The People Bulletin

Both the CBI and EEF have called on the government to use caution in the way they approach employment law and to help organisations and employees to benefit from flexible working. 

The CBI’s  report ‘Thinking Positive: the 21^st century employment relationship’ examines how the employment relationship has changed, becoming even more flexible. The report points to the success of workplace relations forged during the recession, and asks the government to seek alternatives, such as codes of practice, rather than automatically opting for legislation. 

The report states that while the government has made some moves towards reducing regulation there are some policies, such as abolishing the default retirement age, which have reduced flexibility. 

Likewise, whilst recent research has shown that organisations are increasingly operating a two-way street on flexibility with their workforce, the EEF is concerned that recent trends in employment regulations threaten to undermine the benefits that both parties gains from it.  

Their report ‘Flexibilty in the Modern Manufacturing Workplace’ showed 80% of companies felt that co-operation between management and their workforce has helped in achieving the flexibility they needed in the past three years and that 94% of companies thought that this would be vital in the next three years. 

The report made a number of recommendations to policy makers including: 

• to pursue non-regulatory approaches first;
• take proactive steps to simplify current legislation; and
• engage earlier with EU decision-making process and resist any changes that will damage the flexibility of the UK’s labour market. 

John Cridland, CBI director-general, said:

“Traditionally when making employment law governments have tried to specify every last detail of what should go on in the workplace.

“With a strong base of employment rights already in place, we simply don’t need the state telling us how to manage every aspect of basic human relations.

“Good communication helped companies and employees work together to make difficult changes to working patterns to get through the recession. These lessons are particularly important now the public sector is facing similar challenges as a result of measures to cut the deficit”.

Steve Radley, director of policy at the EEF said: 

“Supporting flexibility must be a key part of the government’s growth strategy. To do this, it needs to send a clear signal that additional regulation will be the last rather than the first resort and ensure that any new measures are simpler and much less prescriptive than what we have seen in recent years. 

“Employers are already adopting many changes which are providing positive changes for their workforce. But there is a limit to how far companies can be expected to shoulder responsibility for achieving the government’s social objectives without a negative impact not just on their business, but on the employees themselves”. 

www.cbi.org.uk

www.eef.org.uk

See also: ‘The benefits of flexible working’ by Amy Richardson in The People Bulletin, 19 May 2010