Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, whether his Department has made a recent assessment of the potential merits of revoking (a) the Working Time Regulations and (b) other EU regulations on worker rights.

We are proud of the UK’s record on employment standards, having raised domestic standards over recent years to make them some of the highest in the world. In leaving the EU we regained the ability to regulate autonomously, and the Government is therefore conducting a comprehensive review of all retained EU law to ensure that our regulations, including worker rights, are tailored to the needs of the UK economy and help create the conditions for growth and investment.

The UK has one of the best workers’ rights records in the world. In recent years, the Government has brought forward a raft of legislation on employment rights issues. In April this year, we made sure 2.5 million people across the UK received a pay raise by raising the National Minimum Wage and National Living Wage. We have extended the ban on using exclusivity clauses to contracts where a worker’s guaranteed weekly income is below the Lower Earnings Limit, which is currently £123 a week.

Numerous Private Members’ Bills have been introduced on the matter of employment rights, and we are working closely with these members on their proposals. The Neonatal Care (Leave and Pay) Bill and The Employment (Allocation of Tips) Bill have both passed their Second Reading with Government support and will continue to progress through parliament before receiving royal assent and becoming law in England, Scotland and Wales.