The TUC’s ERA toolkit: check the small print

The TUC has produced a reps’ toolkit for the Employment Rights Act (ERA) 2025: bit.ly/tuc-tk. It is useful as a broad introduction, but some of the new rights are less clear-cut than the toolkit suggests.

Before addressing the toolkit, we must be clear that the Act does improve workers’ rights, and to a more limited extent union rights. However, it also has significant limitations. So the unions must campaign for a second ERA to secure a clear right to strike, sectoral bargaining, and other reforms.

Back to the toolkit. Take fire and rehire as an example. The toolkit states that from January 2027, dismissing someone and rehiring them on worse terms will be automatically unfair in most cases, with an exception for genuine financial difficulties. However, government guidance makes clear this is not absolute. It says dismissal will not be automatically unfair where employers use fire and rehire to introduce non‑restricted changes, such as altering location or job role. The toolkit also does not fully reflect differences between sectors. For local authorities, the ERA allows fire and rehire where a “relevant intervention direction” is in force—such as central government appointing commissioners.

On stronger unions, the toolkit highlights a new right of access for unions to workplaces, both in person and online, to organise, recruit and communicate. While a welcome step forward, the limitations are significant. There is no right of access where the purpose is to organise industrial action, and the right does not apply where an employer has fewer than 21 staff. In addition, employers retain considerable control in practice: they can delay access, shape how it operates, and influence the conditions under which unions engage with workers.

A final example is balloting. The toolkit says that from August 2026, electronic and workplace balloting will be allowed alongside postal voting, with rules phased in through 2026–27. This is correct, but it understates the constraints. These methods will operate within a controlled framework set out in a statutory Code of Practice, with limits on when and how they can be used. Through late 2026 and into 2027, the system will be expanded and refined, rather than introducing full flexibility immediately.

Overall, the toolkit is a useful signpost to change, but it does not fully capture the complexity or limitations of the new laws. Reps still need to delve into the detail.