Top 5 UK recent workplace developments – November 2025

Stay informed with our roundup of the latest employment law developments impacting employers, HR teams, and legal professionals

1. Employment Rights Bill: Update 
2. Employment Rights Bill - New consultations launched
3. Acas Early Conciliation 
4. Collective Redundancies: new digital HR1 form
5. Mayanja v City of Bradford and Metropolitan District Council

1. Employment Rights Bill: Update 

The Employment Rights Bill is in the final phase of the UK parliamentary process

The Employment Rights Bill (ERB) is currently in the final stage of parliamentary debate, with amendments being exchanged between the House of Commons and the House of Lords to address outstanding differences.

The House of Lords has made several amendments to the Bill, such as introducing a six-month qualifying period for unfair dismissal claims instead of making unfair dismissal a 'day one' right, adding a provision for workers to opt out of guaranteed hours contracts, and keeping the existing turnout threshold for industrial action ballots (requiring at least 50% of eligible voters to participate).

The House of Commons did not agree to these amendments and proposed alternatives. The Bill is scheduled to return to the House of Lords for further consideration on 17 November 2025.

Practical point

We will continue to keep you updated on developments.

2. Employment Rights Bill - New consultations launched

The government has launched four consultations to gather feedback on four areas of reform

1. Duty to inform workers of their right to join a trade union
   The ERB introduces a duty on employers to inform workers of their legal right to join a union. Consultation questions include what the statement should contain, how and when it should be delivered, and whether it should be digital or paper based.
    
2. Trade union access to workplaces
   The ERB proposes a statutory duty for employers to allow union access for defined purposes. The consultation about this seeks input on what form the union’s request should take, how employers should be required to respond including time limits and whether they should be able to refuse or negotiate terms, and dispute resolution mechanisms.
   
   These two Trade Union consultations will close on 18 December 2025.  
    
3. Unpaid bereavement leave (including pregnancy loss)
   The ERB proposes a statutory right to unpaid bereavement leave from day one of employment, covering the death of a loved one and pregnancy loss before 24 weeks. The consultation seeks views on eligibility (eg what relationships it should apply to), duration, flexibility, and notice/evidence requirements.
    
4. Enhanced Dismissal Protection for Pregnant Women and New MothersWhen implemented, the ERB will make it unlawful to dismiss employees who are pregnant, on maternity leave or within six months of their return to work except in limited circumstances.  The consultation explores start/end points of protection, exceptions (e.g. redundancy), and whether to extend to other parents.
   
   These two consultations will close on 15 January 2026.

Practical point

Following the conclusion of each consultation process, the Government will need to consider the input received, before publishing its response and draft regulations. In its own Roadmap, the Government has said that “…Engagement and consultation will inform policy development. Following consultation, Government will develop final policy positions to deliver our measures. In some instances, this will be regulations, in others it will be guidance or Codes of Practice by the Government or others such as Acas.” 

Given that the Government says that some measures may require more than one round of consultation, it seems likely there will be some slippage on the implementation timetable. Check back in with our tracker for details of the planned timings.

3. Acas Early Conciliation 

The Acas Early Conciliation period to be increased from six to twelve weeks from 1 December 2025

The government has published Regulations to increase the Early Conciliation (EC) period from six weeks to twelve weeks. The Regulations are due to come into force from 1 December 2025.

The EC period is the period within which Acas has a duty to help facilitate settlement once a claim has been notified to it. If no settlement is achieved within the EC period, Acas must issue an EC certificate bringing the process to an end. 

This will apply to any case notified to Acas for EC on or after 1 December 2025. 

The reason for this increase is to ease pressure on Acas following a rise in demand for EC, together with greater complexity of cases. The EC period will be reviewed again in October 2026 to decide if 12 weeks is still appropriate.

Practical point

This change, when combined with the proposal in the Employment Rights Bill to extend the time limit for bringing Employment Tribunal claims from three to six months, could result in employers being unaware of a potential claim for nine months or more. This means employers should:

• Ensure thorough contemporaneous notes and records are kept of key employment decisions as witnesses’ memories will fade over time. 
• Check your data retention policy allows you to keep documents such as those relating to disciplinaries and grievances for long enough after the employee’s termination date to allow you to respond to claims.

4. Collective Redundancies: new digital HR1 form

From 1 December employers must use the new digital HR1 form

Where an employer is proposing 20 or more redundancies ‘at one establishment’ within a period of 90 days, it must notify the Secretary of State of these proposed redundancies using the HR1 form. 

Until now, employers have been required to download the HR1 form and return it by email. From 1 December 2025 it will become mandatory to use the digital version of the form.

The digital form differs from the previous version in some respects. For example, the employer is no longer required to provide a breakdown of the affected employees by occupational group, there is a new redundancy reason option of “Change in supply chain/loss of supply chain contract” and future consultation dates are no longer accepted. 

Practical point

Employers planning larger-scale redundancies should get to know the digital HR1 system, as from 1 December it will no longer be possible to submit HR1 notifications by email.

The digital form will ‘time out’ and will not save information until final submission, which means it must be completed all at once. Leaving the page for more than 90 minutes requires starting the form again. This means employers will need to review and gather the necessary information and get any internal approvals needed before completing and submitting the form digitally.

Make sure you save or print the summary page for your records. 

5. Race discrimination – new evidence 

Employment Tribunal decision overturned following discovery of new evidence in discrimination case 

Mr Mayanja, a black African applicant, applied for a role with the City of Bradford and Metropolitan District Council. Mr Mayanja was informed he was the preferred candidate, subject to satisfactory references. Following receipt of the references, the Council withdrew his candidacy, saying they showed Mr Mayanja had made misleading statements in his application.

Mr Mayanja brought claims of breach of contract, race discrimination, victimisation, and harassment. Central to his case was the assertion that he had been offered the job; an allegation the Council denied. The Employment Tribunal found Mr Mayanja to be an unreliable witness, preferring the evidence of the recruiting manager, C, and dismissed all his claims. It also imposed a £2,000 costs order, concluding that Mr Mayanja had fabricated the harassment claim and knowingly misrepresented the contract claim.

After the Tribunal hearing, Mr Mayanja discovered an email from C that appeared to offer him the job. He applied for reconsideration, but the Tribunal treated the application as limited to the costs judgment only. Although the Employment Tribunal admitted the email in the interests of justice, it upheld its view that Mr Mayanja’s harassment claim was fabricated and simply reduced the costs award to £200. The Tribunal accepted C’s explanation that the email had been overlooked due to a new computer system and that she had not intended to conceal it.

On appeal, the Employment Appeal Tribunal (EAT) found that the Employment Tribunal had made an error by failing to reconsider the liability judgment in light of the new evidence. It held that Mr Mayanja could not reasonably have been expected to disclose the email earlier as the Council bore the primary responsibility for document disclosure. Crucially, the EAT noted that the Tribunal’s rejection of all Mr Mayanja’s claims was fundamentally based on its adverse credibility finding, which had relied heavily on the absence of a job offer and C’s denial.  

The EAT concluded that the Tribunal’s decision was fundamentally unsafe. It set aside both the liability and costs judgments and remitted the case to a freshly constituted tribunal for a full rehearing.

Practical point:

This case serves as a cautionary tale of the critical role of disclosure in employment litigation.

Employers should ensure that they:

• Keep a brief record of how candidates have been assessed against an essential skills matrix
• Note why a candidate has been rejected following interview or receipt of a reference
• Retain correspondence with candidates for a sufficient period of time to defend claims (on which see the extended time periods dealt above in part 3).

Mayanja v City of Bradford and Metropolitan District Council