025 and is the Employment Rights Act 2025. It is being switched on in stages. This page follows the GOV.UK timetable updated on 25 September 2026. Dates that have not yet arrived can still change.

For a small UK employer, the practical question is which duties already apply, and which ones need a policy update before October 2026 and January 2027. The official list is the Plan to Make Work Pay timetable.

Already in force

From 6 April 2026

• Paternity leave and unpaid parental leave are day-one rights. Newly eligible employees could give notice from 18 February 2026.
• Statutory sick pay no longer has a waiting period, and the lower earnings limit for SSP has been removed.
• The maximum protective award for a failure to consult on a collective redundancy has been doubled.
• Whistleblowing protection covers workers who disclose sexual harassment.
• A bereaved father or partner can take up to 52 weeks of paternity leave if the mother or primary adopter dies in the child’s first year.

The Fair Work Agency was established on 7 April 2026. It brings labour-market enforcement into one body. If your sickness and holiday rules are still a PDF from 2024, update them and ask staff to acknowledge the new version in your policy library.

Trade union changes already live

The Strikes (Minimum Service Levels) Act 2023 was repealed at Royal Assent. On 18 February 2026 most of the Trade Union Act 2016 was repealed, including simpler industrial action notices and protection from dismissal for taking industrial action. Electronic and workplace balloting for statutory trade union ballots started on 25 August 2026. Most companies without a recognised union will not change their day-to-day process because of these points. Know they exist if a union contacts you.

What changes next

1 October 2026: longer tribunal time limits

The time limit for bringing most employment tribunal claims increases from three months to six. For breach of employment contract claims in Scotland, that change is 9 November 2026. Keep notes of the decision, the date, and the policy you relied on. A short record is more useful six months later than it was at three months.

30 October 2026: harassment

• Employers must take all reasonable steps to prevent sexual harassment of their employees. The current duty is to take reasonable steps.
• Employers must not permit harassment of their employees by third parties, such as customers or clients.

Write down the steps you actually take: how someone reports it, who investigates, and what you do about customer or supplier behaviour. A sentence in a handbook that nobody has read is a weak record.

January 2027: dismissal and fire-and-rehire

• The qualifying period for ordinary unfair dismissal falls to six months, for dismissals from 1 January 2027. Compensatory awards are uncapped.
• Fire-and-rehire protections take effect in January 2027.
• Employers will have a duty to inform workers of their right to join a trade union.

A six-month qualifying period means a probation review has to be a real decision, with a note of what was said. Do not wait until month five to discover the role was never defined.

What a small employer should do now

1. Update the sickness policy so it matches day-one statutory sick pay, and say how absence is reported.
2. Check that paternity leave and unpaid parental leave are not written as rights that start after a qualifying period.
3. Add a harassment route that covers customers and other third parties, before 30 October 2026.
4. Keep the written reason for any dismissal or probation decision. The tribunal window is about to be six months.

The UK HR compliance checklist covers the records that sit alongside these duties, including right-to-work checks and holiday. This article is a summary of the public timetable, not legal advice.