Jonathan Reynolds, Secretary of State for Business, Innovation, Science and Trade, announced at the Labour Party Conference that the Government will consult on employment status and tackling bogus self-employment. In an update published on 1 October, the Department confirmed that a consultation on targeted reforms to employment status and protections for the self-employed will be published shortly.
In her analysis of the announcement, Rebecca Seeley Harris, employment status expert and Chair of the Employment Status Experts Forum, examines reported proposals for a rebuttable presumption of worker status, the treatment of substitution clauses and additional protections for genuinely self-employed people. The detailed consultation has yet to be published.
A rebuttable presumption could require the business to demonstrate genuine self-employment, giving individuals a fairer starting point in status disputes. Rebecca’s paper, Rebuttable Presumption of Employment Status, examines how presumptions could protect dependent workers while allowing businesses to establish genuine self-employment. This is directly relevant to the reported proposal to change who must produce the evidence in status disputes. Reform must also distinguish genuine substitution arrangements from clauses that exist only on paper, and clarify which protections would extend to people running their own businesses.
Rebecca also highlights the gap between employment tax and employment rights. Some people, including those treated as deemed employees under the off-payroll working rules, pay tax through PAYE without acquiring corresponding employment rights. Her paper, PAYE Paid: Taxed without Rights, examines this gap and its relevance to reform: tackling bogus self-employment alone would leave people taxed as employees without corresponding rights. Reform should address both issues, with clarity about responsibilities across labour supply chains and coordination between the Department and HMRC.
Rebecca has written to Jonathan Reynolds and Kate Dearden, Minister for the Future of Work, formally introducing the Employment Status Forum and offering the support of the ESF in the consultation process. The correspondence offers the Forum’s expertise on employment status, employment rights, tax and labour supply chains to help inform the proposed reforms.
Analysis: Read Rebecca Seeley Harris’s AccountingWEB article, Government to consult on bogus self-employment. The article and the two papers are her independent professional analysis.
Read the government announcement