The Employment Rights Act 2025 (ERA2025) introduces a statutory right for independent trade unions to access workplaces for the purposes of meeting, supporting, representing, recruiting or organising workers and facilitating collective bargaining. The underlying policy objective is to support fair, modern and effective industrial relations by enabling unions to communicate directly with workers

The Employment Rights Act 2025 (ERA 2025) introduces significant changes to trade union law. The government has recently published  its proposals regarding the prohibition of detrimental treatment related to industrial action, and the introduction of electronic and workplace balloting for industrial action.

Protection Against Detriment for Taking Industrial Action

The ERA 2025 introduced Section 236A

On 15 April 2026, the government launched a consultation on regulations to prevent the misuse of non-disclosure agreements (NDAs) in cases of workplace harassment or discrimination.

NDAs

NDAs are formal agreements or clauses used to keep information confidential by preventing disclosure.  Historically, they have been used to protect commercial data, trade secrets and sensitive business

A recent Employment Appeal Tribunal decision is a timely reminder that, without clear wording on conditions and notice, withdrawing an accepted job offer may expose employers to contractual liability.

Background

Mr Kankanalapalli (K) was offered a project manager role with Loesche Energy Systems Ltd in September 2022, with a proposed start date of 1 November

On 25 March, the government published its response to the consultation on mandatory ethnicity and disability pay gap reporting, confirming its intention to proceed with a new reporting regime for large employers. Reporting will apply to organisations with 250 or more employees, aligning with the existing gender pay gap framework and avoiding additional regulatory burden