Legislation and Guidance

Amendments have been made to HMRC's CJRS Guidance Collection to reflect the further extension of the scheme until the end of September.  For more information on the scheme see our CJRS FAQ.  A further Treasury Direction is expected to be published in due course. 

Shielding guidance has been updated in Scotland, will be updated in Wales, and a new letter sent to the clinically extremely vulnerable in England.  The Scottish guidance anticipates all Level 4 areas moving to Level 3 or lower from 26 April, meaning individuals on the shielding list will be able to return to the workplace from this date.  Should any areas remain at Level 4, or return to that level in the future, anyone shielding should return to working from home.  In Wales, the guidance will be updated on 31 March to confirm shielding measures will be paused from 31 March.  The falling number of COVID-19 cases in England has resulted in the Department of Health and Social Care publishing a new notification letter confirming that the clinically extremely vulnerable will no longer be advised to shield from 1 April.  However, they are advised to attend their workplace only where it is not possible to work from home.  They will also no longer be eligible for SSP from 1 April on the basis of the amended shielding advice.

ACAS has updated its working safely from home guidance.  The Testing staff for coronavirus page now has a section setting out what employers should be discussing with employees when implementing workplace testing.  This covers the practicalities of how the testing will be carried out as well as how the employer must comply with GDPR in terms of use and storage of the resulting data.  Guidance is also supplied on supporting employees to get vaccinated, including suggesting offering paid time off for vaccination appointments and full pay (rather than SSP) should the vaccine side effects cause absence from work.  There have also been a number of deletions from the guidance of some of the more complicated aspects of vaccination, including whether an employer can make vaccinations compulsory and whether a refusal to get vaccinated is a disciplinary issue.

News

New statistics have been published by the UK Government confirming that the third national lockdown announced in January led to the number of furloughed jobs rising from 3.8 million to 4.7 million between December 2020 and January 2021.  Once again hospitality was the worst affected sector, and younger workers (under 25) represented the highest proportion of those furloughed.

"No jab, no job" is set to be one of the most used phrases of 2021.  While many employers may not be able to justify making vaccinations compulsory, the care sector is one area where it may be possible to introduce such a policy.  Care UK, one of the UK's biggest care home providers has recently announced such a policy for new starts.  Others in the same sector are also telling existing staff that they must also take the vaccine. In either case a blanket approach will run the risk of unfair dismissal and/or discrimination claims, and employers should carefully look at each individual's reason for refusal and consider alternative roles away from the frontline for staff before getting to the stage of considering dismissing or taking disciplinary action. 

According to a survey  by analyst company Gartner, 29% of employees have become depressed in consequence of the COVID-19 pandemic.  The survey, which took place in late 2020, looked at 5000 employees.  Nearly 50% of those surveyed had made use of workplace wellbeing programmes.  However, while 90% of employers had put emergency measures in place to support staff during the pandemic, only 25% intend to make those measures permanent post pandemic.

Employment tribunal statistics covering the period October to December 2020 have highlighted the continuing pressure being put on employment tribunals in consequence of the COVID-19 pandemic.  Significant increases in claims are likely due to rising unemployment and changes to working conditions caused by the pandemic.  The outstanding employment tribunal caseload has risen to 51,000 albeit the continuation of the furlough scheme is likely to slow the number of claims being made in the current quarter.