Employment Rights Bill

Chris Hinchliff Excerpts

Tuesday 11th March 2025 Commons Chamber

[Imran Hussain (Bradford East) (Lab)]

It is an absolute honour to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Middlesbrough and Thornaby East (Andy McDonald), and I know the whole House will join me in thanking him for all the work that he has done in shaping the Bill before us today.

The Employment Rights Bill, which I am also proud to have played a small part in shaping, represents a once-in-a-generation opportunity. The Bill is a testament to the values that we stand for: a fair day’s pay for a fair day’s work; dignity; protection; bargaining powers for workers; and a safety net for the most vulnerable when they need it the most.

There is much to celebrate in the Bill, as we have heard in the many excellent contributions today. I have also put my name to many of the amendments that we have heard hon. Members speak to in the House. I do feel that all of them are designed to strengthen the Bill further. However, given the time constraints, I shall focus my remarks on my amendments relating to statutory sick pay.

As we all know, and as has been said very eloquently today, the current system of statutory sick pay is not just insufficient, but completely and inexcusably broken. We have the worst system in Europe, which is shameful. Workers are entitled to just 17% of the average weekly wage, yet the cost of living does not suddenly plunge by 83% when they are sick. Their rent, their energy bills and their grocery tabs are not discounted, so why does SSP remain such a paltry sum? Being forced to survive on £118.75 a week—if they are lucky enough to get that in the first place—leaves workers exposed to financial hardship. It forces many to make the difficult decision to go to work when they are unwell.

It is therefore quite right that the Government have put forward major, necessary and welcome reforms. They include: removing the three-day waiting period, so that workers are entitled to sick pay from day one of illness; and extending sick pay to all workers by removing the lower earnings limit and implementing a fair earnings replacement percentage of 80%.

These reforms will directly benefit more than a million low-paid workers, a disproportionate number of whom continue to be those from black, Asian and minority ethnic backgrounds, women and young people. There is much more that we can do to strengthen the Bill, which is why I have tabled two amendments, which will do just that and ensure that no worker is left behind. Amendment 7 calls for sick pay to be aligned with the national living wage. Let me make it clear that uprating SSP is popular with businesses as well as with workers. Six in 10 employers agree that the rate is simply too low for workers to survive on. We know that because the poverty rate among those claiming SSP is more than double that among the overall working population.

Amendment 7 makes it clear that if a person is working full time, they should not be paid poverty wages when they are unwell. No one should have to choose between their health and their financial security, which is why my amendment would immediately raise SSP to around 67% of the average weekly wage, putting us on a par with many of our European counterparts.

My new clause 102 is about ensuring fairness. Although I welcome the Government’s proposed system, the reality is that 300,000 workers may actually end up worse off than they are today. Those who earn slightly above the current lower earnings limit of £123 up to £146 per week would receive 80% of their earnings, which is lower than the SSP rate that they would receive today.

We cannot allow anyone to be left behind. Although removing the waiting period puts more money in people’s pockets from the beginning of the illness period, workers taking more than four weeks off due to long-term conditions, going through cancer treatment, recovering from serious operations or suffering from mental health crises will face the biggest losses under the new system.

[Chris Hinchliff (North East Hertfordshire) (Lab)]

Research has found that the cost of presenteeism to the private sector in mental ill health alone is £24 billion a year. Does my hon. Friend agree that shows that reforming our statutory sick pay is the most pro-prosperity, pro-productivity policy that we can pursue?

[Imran Hussain]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right, and he makes the case brilliantly against some of the nonsense arguments about productivity that we have heard from the Conservative Benches today. It is the right thing to do, but also it will lead to much improved productivity and a better, healthier, happier workforce, as well as being much better for the employer.

My amendment and new clause would ensure that every worker receives, at the very least, the same amount of sick pay that they would have done under the current system, and not a penny less. I urge the Government to support them, as they are very much in the spirit of this legislation.