2021 Outlook: Employment

Whilst Brexit will have some long-term implications from an HR perspective, the effects of the COVID pandemic are more likely to continue to have the most dramatic effect in the first half of 2021. The emergence of a vaccine is of course good news, but has come too late to save many jobs which have already been lost or will be made redundant over the next 6 months or so as certain industries continue to reel from the effects of lockdown. The Job Retention Scheme should preserve some roles in Q1, but sadly we are seeing that even the JRS cannot save many jobs in the travel, hospitality and high street retailing sectors where businesses are already falling into insolvency. Those companies in badly impacted sectors that do manage to survive until March will then need to make difficult decisions about their staffing requirements as they try to come to terms with what the new post-COVID world may look like for their business.

Employment laws are not expected to change immediately or radically as a result of Brexit, but the new immigration rules will pose both challenges and opportunities for employers. On the one hand, their potential recruitment pool is dramatically narrowed as EU nationals will no longer be able to move freely to and from the UK for work. However, on the other hand, the new rules aim to make the process of employing a migrant worker simpler, fairer and faster. There will be no need for the role to be advertised, the minimum salary threshold will be lowered from £30,000 a year to £25,600 a year and the minimum skills level required will be lowered. For some employers, this may open up possibilities to hire skilled migrant workers from non-EU countries where this would have been more difficult under the old immigration regime.

What of the sectors which have survived and, in some cases, thrived during the pandemic? We have all seen heart-warming stories of airline staff re-skilling to become essential workers, whether for the NHS or in a supermarket, thanks to an increase in demand for personnel in those sectors. The technology and pharmaceutical sectors have of course been extremely busy, and many professional services industries have also proved resilient. Businesses that have been able to adapt quickly to remote working have continued to preserve and, in some cases, create new jobs. Going forward, employers will be much more likely to offer remote and flexible working opportunities to all staff, and in turn this is likely to provide greater opportunities to employees with caring responsibilities such as working mothers. With youth unemployment a significant factor of the pandemic, Government support is required to help young workers to re-skill into the jobs and sectors which shall offer security and opportunity in equal measure.

The hot topics for 2021 in the Employment field are likely to be varied. Equality and diversity shall remain high on the agenda – #MeToo and #BlackLivesMatter have highlighted these issues from a gender and race perspective, and I expect that there will continue to be a growing focus on gender identity and social mobility alongside the other established protected characteristics under discrimination law. Employers now more readily acknowledge their responsibilities to support the mental health of their employees, although this can sometimes be seen as shifting the burden from a chronically under-funded provision of mental health services under the NHS.  Whistleblowing claims are likely to rise as a result of the pandemic, given the added regulation on employers with respect to COVID-secure workplaces and the challenges of keeping confidential information and personal data secure on systems which are not sufficiently robust for large scale and/or permanent remote-working arrangements. Finally, employment status will continue to give many employers headaches, whether they are operating businesses in the gig economy or hiring senior consultants through their personal service companies. It is difficult to see the general direction of travel changing on this topic, particularly anticipating the changes to IR35 now scheduled for April 2021 (delayed from 2020), as varying political agendas such as protecting the rights of workers or collecting more tax from employers all seem to reach a similar end point.