Labour are going to crash the economy/jobs market.

[Batmanisaplaceinturkey]

Just a few of the changes
-Making it harder to dismiss a bad hire.
-SSP a percentage of earnings, available from day one of sickness.

And now plans to raise employers NI.

All very well if the employer is Amazon or Google but not so much the independent coffee shop down the road, the plumbers merchant, the cobblers, the florist etc. More expenses and red tape for them but who cares eh. Even if they do survive their costs will have to rise.

Labours plans will have unintended consequences.

The economy was in an entirely different place in 1999.

It didn't thrive simply because Tony Blair introduced the NMW.

And it has been pointed out by plenty of others that while in essence being a laudable policy, the actual effect it has had is to keep wages artificially low, while they are topped up by the government with taxpayers' money.

Employers are also workers so they need ''rights'' too!

This is a good summary of a lot of the big issues.

I might add, how to fix a civil service that prides itself on protection over productivity.

Not as many as they should have, and not so many as they had before the last 14 years of Tory rule.

As an employment lawyer, I contend that this ridiculous comment illustrates the level of extreme naivety of many people in the UK.

To those fearing that members of my sector are 'rubbing their hands' over Labour's new legislation, I wouldn't go that far, but let's just say, we are hiring appropriate candidates for the anticipated increase in volume of work.

That doesn't make me happy, though. Employers deserve better.

I don’t follow politics as closely. Off the top of my head.

Under Labour PM Ted Heath - the 1973 the 3 day working week caused by a lack of energy with dwindling reserves of fuel exacerbated by the Minor’s strike of 1972.

Overspending in good times meaning there was no money saved for good times with the 2008 global financial crisis. The famous letter left for the conservatives “I’m afraid there is no money”.

Tony Blair’s PFI hospital financing scandal, the consequences of which is still felt to this day, 25 plus years on.

The lack of confidence in the current Labour government with their on the back of a postage stamp decisions just over 100 days in.

I agree your list is incomplete and Labour’s list will be shorter just by dint of them being fewer years in office.

Both parties are equally clueless imo.

And how much less money was left for Labour after the Tories left this year?

We are more in debt in 2024 than we ever were in 2010.

It was largely the tax credit system rather than the minimum wage policy that depressed productivity and salary increases.

You're saying that an employer cannot terminate an employee that doesn't meet performance requirements?
(after due process)

DogInATent You clearly fail to understand how difficult it is for employers to terminate an employment contract due to underperformance, and the financial and emotional cost of dealing with proceedings by aggrieved ex-employees.

Single Employment Tribunal (ET) receipts and open cases increased by 6% and 7% respectively, while disposals decreased by 11% in Q3 2023/24, compared to the same period a year ago. In Q3 2023/24 Multiple ET receipts, disposals, and open cases all increased, by 3%, 100% and 2% respectively compared to Q3 2023/24.

Every one of these cases represents expense and stress for employers, and usually disappointment and outlay for ex-employees.

This is set to significantly increase under Labour.

You see that as a good thing?

Got to disagree with you on most of this:

"Minor’s strike of 1972..." Whose strike?

“I’m afraid there is no money.” Idiotic and flippant remark famously weaponised by the Tories to feed to the easily influenced. A mistake, certainly, but not a cause of economic suffering. For those, see my note above.

GFC caused purely by voracious capitalist practices by the usual suspects - who usually vote Conservative - devising new methods to rinse customers

"Tony Blair’s PFI hospital financing " The NHS had been run down for decades by the Thatcherites - somebody had to do something - note the immediate results and uplift in quality of the NHS.

"The lack of confidence in the current Labour government" Who from? The Daily Express crowd?

"Both parties are equally clueless imo." I don't mind a debate at a decent level, but that's poor, tbh...meaningless, lazy cynicism.

Fair enough to put your opinions forward though, ofc. Open debate is good.

The prosperity of countries and how they can afford to support a decent standard of living for their citizens in a generation's time will largely come down to energy, food and water security (UK exceptionally well-placed geographically for this but squandering it) and who owns the IP for the technologies of the future in robotics, AI, medicine, new food production processes, energy generation and storage, also potentially geo-engineering.

We need to throw everything we have left (not much) at education, skills, infrastructure, tech, research on our science and tech strength areas, and design our tax and laws to protect these investments and encourage the best from around the world to come here and participate alongside homegrown talent. A full industrial strategy focused on these long-term goals for higher productivity, vociferous protection of IP like the US has, while making the UK attractive to those with the skills, brains, knowledge, experience and money to make this possible.

The irony is that a long-term industrial strategy based on the above would actually have investors keen to invest here if they were convinced it was serious and plausible, even it it meant more short-term borrowing because this is not just chucking more money down an endless drain of unreasonable publicly funded pension/ healthcare demands but actually building assets for the future (providing they are also convinced the Government wouldn't tax any such assets into oblivion).

If you care about your children and grandchildren you'd be asking politicians questions about such plans. Did any of this feature anywhere in voter's top 10 concerns at the election? Of course not. Banging on about culture wars and immigration on one side and "tax the rich" (read: anybody slightly better off than me") and other such irrelevant nonsense as usual.

What is being pursued currently bears no resemblance to the above. People will reap what they sow, just like with Brexit and those apparently confused why their standard of living has now declined. It will continue to do so while the voters are so stupid they collude with Government slogans and sim

Sorry, "Government slogans and simplistic trivial nonsense that address none of the long-term issues that matter"

What percentage of dismissals go to tribunal?
How many of those that do were avoidable?

Fewer than 800/year unfair dismissal compensations claims were awarded in the most recent stats. Unfortunately it's not possible to determine how many of those were genuine unfair dismissals and how many were as a result of the employer not taking advice to enable them to manage the process properly.

DogInATent Although your level of naivety pays the wages in my sector, I can assure you that the cost, stress and disappointment involved for both sides far outweighs the benefit of overly-generous workers' rights legislation.

And the other blames the other, ad infinitum
It does my head in!

I might add, how to fix a civil service that prides itself on protection over productivity.

The Civil service bashing is extremely tiresome. For the level of skills and experience required (even factoring in the very generous pension scheme) they are largely enormously underpaid versus comparable private sector roles in terms of responsibility, expertise and skills. Hugely underpaid in terms of skillset in the UK, like so many other professionals. This is yet another media myth that has no basis in reality because they've always been a convenient scapegoat upon which incompetent politicians can blame their own failures.

While we're at it, if we want anyone resembling a competent politician in Parliament we'll need to cut the number to 1/3, triple their salary, and put some minimum requirements in place just like when recruiting for any other role with any level of responsibility.

They do everytime they get in to power.

But the last Tory government did nothing but fight amongst themselves so people had no alternative but the vote them in.

GFC caused purely by voracious capitalist practices by the usual suspects - who usually vote Conservative - devising new methods to rinse customers

Blair’s gov rode this wave with little thought to risk exposure. The other party wasn’t even in power. You need to look at who was actually in gov at the time.

The pp is right re PFI too, off books gov debt at huge mark up, hence no one using it again.

Not sure about what the impact will be but agree with pp on looking at SMEs and interesting to read insight from your sector

I run a small business and it doesn't bother me, because for the minor inconvenience for me it's going to hold a lot more big companies to account and raise the standard for everyone.

Also, no one can do more harm to the economy than Liz Truss even if they tried.

So I'm naïve thinking it's possible that there's a right way to sack someone for performance issues. You're saying there is no right way, its impossible to do correctly? No one can be sacked because they’re incapable of doing, or unwilling to do, their job to the required standard.

How could that be - how would UK business survive if the employment law sector is letting it down so badly?

Clearly, there must be a right way, a correct process, for doing these things.

(I'm not as naïve as you think, I'm just very, very cynical)

I don't understand employers who say that it will be harder to get rid of employees who perform poorly.

That really is not the case. You are still able to dismiss someone based on poor performance and probation periods remain.

It is just about clamping down further on employers who get rid of someone for random reasons like their face not 'fitting in'...

It is just the usual hysteria, similar to what happened when the minimum wage was introduced.

Too many employers in this country got used to paying rubbish wages and being subsided by the tax payers, as their employees have to claim benefits on top of their meagre wages to make ends meet. Not to mention toxic and insecure work places with zero hour contracts.

I tend to think that employees that are treated correctly and paid a fair wage are more likely to do a good job and to remain for longer in that employment.

Bizarre that so many employers prefer short term thinking and see employees as 'enemies' that need to be exploited and kept downtrodden. No wonder we have such rubbish productivity and high levels of work sickness...

"Blair’s gov rode this wave with little thought to risk exposure. The other party wasn’t even in power. You need to look at who was actually in gov at the time".

Fair point...but any attempt at regulating those bunch of Tory gangsters in international finance meets with constant wingeing from the Daily Mail and Daily Express.

The risk exposure was all privately run financial institutions'.

Brown's government had to bail them out. You and I had to pay for the privateers recklessness.

Privatise the profits, socialise the losses - in every country all over the globe during 2008/9.

Tory friends costing us billions. Again.

"The pp is right re PFI too, off books gov debt at huge mark up, hence no one using it again."

Again, someone had to save the infrastructure of the NHS estate. Tory dogma had systematically run it down since 1979...Not an ideal solution, but it worked.

Locked out of your house? Either sit round and do nothing... or pay a locksmith more than the going rate to solve the emergency.

I wish someone would just raise income tax. It's far too low to fund the services we need. Both DH and I fall into the higher rate band plus the added Scottish tax but could pay more for a functioning NHS and Education system.