How Good Work Plan affects your business

In July 2017, Matthew Taylor, Chief Executive of the Royal Society of Arts, carried out an independent review of modern working practices. His results and findings, published as the Taylor Review, have listed out a number of recommendations for the UK Government.

The response to the Taylor Review was published by the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy in 2018. It is called the Good Work Plan, wherein the Government has listed out the ways in which it plans to address the concerns, and implement the listed recommendations made by Matthew Taylor.

The Good Work Plan has highlighted a marked methodological shift in changes and ideals that will impact UK employers. The details below shall cover the various aspects of the impact that the Good Work Plan aims to bring about.

The Good Work Plan has been drafted with the following objectives:

• Narrowing the gap between various employment statuses,
• Making the job market more fair for agency workers,
• Increasing the functional transparency of the job market
• Enforcing new legislations

The Good Work Plan also sets out five foundational principles of quality work:

• Satisfaction
• Fair pay
• Participation and progression
• Wellbeing, safety and security
• Voice and autonomy

The Good Work Plan was published by the Government in December 2018 as a result of lengthy consultation in relation to modern working practices in the UK.
The major pointers highlighted by the Good Work Plan can be summed up thus:

• Making employers issue a statement of rights to workers

An employee who is about to commence his employment, which can be for a month or more, is entitled to receive a written statement of terms from his employer. The Good Work Plan requires all employers to share a proper documented statement to their employees, regarding the terms of employment, right from the start.

2. Reserving tips meant for employees
Tip given for a great, impeccable service is meant to go straight to the person who provided that service. But the Taylor Review brought to light a fairly common practice by which a small number of employers actually retain tips earned by their staff. The Good Work Plan aims to keep employers from taking tips intended for their staff.
3. Removing the pay-between-assignment contracts
Pay-between-assignment contracts are given to agency workers wherein they are entitled to be paid from their agency in between assignments, i.e., they are still getting paid even after leaving a job and while on the lookout for the next job. According to the Taylor Review, such arrangements are misused to maintain equal pay arrangements between agency workers and permanent workers. Therefore, the Good Work Plan proposes to ban this particular contractual arrangement.

4. Employment Status
The Good Work Plan shall redefine the terms “employee”, “worker” and “self-employed” and assist businesses in categorising their staff correctly.

5. Continuity of Service
The Good Work Plan shall enforce continuous worker service. If an employee stops working then their continuous service may be terminated only if they are unable to revert within a week. If they’re let go on the pretext of no work being available for them, then the organization is instructed to find some more work for them to preserve continuity of service.
6. Minimising differences between different employment types
A bulk of Good Work Plan focus section is agency work, as agency workers are often the financially weakest ones who are working in unfair conditions and running the greatest risk.
The Good Work Plan aims to align the various employment types and minimise the differences between them. The major aim is to make sure all workers have similar rights, and pay similar rates of tax.

7. Enforcing holiday pay entitlement
The Good Work Plan aims to improve the enforcement of the employment laws. For instance, tough penalties exist for companies fail to pay employees the National Minimum Wage. Secondly, these penalties are extended for employers who take unfair advantage of vulnerable workers by deducting their holiday pay.

8. Workers’ Rights to Equality
The Good Work Plan hails the model of flexible working. It also points out its one-sidedness, as this model leaves the workers at too much risk. To combat the ensuing financial instability, the Good Work Plan aims to implement the legislation that “all workers have the right to request a more stable contract” after they’ve been with their employer for 26 weeks. A major reason for a worker’s financial instability is the fact that not many of them fully understand the contract that they accept on their employer’s behalf, which may lead to their exploitation. The Good Work Plan decrees employers to be extremely lucid about their employee contracts.