Serving the Teesside Business Community | 15
How will Brexit
affect employment
and immigration?
Advice from the
commercial law experts
A
s the clock ticks down to 29 March
2019, the UK and the EU are
stepping up their preparations for
the possibility of a no-deal Brexit.
So, too, should businesses. If they haven’t
done so already, businesses need to urgently
take steps to identify the possible risks and
opportunities that may arise from the UK’s
departure and put themselves in the best
possible position to mitigate the risks and
take advantage of the opportunities.
Deal or No Deal: Employment
If there is a deal there are no plans to change
UK employment law. Employment law
derived from the EU will also not change
on Brexit unless and until it is amended by
parliament, which is very unlikely to be on
its list of priorities or politically desirable.
The pipeline of EU law into UK law will be
broken, but the government has confirmed
that the UK will seek to keep pace with
future EU employment law through separate
arrangements and that Employment Tribunals
will still consider EU case law.
If there is no deal there will be little
immediate change but as time progresses
the UK will potentially have the freedom to
implement either UK or EU employment law.
Deal or No Deal: Immigration
If there is a deal the free movement of EU
workers will continue until January 1 2021.
Thereafter highly skilled workers will be
prioritsed and it is likely the Tier 2 Points
Based Immigration System will be adapted
to allow more highly skilled individuals to be
able to live and work in the UK.
In the event of a no deal Brexit free
movement of workers could end as soon
as March 29, 2019, although EU citizens in
the UK pre-Brexit will most likely be able to
stay and work in the UK. The situation for EU
citizens arriving post-Brexit under a no deal
is uncertain and one possibility is that a new
immigration system will be implemented.
Laura Kirkpatrick
Associate, Endeavour Partnership
[email protected]
01642 610300
www.endeavour.law/brexit
How will your workforce be affected?
To find out the answer to this question,
businesses should take steps now to identify
the possible risks and opportunities that may
arise, in respect of its workforce, from the
UK’s departure from the EU by undertaking
a Brexit Assurance Audit. This expert review
will put their business or organisation in the
best possible position to mitigate the risks
and take advantage of the opportunities.
To gain an initial overview, businesses
should gather its senior management team
and HR and collate all current right to work
checks of its workforce, with a view to
refreshing these as step one.
As the UK’s immigration system is very
likely to change, businesses need to be
aware of how many EU citizens it employs
and what rights they have accumulated
to remain in the UK. To ensure these
employees can continue to work in the UK,
businesses may wish to provide certainty
by proactively exploring options available for
those individuals. For example, possible pre-
Brexit citizenship for qualifying EU nationals,
indefinite leave to remain applications and
employee support programmes to assist in
securing settlement at Brexit or during the
transitional period.
For sectors such as hospitality, agriculture
and technology, recruitment and retention are
very important factors to consider in light of
Brexit. Businesses will need to ensure they
are the preferred place to work in order to
attract and retain the best talent to maintain
a competitive edge. Therefore, businesses
might want to look at their contractual
documentation, benefit packages and
performance plans.
Brexit may be an opportunity for
businesses to grow their workforce resulting
in a need to consider tapping into other
talent pools or recruit from overseas using
the Points Based Immigration system.
Businesses may want to consider other
employment relationships such as using
consultants or implementing apprenticeships
to ensure the workforce has the necessary
future-proofing skills.
Alternatively, if Brexit brings with it
some of the much-publicised economic
slowdown or even a precursor to a recession
as predicted by even the Bank of England
in recent news, employers may need to
consider reorganising employees or even
potential redundancies.
There is no doubt Brexit is creating a
plethora of questions and the need for
reviews and pre-planning. Undertaking a
Brexit Assurance Audit will at least enable
businesses to identify areas of risk and
to consider contingency plans to retain or
replace key affected employees if this proves
necessary following March 2019.
I would be delighted to answer your
questions and to assist you in your Brexit
countdown preparations.