Theresa May makes employee rights pledge to charm Labour MPs into backing Brexit deal

Theresa May has pledged that the standards of workers’ rights from EU laws retained in UK law will not be reduced after Brexit.

As part of the EU withdrawal agreement, parliament will be given the right to consider any future changes in EU law that strengthen workers’ rights or workplace health and safety standards. It will also be given a vote on whether they should be adopted into UK law.

The latest pledges from the Prime Minister have been seen as necessary to try and secure Labour’s support for her Brexit deal when it is voted on later this month.

Business Secretary Greg Clark said: “While the EU sets minimum requirements in many areas of workers’ rights, time and again the UK has led the way and chosen to exceed them. We are determined to maintain this record of leadership outside the EU. Yet it is a fact that some people felt that the rights of workers would not be adequately addressed, so as part of the withdrawal agreement bill we will ensure parliament is given a vote on the action government will take in response to changes to EU legislation on workers’ rights.”

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Matthew Fell, chief UK policy director at the CBI, said: “Businesses have been clear that they are not looking for a race to the bottom on standards.

“Critically, this new approach maintains a key role for parliament in assessing whether any future measures on workers’ rights are appropriate for the UK or not.”

Rachel Reeves, chair of the Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Committee, said the "Brexit offer" from the Prime Minister was an "uninspiring message that workers may not face a grim restriction of their rights when the UK leaves the EU".

"The reality is that this commitment amounts only to a vague promise which the government knows it cannot keep. A legal commitment to consider new EU proposals doesn’t bind a government to accept them and doesn’t mean that a future parliament will agree them.

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“Extra protections are needed for workers, not the hollow words offered by the government today. The BEIS Committee has been pushing throughout this parliament for tougher labour enforcement and for legislation to help protect workers, including in the gig-economy.

"The government has today re-announced last year’s proposals for a single labour market enforcement body. Yet it has nothing new to say on when this will actually happen, whether it will receive any extra funding, and when the government will finally bring forward the long-promised legislation to end bogus self-employment. The government needs to stop making empty promises to shore up support for Brexit and instead come forward with the laws needed to ensure workers have the protections and rights they deserve”.