Out-Law / Your Daily Need-To-Know

Employee information and consultation rights: now in force

18 Apr 2005, 1:30 pm

Organisations employing more than 150 staff now need to have systems in place to allow meaningful dialogue to take place between managers and staff, following a change to UK employment law that came into force yesterday.

Welcoming the new Information and Consultation of Employees Regulations, also known as the ICE Regulations, TUC General Secretary Brendan Barber said:

"These new changes from Europe mean that employees now have a right to be told what's going on and a right to be heard. It should put a stop to the bolts from the blue where in the past staff heard their jobs were to be axed via text messages or by listening to the local radio."

The Regulations give employers the flexibility to agree consultation arrangements with their employees tailored to their particular circumstances. The DTI says they will facilitate voluntary agreements and allow pre-existing arrangements supported by the workforce and management to continue.

In general, the Regulations give employers and employees a free hand to agree on the subjects, timing and method of consultation; set up arrangements that apply to several companies as a group; and agree different consultation arrangements in different parts of a company, for example, at different locations or covering different parts of the workforce.

After the Regulations come into force, employers need not do anything unless employees trigger a request for negotiations. When there is such a request, the negotiation of an information and consultation agreement will take place against the benchmark of "standard information and consultation provisions", which the Central Arbitration Committee may ultimately enforce in the event of a failure to agree.

Brendan Barber concluded:

"Well-run, successful companies have been informing and consulting with their employees for years. Sensible employers know only too well the competitive edge that comes from helping staff feel more valued and involved in the running of their firm or organisation. Only bad managers who insist on keeping their staff in the dark have anything to fear."

The ICE Regulations apply to firms with 150 or more employees as from yesterday. They will apply to firms with 100 or more employees in 2007 and those with 50 or more in 2008.