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To welcome in 2025, we thought it may help to have a look at some of the issues likely to cross HR practitioners’ desks over the coming months.
- Are Staff Handbooks and Employment Contracts up to date?
The beginning of the year is always a busy time for us in reviewing our clients’ employment contracts and staff handbooks.
There has been a flurry of new legislation over the past year on matters as diverse as flexible working and sexual harassment with a new right to take carers leave. Have you checked your contracts and handbooks to make sure that they are compliant with recent changes?
To help with this, we are offering a free contract review – Click here to view this offer!
- Holiday
Last year new legislation came into effect on holiday: https://www.cwj.co.uk/site/newsandevents/legalnews/reform-of-holiday-pay now is a good time to review your holiday procedures to make sure that they are in line with the changes.
The changes particularly affect in particular those employees with variable hours or pay and rolled-up holiday pay, and employers must ensure that variable elements of pay are included in holiday pay.
More broadly, are staff taking their breaks and holiday? It is essential to encourage and remind staff to take their holiday entitlement, or there is a risk of employees being entitled to carry over holiday that they have not been encouraged to take.
- Sexual harassment
We have seen an uplift in the past year of sexual harassment issues, employees are rightly increasingly prepared to raise the flag and report when they come across inappropriate conduct in the workplace. In the event of a claim, employers must be able to show that they took steps to prevent predatory or unwelcome behaviour.
As a minimum this will involve workplace risk assessments to identify risk areas specific to their business and putting in place measures to avoid the risk, policies, workplace specific training and methods of reporting inappropriate conduct. More guidance can be found here: https://www.cwj.co.uk/site/newsandevents/legalnews/preventing_workplace_sexual_harassment_ECHR_templates.html
- Legislation on the horizon for the coming year
The Employment Rights Bill will continue to make its way through parliament over the coming months https://www.cwj.co.uk/site/newsandevents/legalnews/employment-rights-bill Although expected to become law in 2025, the changes are expected to come into effect in 2026, and we will be providing updates on this throughout the year.
More immediate is the new right to neonatal leave which is due to come into effect in April this year.
- General housekeeping
Are there any trends over the past year that require review? For example,
- Any high absence levels that need looking into – are there any employees or teams with consistently high absence levels that may point to an underlying issue or the need for formal action to be taken?
- Are appraisal and performance management reviews in hand? Checking that managers are on top of their one to ones, whether there is consistency and adequate record keeping, and ultimately whether performance concerns are being properly followed up with staff at an early enough stage.
- Any worrying trends in exit interview data that need following up?
If you need assistance with reviewing your Employment Contracts and/or policies, our Employment team can help. To get in touch, please call 01689 887840 or email laura.claridge@cwj.co.uk