TUPE changes that dilute protection now in effect
Changes to TUPE became law on 31 January 2014.
The changes will affect all transfers on or after that date. The changes are made under new regulations, known as the Collective Redundancies and Transfer of Undertakings (Protection of Employment) (Amendment) Regulations 2014.
Although they are not as extensive as unions feared at the start of the consultation (they do not, for example, remove the regulations governing service provision change), they nevertheless significantly dilute the protection provided by TUPE, making it easier and quicker for employers to cut pay and other terms and to dismiss workers.
Several of the changes, including provisions designed to downgrade the protection of terms incorporated from a collective agreement, amount to a direct assault on the machinery of collective bargaining, prompting TUC general secretary Frances O’Grady to describe them as a “blatant attack on the ability of unions to represent working people”.
The new regulations also introduce a right (but not a duty) for the transferee, with the permission of the transferor, to engage in collective consultation with the transferor’s workplace before the transfer date, where a transferee intends to make redundancies.
The TUC has pointed out that collective redundancy consultation by an entity that is not the employer is an infringement of the Collective Redundancies Directive.