Professor Len Shackleton is the Editorial and Research Fellow at the Institute of Economic Affairs
Labour’s long-promised Employment Rights Bill may not be quite as immediately game-changing as the trade unions hoped or the business lobby feared. There will be implementation delays, with most elements not operative until 2026 – unsurprising given the expected complexity of the legislation. Further consultation will be needed before more detailed regulations are tabled. But
The last two and a half years have seen a dramatic revival in trade union militancy, with working days lost through strikes reaching their highest level for more than thirty years. The arrival of a Labour government has already seen markedly more generous settlements than the Conservatives offered – and the new administration has committed
Are chief executives overpaid? The High Pay Centre thinks so. Every January, it releases data showing the huge inequality between top UK CEOs and average workers. The results are startling: ‘Bosses of Britain’s biggest companies will have made more money in 2024 by lunchtime on Thursday than the typical worker will all year,’ according to
‘A drugged woman is kissed without her consent? I don’t call that a happy ending.’
‘It was my father’s beloved possession — and I obviously couldn’t have cared less about it until I realised it might get me on telly.’
While welcoming George Osborne’s emphasis this week on raising employment, I have some caveats about his target – to have the highest employment rate in the G7. This isn’t hugely challenging. Those in employment currently amount to 71.2 per cent of the UK population of working age, well ahead of Italy (55.5 per cent), France
One million people on zero hours contracts, scream the media – quoting figures released today by the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development. This is at odds with recent ONS figures that put the number on these contracts closer to 200,000. Zero-hours contracts have been around for many years in the retail and hospitality industries, where demand
As we move towards the budget we will be hearing more and more warnings about the impact of further cuts in public sector employment. One line, pursued repeatedly by the TUC and the Fawcett Society since Mr Osborne’s first budget, is that such cuts will particularly impact on women. As the public sector employs more
