We have made this article free to read from Workplace Report. Subscribe for more information like this.
LRD's extensive collection of online content is available to affiliates by subscribing to Publications Online.
The Fair Work Agency has opened its doors, marking a new chapter in labour market enforcement in the UK. But will it have the remit and resource to deliver?
The new Fair Work Agency (FWA) was officially launched in April. While it will take some years to become fully operational, the new organisation has been billed as the new “single enforcement body” for the labour market in the UK.
Labour’s Plan to Make Work Pay featured action on enforcement as a central pillar of its approach. The FWA is the outcome of that commitment, and trade union leaders are represented on the board — the general secretaries of the Prospect specialists’ union Mike Clancy and CWU communication workers’ union Dave Ward, and a former assistant general secretary of the Unite general union, Diana Ward.
But the agency is off to a shaky start amid criticisms that the remit and resourcing of the FWA is not up to the monumental task of fixing the enforcement system.
Following suggestions that the FWA would focus on “reducing regulatory burdens”, Unite general secretary Sharon Graham said that the government “needs to urgently ensure that the FWA focuses its attention on bringing rogue bosses to heel rather than seeking ways to allow dodgy companies to continue bad behaviour”.
TUC...
In recent days, false information has circulated on social media, falsely presented as statements issued by official institutions regarding prevailing weather conditions across the island. In respo...