Our low-down on selected policies of the three main political parties.
Conservatives
- Zero-hours contracts: make exclusivity unenforceable.
- Minimum wage: increase to £8 per hour by 2020; increase income tax threshold.
- Parental rights: increase free childcare entitlement to 30 hours per week.
- Equal rights: require employers of more than 250 people to publish equal pay data.
- Apprenticeships: create and extra 3 million apprenticeships over the next parliament.
- Migrant workers: take steps to eradicate exploitation.
- Human rights: replace Human Rights Act with new Bill of Rights, breaking the link with the European Court of Human Rights.
- Trade unions: require a minimum turnout of 40% in strike ballots; introduce a time limit between ballot and strike action; remove ban on agency workers covering for striking workers.
- Volunteering: introduce free volunteering right of 3 days for employees of large companies and in the public sector.
Labour
- Zero-hours contracts: those working more than 12 weeks on a zero-hours contract to be entitled to a ‘regular’ contract; outlaw employers being able to force availability and change shifts at short notice.
- Minimum wage: increase to £8 per hour by October 2019; give local authorities a role in enforcement; increase maximum penalty to £50,000.
- Parental rights: increase paternity leave from 2 to 4 weeks, and increase a week’s paternity pay to £260; increase free childcare from 15 to 25 hours per week.
- Employment Tribunals: abolish existing tribunal fee system
- Equal rights: require employers of more than 250 people to publish equal pay data; provide equal rights for self-employed people; reinstate liability for third party harassment.
- Apprenticeships: require major government contract holders, those recruiting from outside the EU, and certain government departments to offer them; guarantee apprenticeships to 18 year olds with the right grades.
- Migrant workers: ensure migrant workers’ jobs and conditions are on a par with local employees.
- Human rights: preserve the Human Rights Act but look to reform the European Court of Human Rights.
- Young people: guarantee jobs for young people unemployed for over a year (or for 2 years if over 25).
- Armed forces: introduce anti-discrimination legislation to protect members of the armed forces.
- Employee shareholders: scrap existing legislation; consider implementing a right to a profit share where there are more than 50 employees.
- Pay transparency: require companies with remuneration committees to include elected employee representatives and publish top pay and pay ratios.
- Agency workers: remove ‘Swedish derogation’ exception to Agency Workers Regulations; ban agencies from exclusively recruiting from overseas.
Liberal Democrats
- Zero-hours contracts: create a right to request a fixed term contract.
- Minimum wage: ask Low Pay Commission to consider ways of increasing minimum wage; raise income tax threshold; tackle employers calling employees ‘self-employed’ to avoid the minimum wage.
- Parental rights: additional 1 month paternity leave; shared parental leave rights from day 1; increase availability of free childcare of 15 hours per week.
- Employment Tribunals: review tribunal fee system.
- Apprenticeships: double the number of businesses offering apprenticeships.
- Equal rights: implement remaining provisions of Equality Act; require employers of more than 250 employees to publish equal pay data; outlaw caste discrimination.
- Human rights: introduce a new Freedoms Act, embedding rights to freedom of speech and protest.
- Trade unions: introduce e-balloting.
