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Rachel Farr

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Rachel Farr is a Senior Knowledge Lawyer in Baker McKenzie, London office.

In this episode of FInsight: The Global Financial Institutions Industry Podcast, Blair Robinson (Partner, New York) and Lorren Martin (Senior Associate, London) discuss how financial institutions are navigating issues around inclusion, diversity and equity (ID&E) on both sides of the Atlantic and globally, with Rachel Farr (Senior Knowledge Lawyer, London).

Employees will have a statutory right to a week’s unpaid leave each year to care for a dependent from 6 April 2024. The Carer’s Leave Regulations 2024 have been laid before Parliament and are expected to be made shortly. They set out details of the scheme intended under the Carer’s Leave Act 2023, as previously reported.

Employers will need to decide whether they wish to enhance the new rights, for example, by paying for some or all of the leave, as part of an employee benefits package to recruit, retain, and support employees with caring responsibilities. Some employers may already offer a form of contractual carer’s leave.

From 6 April 2024, the current right of employees on maternity, adoption, and shared parental leave (“family leave”) to be offered suitable alternative employment in preference to other employees who are at risk of redundancy will be extended to cover pregnant employees, and those who have recently returned from such types of family leave.

In an article for PLC Magazine, Monica Kurnatowska and Rob Marsh outline employers’ obligations under the new EU Pay Transparency Directive. It considers key elements including pay reporting, pay transparency, pay assessments and equal value, and remedies and enforcement as well as the practical implications for employers in the EU and in the UK in the light of the UK’s withdrawal from the EU.

The Worker Protection (Amendment of Equality Act 2010) Act 2023 is due to receive Royal Assent. The Act will introduce a new duty on employers to take reasonable steps to prevent sexual harassment and is expected to come into force 12 months after Royal Assent is granted. This duty will sit alongside employees’ existing protections from sexual harassment in the workplace.

In July 2022, the law changed to allow employment businesses to supply workers to cover the duties of those taking part in official industrial action. Previously, it had been a criminal offence to do so. Following a successful judicial review challenge brought by unions, that law has been quashed. It is once again a criminal offence to supply agency workers to cover the duties of workers on an official strike, or to supply agency workers to cover the duties of other workers reassigned to cover striking workers.

After a long period in which the UK government has promised several employment law changes contained in an Employment Bill without bringing forward such a Bill, it has now announced it is supporting certain private members’ bills which include developments in these areas. These include expanding the right to request flexible working, a new right to request more predictable working conditions, a number of changes to family leave entitlements, and protection for those facing harassment by third parties such as customers at work.