United Kingdom - Unions welcome Employment Rights Bill - December 31, 2025

Unions, including UNISON celebrate the passing of the Employment Rights Bill by Parliament – heralding what they believe will be a bright new era for workers’ rights. The new legislation, which has been described by the unions as ‘groundbreaking’, ‘transformative’ and ‘a gamechanger’, covers a raft of new rights, both individual and collective. These range from improved pregnancy, maternity and paternity rights and day one sick leave, to curbs on exploitative zero-hours contracts and unscrupulous fire and rehire practices, to greater protection from unfair dismissal, improved facility time for union reps and the lifting of the many constraints on union activity imposed by conservative governments.

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For more information, please contact Paul de Beer or Oana Ciuca, De Burcht (Scientific Bureau for the Dutch Trade Union Movement) p.t.debeer@uva.nl or the Head of communications at the ETUI, Mehmet Koksal mkoksal@etui.org. For previous full issues of the Collective bargaining newsletter please visit https://www.etui.org/Newsletters/Collective-bargaining-newsletter or consult the archive with all articles in our database at www.cbnarchive.eu. You may find further information on the ETUI at www.etui.org.