HR and Employment Law FAQs April 2026

3. What does the new holiday record-keeping requirement under the Employment Rights Act 2025 mean for employers in practice?

On 6 April 2026, a new duty came into force under section 35 of the Employment Rights Act, which requires employers to keep “adequate records” showing compliance with workers’ holiday rights under the Working Time Regulations (including the amount of leave and pay). (Prior to 6 April, although it was considered good practice for an employer to keep records of the holiday taken by their workers, they were not legally required to do so (unless they were an employment business providing agency workers)).

The requirement under the Employment Rights Act is for employers to keep records, for all workers, of:

• any statutory holiday taken;
• any statutory holiday carried forward;
• statutory holiday pay paid, including how it has been calculated and which pay elements have been included; and
• payments in lieu of untaken statutory holiday on termination.

There is no set format for the records; they “may be created, maintained and kept in such manner and format as the employer reasonably thinks fit”. The records must be kept for six years (from the date they were created). Failure to keep adequate holiday records dating back to 6 April 2026 is an offence punishable by a fine. If there are currently gaps in your holiday record keeping, you may find this new requirement administratively burdensome. However, if you already have robust holiday record keeping procedures in place, few changes may be needed.

In the light of the above, employers should review their position now in relation to holiday record-keeping and consider where improvements could be made moving forwards. For example, do you have good processes in place to ensure that all holiday and pay entitlements are accurately documented and can be retained for six years? Keep in mind that you may need to update your data privacy and retention policies to reflect the new six year retention requirement. Consider too whether there are other records you could usefully retain to help demonstrate your compliance, such as any emails you have sent to staff encouraging them to take holiday. 

Although the requirement is only to keep records of statutory holiday taken and pay received for that holiday, we anticipate (and recommend) that employers keep records of all holidays taken and pay received, particularly because it can be difficult to distinguish between statutory and contractual holiday (see our HR and Legal Resources webpage Holiday entitlement and pay). Note that the requirement is to keep records to show that holiday has been taken as well as paid for. Therefore, if you currently only record when holiday was paid, you will need to ensure that you also record the days on which the worker actually took the holiday, and keep those records for six years as well.

In due course, the Fair Work Agency (the FWA) - which was established on 7 April 2026 - will have the power to enforce this requirement to keep adequate records of statutory holiday entitlement and pay. It is currently unclear when the FWA’s enforcement powers will take effect (the Government’s recently published Strategic Steer to the Fair Work Agency for the Transitional Year of Operation indicates that the FWA will commence holiday pay enforcement in 2027). We will keep you updated on any developments.

If you are a Make UK subscriber, you can speak to your regular adviser with any queries you may have about annual leave and/or access our HR & Legal Resources. If you are not a Make UK subscriber, you can contact us for further support on this topic or to access our resources. Please click here for information on how we can help your business.
 

4. Where should we hold a disciplinary hearing?  

Most disciplinary hearings are likely to take place in person, at your premises. In some circumstances, however, it may be appropriate or necessary to hold a disciplinary hearing remotely (for example, if the participants are home or hybrid workers).  

In order to maintain flexibility to choose the most appropriate location for a disciplinary hearing in each case, we recommend specifying in your disciplinary policy that a hearing may be either remote or in person, at your discretion, and that home or hybrid workers may be required to attend your premises for hearings that are in person. Our template disciplinary policy (which is available to Make UK subscribers in our HR & Legal Resources) takes this approach.

When considering whether to hold a disciplinary hearing remotely or in person, bear in mind that if the employee concerned is not used to remote meetings because they do not work from home (for example, a production operative), an in-person hearing may be more appropriate.

When scheduling remote hearings, you will need to ensure that all parties (including any companion for the employee) have access to the necessary technology to enable them to fully participate in the hearing, as well as any relevant materials that may be referred to. You will also need to consider whether any participant has a disability or other accessibility issue that could affect their ability to use video conferencing technology and whether any reasonable adjustments might be required as a result. 

If you are a Make UK subscriber, you can speak to your regular adviser for further guidance and/or access information about disciplinary matters, including template policies and drafting guidance, in the HR & Legal Resources section of our website. 

If you are not a Make UK subscriber, you can contact us for further support on this topic or to access our resources. Please click here for information on how we can help your business.
 

5. How can we make our views known to Government on the employment-related consultation issues that are currently “live”?

Our Policy Team is preparing to submit responses to the following consultations and is keen to hear your views on the Government’s proposals. If you would like to contribute, please email our Policy Team:

• Consultation on a draft code of practice on trade union right of access: This consultation seeks views on a draft statutory code of practice to support the new legal framework for trade unions and employers when negotiating trade unions’ access into workplaces. (A consultation on how these provisions should operate closed in December 2025, and the Government published its response to the consultation along with the new draft code of practice on 8 April 2026.) This new code, which will be the main source of practical guidance on the new statutory access framework, will include details of: how access requests should be made; how access agreements should be negotiated and implemented across different types of workplaces; and best practice examples to support effective engagement. The consultation is seeking views from all interested parties to ensure that the new code is clear, practical and balanced.
• Consultation on collective redundancy: This seeks views on the level and methods by which a new organisation-wide threshold for triggering collective redundancy obligations might be set. (Currently, employers are required to undertake collective redundancy consultations when proposing to make 20 or more redundancies at one establishment within a 90-day period. Under the Employment Rights Act, an additional trigger will apply meaning that employers will need to carry out collective redundancy consultation whenever they make a threshold number of redundancies across their entire organisation.) The Government’s preferred approach is for the organisation-wide threshold to be a single fixed number of between 250 and 1,000 proposed redundancies. The consultation is seeking views on whether a fixed number is the right approach and what the relevant number should be within that range. The consultation document also explores whether the Government should adopt a tiered approach based on the number of proposed redundancies and the number of employees in the organisation, or a percentage-based method, or a mixture of methods.
• Consultation on detriments for taking industrial action: This seeks views on the types of detriments that employers should be prohibited from imposing on workers for taking industrial action. The Government’s current preference is to prohibit all detriments connected with taking industrial action, for example this might include detriments such as being rejected for a promotion or refused a training opportunity. An alternative approach would be for regulations to specify a list of prohibited detriments. The consultation explores the merits of these possible approaches and seek views on which would be better.
• Consultation on improving access to flexible working: This seeks views on a proposed new employee consultation process for employers if they are minded to reject a flexible working request.
• Consultation on modernising the agency worker regulatory framework. This seeks views on various issues relating to the temporary labour market including whether any changes should be made to the Agency Workers Regulations 2010.

In addition, on 8 April 2026 the Government published a new call for evidence on the Transfer of Undertakings (Protection of Employment) Regulations (the TUPE regulations), to which our Policy Team will also submit a response. The Government has committed to strengthening the TUPE Regulations and will use this call for evidence to inform its development of policy proposals for reform.