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Would Tories repeal the Agency Worker rules?

Amendments of new rights for agency workers is a possible outcome of the General Election, leading law firm Eversheds has announced. The out-going Labour Government has delayed implementation of the Agency Workers Regulations until 1 October 2011.

And Mark Hammerton, partner at Eversheds drew attention to the fact that the Conservatives tabled a motion in the House of Commons calling for the Regulations to be revoked: ‘The Conservative Party has opposed the Regulations throughout their formation, so this delay begged the question: would the Conservative Party change the Regulations, or even repeal them, if they won the General Election?’

However, scope for change would be severely limited, as the rights are part of European Union law.

But there may be some scope to dilute the impact of the rules, intended to give agency workers equal entitlement to core employment rights, including pay, he said. ‘A failure to implement the Directive in full would lead to the EU taking enforcement action against the UK. Probably one of the main areas where there is greater room for amendment of the current Regulations is what's meant by the “pay" which should be provided to the agency worker when comparing him/her to the employee/worker.

‘The Regulations take quite a broad comprehensive approach to pay for example, including many bonus arrangements. This has been one of the most contentious aspects of the consultation process so far and employers and recruiters will be hoping that any change of Government can be persuaded that so called "gold plating" can be removed.

‘The safer approach for now is to assume that the final Regulations will remain as drafted and be pleasantly surprised if there is material change.’