Good morning, everyone, Kyle here and thank you for joining us for our August newsletter. For those who don’t know me, I’m Kyle, one of the solicitors here at PJH Law, and I’ll be taking you through a brief roundup of this month’s employment law news. I hope you all enjoyed the bank holiday weekend and the shortened week as we move into September.

Last week, we examined an interesting case which found that an employee does not need to have a protected characteristic in order to suffer discrimination—you can find that case here. This week, we launch Yoga HR, we also look at changes to how the National Minimum Wage may be calculated, an update to the code on fire and re-hire, and a lighter piece of news about a new proposed protected characteristic.

For anyone who missed our last newsletter, you can read it here.

PJH Law News – Launch of Yoga HR and 25% discount offer to our first 50 subscribers

We are very pleased to announce Yoga HR, an e-learning LMS to stretch your employee’s potential. Yoga HR’s vision is to be the leading e-learning content supplier to HR functions in the UK, providing courses that are engaging, stretching and relevant thereby helping organisations to grow and become leaner, calmer and more mentally flexible.

The courses are written by HR and Legal professionals with more than 50 years’ combined practicing experience and utilise AI avatars to deliver training that is engaging and interactive. No more slideshows! Our courses can be split into to two groups: compliance and upskilling. Compliance courses include anti-bribery, manual handling, data protection and sexual harassment whilst the upskilling courses include neurodiversity, menopause at work and communication skills.

To mark the exciting launch of Yoga HR we’re offering an exclusive 25% discount to the first fifty readers and clients who take up a license. Use code FIRST50 at checkout and save on our brand-new, top-rated courses.

 

National Minimum Wage – Changes to Calculation

 

In a statement this week, Jonathan Reynolds, the Secretary of State for the Department for Business and Trade, followed up on a manifesto pledge. The statement expands the remit of what the Low Pay Commission (LPC) can consider when recommending the minimum wage rate to the government. Emphasising the impact that the cost of living has had on workers, the LPC will now take into account the increased cost of living when recommending future rates. Given the sharp increases in the cost of living driven by inflation and a desire to increase profit margins (looking at you, oil, electricity, water and gas companies) over the past few years, this may result in the highest increase we’ve seen in years.

The LPC will recommend the rate in October 2025, with a decision to be announced in April 2026.

While the statement sets out that the impact on businesses, competitiveness, the labour market, and the wider economy will be assessed when recommending future increases, we will have to wait and see what changes this brings to the national minimum wage.

In addition to this change, Labour has pledged to close the gap between under-21s and over-21s by creating a single adult rate. However, we have no timeline for when—or if—this change will be implemented.

 

Code of Practice

Labour’s new Code of Practice on Dismissal and Re-engagement came into effect on 30 July 2024. The code criticises the use of dismissal and re-engagement when employees do not agree to some or all of the contractual changes proposed, as it creates legal and reputational risks for the employer, harms employee interests, and damages relations between employees and their employer. The new Code seeks to address this by providing a procedure employers can use before considering dismissal and re-engagement.

Note the word “can” in the previous sentence. While Employment Tribunals can consider a breach of the code when granting an uplift to an existing award, a breach of the code is not a claim in and of itself and must be attached to another claim. So, if the code is breached but the dismissal is fair, the employee will not have a successful claim. This has drawn criticism, as some view the enforcement of the code as lacking.

Labour has pledged to review the code moving forward, and we will keep an eye on its impact.

 

Lighter Side of the News – Fox hunters seek protection under the Equality Act

I think we all know who the true downtrodden are in this country. When a certain group suggested adding a new protected characteristic to the Equality Act, we all instinctively knew who they were referring to. That’s right, the underclass we were all expecting—fox hunters!

This month saw “Hunting Kind”—a pro-fox hunting group—compare their plight to those who experience race or sex discrimination. During an interview on the Fieldsports Channel podcast, the leader of the group, Ed Swales, claimed that they should qualify as an ethnic group. As we all know, being denied employment or housing because of your disability or religion is much the same as receiving unpleasant messages on social media from people who believe animals shouldn’t be torn apart by dogs and people in red velvet jackets on horseback. Mr. Swales went on to claim that he was mounting a legal challenge and that his claim was being reviewed by an unspecified KC.

I hope the KC is getting paid up front!

 

Feedback of the Week

Last but not least, we’ve received some great feedback from one of Liam’s clients, who said:

“Excellent service from start to finish. Liam’s expertise took all the emotion out of the situation and we achieved the desired outcome. Communicaton was spot on at all times and I woul happily recommend PJH. Thanks so much for your help.”