2026 is going to be a BIG year of changes for employment law, along with the usual annual April updates the Employment Rights Act (ERA25) is bringing in a lot of new rules and requirements to get our heads around so here’s what we know at the moment all in one place.
We usually update you in March but this year it is important that we get going on the actions the ERA25 creates – so here we are a month early!
Bereaved Partners Paternity Leave (BPPL)
In December 2025 a new piece of statutory legislaton slipped through without any noise and was missed by almost everyone!
BPPL entitles employees to take up to 52 weeks’ unpaid leave in the first year of a child’s life, or within 52 weeks of the child’s placement for adoption, if the child’s mother or primary adopter has died, and the employee has main responsibility for bringing up the child.
From April 2026 under the ERA25 this leave becomes a day one right as it sits within the Paternity Rights set out below.
Paternity Leave (PL) and Unpaid Parental Leave (UPL) become a ‘Day 1 Right’
One of the first implemenations of the ERA25 is the introduction of Day 1 Rights for PL and UPL which bring them in line with Maternity Leave.
There is no change to the eligibility requirements or dates for Paternity Leave Pay.
Quick explanation – UPL is the right for biological and adoptive parents named on the birth or adoption certificate and who have formal parental responsibility for a child to take up to 18 weeks’ unpaid parental leave for each child during the first 18 years of the child’s life. This is not the same as emergency dependant leave which remains unchanged in the new legislation.
Statutory Sick Pay (SSP)
Another ERA25 implementation is that from April 2026, SSP will be payable from the first day of any sickness absence, removing the current three waiting days. The lower earnings limit to recveive SSP is also being removed recent work data shows that this means 1.3 million more workers will be eligible for SSP.
The rate of SSP moving forward will be the current applicable statutory rate or 80% of the average weekly earnings (over an eight week period), whichever is the lower.
You should already have a robust sickness and return to work process but that will become even more important when dealing with persistent short-term absences as they will now start to cost you a little more as a business.
If you don’t? Talk to us!
NMW
National Minimum Wage and National Living Wages rates increase as of 1 April 2026.
If you are an employer who pays national minimum wage or has apprentices your salary budget is going to increase. Even if you currently pay over NMW, with these increases and the lowered age for national living wage you should check that your employees will be receiving at least statutory pay from April. It may also have a knock on effect if your starting salary increases significantly, for those higher up the pay scales if you want to maintain a differential between salary bands.
Rates from April 2026:
- 21 and over Rate £12.71 (currently £12.21)
- 18-20 Year Old Rate £10.85 (currently £10.00)
- 16-17 Year Old Rate £8.00 (currently £7.55)
- Apprentice Rate (1st year only) £8.00 (currently £7.55)
- Offset accommodation £11.10 (currently £10.66
Other Statutory Rate Increases
The lower earnings limit which must be met for most statutory payments is increasing from £125 per week to £129 per week.
Maternity (SMP), adoption (SAP), paternity (SPP), parental bereavement (SPBP), shared parental (SHPP) and neonatal care (NNCP) pay will be £194.32 per week (or 90% of the employee’s average weekly earnings if this figure is less than the statutory rate). (SMP and SAP for the first 6 weeks is 90% of the employee’s average weekly earnings, the following 33 weeks should be paid at the statutory rate).
Maternity Allowance (MA) – An employee who earns less than £129 per week but meets the qualifying criteria will be entitled to claim a Maternity Allowance of £194.32 per week (or 90 per cent of their average gross weekly earnings per week if this figure is less than the statutory amount) but this isn’t paid by the employer.
Statutory Sick Pay (SPP) will increase on 6 April 2026. The new rate is £123.25 per week, or 80% of the average weekly wage (over the previous 8 weeks), whichever is the lower. You can use the government calculator to work out daily pay if you are paying SSP.
Redundancy Pay – The cap on the maximum amount of a week’s pay for calculating redundancy pay is expected to increase from £719 in April but as yet the amount has not been confirmed.
Unfair Dismissal Compensatory Award – No change to the maximum amount that can be awarded for an unfair dismissal compensatory award (currently £118,223.00 or 1 years pay, whichever is the lower) has been announced. However, from January 2027 under the ERA the cap will be removed altogether.
In the Pipeline with The Employment Rights Act 2025 (ERA25)
Tribunal Time Limits – October 2026 will see an increase in the time permitted to bring a tribunal claim from 3 to 6 months.
Anti-Sexual Harassment – From October 2026 employers will need to take ‘all reasonable steps’ to prevent sexual harassment of their employees.
Tipping Laws will also be tightened from October 2026
Zero Hours Contracts – Although there is no set date as yet in 2027 zero hours workers will have the right to be offered a guaranteed hours contract based on hours previously worked and will also be entitled to receive pay for for cancelled or moved shifts when short notice is given. The specifics of this won’t be known until the government has completed its consultation.
Redundancy From 1 April 2026 The “protected period” for collective redundancy consultation will be increased from 90 days’ gross pay to 180 days when employers fail to consult correctly on collective redundancies (collective redundancy is where 20 or more employees are dismissed from one location). The Act is also looking to change the location criteria so that it covers an organisation as a whole rather than per location.
Fair Work Agency (FWA) will be given additional powers to issue notices for underpayment of statutory pay to ease the burden on Employment Tribunals from 7 April 2026. The FWA will also be able to bring ET proceedings on behalf of workers who do not pursue a claim themselves as well as providing legal assistance on proceedings.
Unfair Dismissal After much discussion we now know that as of 1 January 2027 any employee who has over six months’ continuous service on 1 January 2027 will have protection against unfair dismissal. For example a new starter on 1 August 2026 will have 6 months continuous service on the implementation date and will be protected.
Fire & Rehire Making changes to an employee’s terms is informally known as Fire & Rehire (dismissing from one contract and immediately re-employing on another). While these changes can be made when mutually agreed, such as through a flexible working request when it is employer imposed it can be problematic. The Act will mean that ‘restricted variations’ to core terms such as pay, hours, holiday and pensions will not be possible, there is also consultation taking place now (ends 1 April 2026) as to whether expenses and benefits and shift patterns will be considered a restricted variation. We don’t have an implementation date for this yet but anticipate it will not be until 2027.
What do you need to do with all this news?
Make sure you increase any pay if needed to meet the new NMW and Statutory Pay rates.
Identify any employees who currently have less than 2 years’ service but would have 6 months’ service by 1 January 2027 and ensure any concerns you have are addressed and resolved before 1 December 2026 at the latest.
If you are thinking of making any changes to the terms of your employees’ contracts, make it a priority to start a full and proper consultation process with them as soon as possible and complete the process by early December 2026 at the latest.
If you’re a retained vivoHR client we will be updating your contracts and policies / handbook for you with the upcoming changes and we will be in touch soon about that. This is provided as part of our retained HR Support service at no additional cost.
We have a number of additional resources that will support businesses to manage these changes and be the most effective employers – retained HR Support clients always receive these at a preferential price.
If you don’t have a retained HR Support package with us but would like us to make sure any of your contracts, policies and processes will be compliant with the new updates please get in touch and we’ll be happy to help you. Maybe now is the time to think about signing up for the retained HR Support!
To help you keep on top of the ERA25 we have created a one-stop-information-hub on our website where we’ll be posting updates as and when we know them, as well as answering all your frequently asked questions. There are useful resources including blogs, videos and a checklist of actions you may need to complete. Make sure to bookmark it and visit it regularly to stay in the know!