The initial consultation, which opened last week and will run for 12 weeks until 31 July, seeks recruiters’ views on the contentious legislation which proposes to increase pay and benefits rights of agency workers here after 12 weeks of working in the same job.

Opinion is sought on which workers will be covered by the Directive, as well as on other points including the definition of pay, holiday entitlement, duration of working time, the 12 weeks qualifying period, how the principle of ‘equal treatment’ should be established, liability for compliance with obligations under the Directive and dispute resolution.

After the initial stage of consultation, the findings will be published and a second stage of consultation will begin on draft regulations.

The Agency Work Commission, which was set up to ensure EU regulations do not have a negative impact on UK industry, made initial recommendations which it presented to the Department for Business (BERR). These include limiting equal treatment to basic salary and other basic statutory rights; ensuring liability rests with clients as well as agencies; and introducing measures to limit the increase in employment tribunals.

And Tom Hadley, director of external relations at the Recruitment and Employment Confederation (REC), told Recruiter that clear definitions on what constitutes the 12-week period and the definition of “equal treatment” are essential to encourage employers to continue using agencies, as
well as avoiding a deluge of employment tribunals.

Kevin Barrow, partner at law firm Blake Lapthorn, feels confident that firms would be able to continue to use temporary workers at not much extra cost.

“There is nothing completely unexpected in the consultation,” he said. “However, there is a lot of work that will have to be done on the detail of the regulations if they are to be workable, and staffing companies and end users will have to adjust some of their current arrangements to
minimise extra cost and administrative burden.”