This week the Liberal Democrat and the Conservative parties published their manifestos ahead of the upcoming general election on 4 July.
We look at some the key pledges that will impact HR practitioners in the education sector.
The Liberal Democrats
There is a general focus on Pay and Family Rights.
| Area for reform |
Proposal
|
| Employment Law |
‘Fix’ the statutory sick pay system
- Extend it to those earning under £123 a week. One million plus workers (mainly women)
- Aligning rate with national minimum wage
- Making payments from first day of absence (rather than 4th)
- Support small employers with costs of SSP. Consultation to find way to do so
|
| Family Friendly |
- Doubling of Statutory Maternity and Shared Parental Pay to £350 a week
- Introducing an extra use it or lose it month for fathers/partners at 90% pay
- Make all parental pay and leave a day one right and extend them to self-employed parents
- Extend flexible working rights – including the right to disabled people to work from home unless there are significant business reasons that make it not possible
|
| Education |
- A mental health professional in every school
- Increase funding per pupil above rate of inflation, and end crumbling schools and repair backlog
- Introduce tutoring guarantee for every disadvantaged pupil
- Invest in high quality EY education, 3-5 extra hours for disadvantaged children, tripling of EYPP to £1000 a year
- Extend free school meals to all children in poverty, with ambition to extend to all primary pupils when public finances allow
|
| Teacher Recruitment |
- Reform school teachers review body (STRB) to make it independent of government
- Better funding for teacher training
- Teaching delivered by subject specialist
- Introduce high quality professional development plan for teachers
- Cross party commission to broaden curriculum
- Improve vocational education
- Expand provision of extra-curricular, new free entitlement for disadvantaged children
|
Conservative Party
The first two areas are not new announcements and the other areas relate to tax, but are useful from an HR perspective.
| Employment Law |
- Continue removing EU laws from the statute books
- Increase National Living Wage
- Overhaul the ‘fit note’ system to move responsibility from GPs to other healthcare professionals
|
| Industrial Action |
- Continue with the implementation of minimum service level agreements (regarding industrial action)
|
| Equality Law |
- Clarify protected characteristics under the Equality Act
|
| Tax |
- Cut employee’s national insurance to 6% from 2027
- Abolish national insurance for self-employed people by the end of the next parliament
|
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