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Out-Law News 2 min. read

Restrictions on picketing and protest dropped from UK Trade Union Bill


The UK government has abandoned plans to require trade unions to provide their employers with advanced notice of their plans for pickets, social media campaigns and other forms of 'leverage' action.

It will, however, update the existing guidance around picketing to clarify the "rights and responsibilities" of those involved in industrial disputes, particularly in relation to social media and protests short of strike action. Minor amendments to the rules around picketing, including a legal obligation for unions to appoint a 'supervisor' of the picket, are currently being debated as part of the Trade Union Bill.

Employment law expert Christopher Mordue of Pinsent Masons, the law firm behind Out-Law.com, said that the now-abandoned proposals had been among the heaviest criticised by opponents of the UK government's trade union reform programme. However, employers would feel that the government had missed an "important opportunity" to "level the playing field and make sure that industrial relations laws keep pace with changing union tactics".

"For employers, this was never about getting the names of pickets, forcing pickets to wear armbands or seeing every tweet or Facebook post in advance," he said. "What employers really wanted was for unions to be required to give some warning – however general – of their picketing plans and their plans for the kind of demonstrations, protests, leafleting and social media campaigns which are part of 21st century industrial disputes."

"As things stand, unions will retain the element of surprise which makes these tactics so attractive and often leaves employers on the back foot. Unions have to give notice for conventional forms of industrial action such as strikes and there's no real reason why this shouldn't apply to other union action, to allow employers to make contingency plans, alert their workforces, customers and suppliers and, where necessary, take action to protect their rights," he said.

The government consulted on new rules on picketing, including the creation of a new criminal offence of "intimidation on the picket line", over the summer. It said that it found "evidence" of workers that had chosen not to strike being intimidated by individuals on picket lines or through social media, proving that "more needs to be done to remind all parties of their rights and responsibilities".

Measures that were consulted upon, but which will not now be taken forward, include the proposed advanced notice requirements and new criminal offence, and plans to give legal force to parts of the picketing code of practice including requiring all pickets to wear some form of visible identification. The Trade Union Bill would, however, require picket supervisors appointed by the union to wear an armband or other form of visible identification.

If passed in its current form, the Bill would require unions to provide the appointed picket supervisor with a letter authorising the picket, which would have to be shown to the police or employer on request. The government intends to limit this right to request only to the police, employer or employer's representative, and not "any other person who reasonably asks to see it" as currently drafted. This letter would not contain the name of the picket supervisor, as originally proposed.

The Bill as drafted would amend the rules around strikes, introducing a new 50% voting turnout requirement and an additional threshold requiring 40% support for industrial action regardless of turnout in certain key sectors. It would also set a four-month time limit on any mandate for strike action and lift the ban on the use of agency staff to cover for striking workers, amongst other measures.

Mordue said that businesses would now be hoping that the government would "hold its nerve" on these measures, which were included in the Conservative Party's manifesto ahead of the 2015 general election.

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