Employment Rights Act changes on 30 October 2026

On 30 October 2026, a legal switch is being flipped. The new regulations made on 1 October are not a brand-new employment law by themselves; they are the sixth commencement order for the Employment Rights Act 2025, which means they decide which parts of that Act start operating on that date. For readers, the big point is simple: if you are a worker, a union rep or an employer, 30 October is the date to watch. legislation.gov.uk says this order brings in stronger harassment duties, trade union access and recognition changes, new facilities for union representatives, and seafarer provisions. (legislation.gov.uk) **What this means:** when you read a commencement order, you are not usually reading the rule in full. You are reading the timetable. The real detail sits in the Employment Rights Act 2025 itself and, in some cases, in related regulations and Codes of Practice. (legislation.gov.uk)

One of the clearest changes is sexual harassment law. Section 20 of the 2025 Act upgrades the employer duty in the Equality Act 2010 from taking 'reasonable steps' to taking 'all reasonable steps' to prevent sexual harassment. Section 21 adds a rule on harassment by third parties, so an employer must not permit a customer or other non-employee to harass a worker if the employer failed to take all reasonable steps to stop it. Section 22 then gives ministers power to spell out, in later regulations, steps that count as reasonable, including assessments, policies, reporting routes and complaint handling. (legislation.gov.uk) For workers, this matters because the law is no longer only about what happened after a complaint. It puts more weight on prevention before the incident. For employers, it is a warning not to treat a slide deck and a forgotten policy as enough. These harassment provisions sit in the Equality Act framework for England, Wales and Scotland, not Northern Ireland, so readers should not assume the same rule applies across every part of the UK. (legislation.gov.uk)

If you manage staff, the practical lesson is plain. By 30 October, you need working systems, not just good intentions: clear reporting channels, records of complaints, action plans for customer-facing risk, and managers who know what to do when someone raises a problem. Because section 22 allows later regulations to specify steps in more detail, this is also an area to keep reviewing rather than filing away after one policy update. (legislation.gov.uk) If you are an employee, keep in mind that the law still asks case-by-case questions. A new duty does not mean every bad incident automatically wins at tribunal. But it does make the employer's prevention work much more important evidence. That is the practical inference from the stronger preventative wording in sections 20 and 21. (legislation.gov.uk)

The same date also brings in section 56 and Schedule 5 on seafarers' wages and working conditions. In legal terms, this part amends the Seafarers’ Wages Act 2023 and builds more machinery around pay and working conditions for relevant services. For most readers on land, the main thing to know is that this is sector-specific and will matter most to employers, workers and unions in shipping and port-linked work. (legislation.gov.uk) Trade union access is easier to picture. Section 59 creates 'access agreements' between qualifying unions and employers so union officials can enter a workplace, communicate with workers, or both, for set access purposes such as meeting, supporting, representing, recruiting and organising workers, and helping collective bargaining. The Act is clear that this access is not for organising industrial action, and the official explanatory notes say access should work without unreasonably interfering with the employer's business. (legislation.gov.uk)

That access right is not just a headline promise. Separate regulations linked to the new workplace access regime are also set to come into force on 30 October 2026, and legislation.gov.uk says they include a 15-working-day response period after an access request is given. So, if you are in a union, this is not only about principle; it is about a workable procedure. If you are an employer, you will need someone in the business who can respond quickly and lawfully. (legislation.gov.uk) Section 60 and Schedule 6 are the dense bit. They reshape parts of the statutory trade union recognition and derecognition process that sits with the Central Arbitration Committee, or CAC. The government’s explanatory notes say Schedule A1 to the 1992 Act is the core route for recognition and derecognition, and the 2025 Act changes that route in several places. (legislation.gov.uk)

Here is the simplest way to read the transition rules. If a recognition, derecognition or bargaining-unit case was already with the CAC before 30 October 2026, the old rules usually stay in place for that case. If the relevant application reaches the CAC on or after 30 October, the new rules are much more likely to apply. In other words, two otherwise similar disputes can fall under different rulebooks purely because of timing. (recordinglaw.com) This matters because commencement dates are not administrative trivia. For unions, the filing date can affect which recognition tests and consequences apply. For employers, it means any live CAC case needs to be checked against the exact application date before anyone assumes the new framework helps them or hurts them. That is an explanation of the cut-off effect in the regulations, not a substitute for legal advice on a live case. (recordinglaw.com)

Section 64 is about something very practical: facility time. legislation.gov.uk shows that when an employer permits time off for trade union duties or for union learning representatives as the law requires, the employer must also, if asked, provide reasonable accommodation and other facilities for carrying out that work, taking account of any relevant ACAS Code of Practice. But the commencement order draws a line on timing: if the refusal of time off happened before 30 October 2026, the old rules still govern that tribunal claim. (legislation.gov.uk) That is a good example of how these regulations work. They are not trying to rewrite the past. They are mainly telling tribunals, unions and employers which rule applies from which date. That sounds dry, but it can decide real cases. (legislation.gov.uk)

Section 65 does something new for equality representatives. It inserts a right to time off during working hours for recognised union equality reps to do equality-related activities, including promoting equality at work, arranging training, supporting union members, consulting the employer and analysing workplace equality information. The Act also links this new role to related rules on pay, tribunal time limits, remedies and ACAS Codes. (legislation.gov.uk) The commencement order also tries to avoid a cliff edge for people already doing this kind of work. Existing equality reps who, immediately before 30 October, have been carrying out those functions continuously for at least six months and were appointed or elected under union rules are treated as meeting the notice and training condition. For union branches, that means checking who is already in post now, not after the date has passed. (legislationtracker.co.uk)

So if you want the short version, here it is. From 30 October 2026, employers face tougher prevention duties on sexual harassment, unions gain stronger workplace access and fresh recognition rules, union officials and learning representatives gain clearer facility support, and equality representatives move onto a statutory footing. Some of the groundwork for Codes of Practice started earlier in January 2026, but the main day-to-day rights in this package are set to start on 30 October. (legislation.gov.uk) If you are a worker, keep records and ask which policy applies from 30 October. If you are a union rep, check your CAC dates and who counts as an existing equality rep. If you are an employer, do not wait for 29 October to read this properly. The Common Room test is simple: can everyone in your workplace explain what changes on the date, and who has to act? If not, there is still time to fix that. (legislation.gov.uk)