Governments announce new rights long before they become law, and some never do. This page sets out, card by card, what was promised, what the law actually says today, and what that means for you.
Law is also not the same everywhere in the UK. Employment law in Northern Ireland is mostly separate, and housing, debt and court rules are different in England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. The last section shows where that matters most.
How to read a card: the first tag is where it applies (UK, GB = England, Wales and Scotland, or one nation). The second is its status: in force, from a date, dropped, or no date set. Where the government has not set a date, we say so rather than guess.
📜
Promised, not law yet
10 cards
✓ Promised
Protection from unfair dismissal from your first day in a job (Next Steps to Make Work Pay, October 2024).
✗ The law
The Employment Rights Act 2025 cuts the qualifying period from 2 years to 6 months, not to day one. The 6 months applies where your employment ends on or after 1 January 2027.
Until then you need 2 years of continuous employment to claim ordinary unfair dismissal. Some dismissals need no minimum service at all, for example for whistleblowing, pregnancy or raising a health and safety concern.
What this means for you: If your employment ends before 1 January 2027 and you have less than 2 years' service, you usually cannot claim ordinary unfair dismissal. From 1 January 2027 you need 6 months. A discrimination claim, or a dismissal for an automatically unfair reason, needs no minimum service.
✓ Promised
A right to switch off, to be set out in a statutory code of practice (Next Steps to Make Work Pay, October 2024).
✗ The law
It is not in the Employment Rights Act 2025, and it is not in the government's implementation roadmap.
What your employer can expect of you outside your hours still depends on your contract. No law gives a general right to ignore work calls and messages.
What this means for you: If you are contacted outside your hours, check your contract and your employer's policies. There is no separate legal right to rely on. If it is causing a problem, you can raise a grievance.
✓ Promised
End unscrupulous fire and rehire. The July 2025 roadmap said this would start in October 2026.
✗ The law
The Act will make it automatically unfair to dismiss an employee for refusing a change to pay, hours, shift times, time off or pensions, with a narrow exception for an employer in severe financial difficulty. The government's updated timeline puts this in January 2027.
Until it starts, fire and rehire is not banned and today's rules apply.
What this means for you: If your employer threatens to dismiss you and re-employ you on worse terms, get advice from Acas or your union early. Until 1 January 2027 an ordinary unfair dismissal claim needs 2 years' service.
✓ Promised
End exploitative zero hours contracts, with a right to be offered guaranteed hours and reasonable notice of shifts.
✗ The law
These rights are in the Employment Rights Act 2025 but are not in force yet. The roadmap puts them in 2027.
Until they start, today's rules apply. A zero hours contract cannot stop you working for someone else, and you build up holiday from the hours you work.
What this means for you: You cannot yet insist on guaranteed hours. You can already work for other employers, whatever your contract says.
Today
Collective consultation, and form HR1, applies when an employer proposes 20 or more redundancies at one establishment within 90 days.
Planned
The Act allows a second threshold counted across the whole employer. The government consulted on it in 2026 and the roadmap puts it in 2027.
So an employer making 15 redundancies at each of four sites does not have to consult collectively today, because no single site reaches 20. The maximum protective award for failing to consult doubled to 180 days' pay from April 2026.
What this means for you: If fewer than 20 people at your site face redundancy, your employer may not have to consult as a group. You still have individual rights: a fair process, notice, and redundancy pay after 2 years' service.
Before
Most claims: 3 months less 1 day from the act you are complaining about.
From 1 October 2026
6 months less 1 day, but only where that act, or the last act in a series, happens on or after 1 October 2026.
The new limit is not backdated: an act before 1 October 2026 keeps the 3-month limit. Before most claims you must notify Acas, which pauses the clock.
What this means for you: Check which side of 1 October 2026 your act falls on, and contact Acas well before your deadline.
✓ Promised
Stronger rights for pregnant workers, including protection from dismissal.
✗ The law
The Employment Rights Act 2025 lets the government strengthen this protection. The roadmap puts it in 2027.
Until then, today's protection applies. Dismissal because of pregnancy is automatically unfair and needs no minimum service.
What this means for you: If you are treated badly or dismissed because you are pregnant, notify Acas and claim within 3 months less 1 day, or 6 months less 1 day for acts on or after 1 October 2026.
✓ Promised
Large employers to report their ethnicity and disability pay gaps.
✗ The law
Not in the Employment Rights Act 2025. The roadmap links it to a separate draft Equality (Race and Disability) Bill, which is not law.
Employers with 250 or more staff already report their gender pay gap. Gender pay gap and menopause action plans became voluntary in April 2026 and are due to be required in 2027.
What this means for you: Your employer does not have to publish an ethnicity or disability pay gap. If you think you are paid less because of race or disability, that can still be a discrimination claim.
✓ Promised
A private rented sector database and a landlord ombudsman, under the Renters' Rights Act 2025.
✗ The law
Both are in the Act but not in force yet. This page gives no date until one is confirmed.
The main tenancy changes did start on 1 May 2026: most private tenancies became periodic, and Section 21 "no-fault" notices ended.
What this means for you: The Housing Ombudsman can only look at a private landlord that has joined its scheme voluntarily. For problems with a private landlord, ask your council's private housing team, Shelter or Citizens Advice.
✓ Promised
Apply the Decent Homes Standard to privately rented homes for the first time.
✗ The law
The government has confirmed privately rented homes must meet the new standard from 2035.
The government's own figures classed 21% of privately rented homes in England as non-decent in 2023.
What this means for you: You do not have to wait for 2035. Report disrepair to your landlord in writing, and to your council's private housing team if nothing is done.
⚖️
Rights that do not fit together
6 cards
✓ Day one
Since 6 April 2026, statutory sick pay is paid from the first full day of sickness absence.
✗ But
You need 2 years' service to claim ordinary unfair dismissal, or 6 months where your employment ends on or after 1 January 2027.
So a new employee can get sick pay from day one and still be dismissed while off sick without an ordinary unfair dismissal claim. The exceptions matter: if the illness is a disability, dismissal because of it can be disability discrimination, which needs no minimum service. Some reasons are automatically unfair from day one.
What this means for you: If you are dismissed while off sick with short service, check whether your condition could be a disability under the Equality Act 2010, and act within the tribunal time limit.
✓ Promised
Remove the age bands so every adult worker gets the same minimum rate (Next Steps to Make Work Pay, October 2024).
✗ The law
From 1 April 2026: £12.71 an hour at 21 and over, £10.85 at 18 to 20, and £8.00 under 18 and for apprentices.
The rates are the same in England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland, and change on 1 April every year. No date has been set for ending the age bands.
What this means for you: At 18 to 20 you can lawfully be paid £1.86 an hour less than a colleague of 21 doing the same job.
On paper
An employer that underpays the minimum wage must pay the arrears and can be fined 200% of the underpayment, up to £20,000 per worker, and publicly named.
In practice
The Fair Work Agency started on 7 April 2026. It covers the minimum wage, employment agencies, gangmasters, serious exploitation and unpaid tribunal awards. It does not enforce holiday pay or sick pay yet.
HMRC enforces the minimum wage on behalf of the Fair Work Agency, in Northern Ireland as well. For holiday pay, sick pay and most other rights, you still bring your own tribunal claim, and the time limits are short.
What this means for you: For underpaid minimum wage, complain online or through the Acas helpline, even after you have left the job. For unpaid holiday or sick pay, work out your own tribunal deadline straight away.
Whistleblowing law
Protects you when you report wrongdoing in the public interest, such as a crime or a danger to health and safety. Since 6 April 2026 that includes sexual harassment.
It does not cover
A complaint only about your own treatment, such as bullying or discrimination, that is not in the public interest.
That does not leave a discrimination complaint unprotected. Under the Equality Act 2010, treating you badly because you complained about discrimination, or supported someone else's complaint, is victimisation, which is unlawful in its own right. Bullying that is not linked to a protected characteristic has no specific law of its own.
What this means for you: Put your complaint in writing and say what it is about. If it is discrimination, say so: complaining about discrimination is protected even when it is not whistleblowing.
Claimed before 6 April 2026
People already getting the health element keep the higher rate: £429.80 a month in 2026 to 2027.
Claimed from 6 April 2026
Most new claimants get £217.26 a month for the same assessment result, unless they are terminally ill or meet the severe conditions criteria.
Two people with the same condition and the same assessment can get different amounts, depending only on when they claimed. The lower rate is set to stay frozen until 2029 to 2030. Northern Ireland makes its own benefit law.
What this means for you: If you already get the higher rate, talk to an adviser before you end your Universal Credit claim or make a new one.
✓ The promise
Doing some work or volunteering will not, on its own, lead to a reassessment of your benefit.
✗ The small print
It started on 30 April 2026. It does not cover new claimants still waiting for their first assessment, and information about the work you did can still be used at a later assessment.
The government's own Social Security Advisory Committee told the minister in February 2026 that the regulations alone would not give people the reassurance intended.
What this means for you: You still have to report changes of circumstances, and the permitted work rules for New Style ESA have not changed.
🇬🇧
Same UK, different rights
9 cards
England, Wales and Scotland2 years. 6 months where your employment ends on or after 1 January 2027.
Northern Ireland1 year. The January 2027 change does not apply.
In both, no minimum service is needed for an automatically unfair reason, such as whistleblowing, pregnancy or raising a health and safety concern.
What this means for you: Until 1 January 2027, an employee with 18 months' service can claim unfair dismissal in Belfast but not in Glasgow. From 1 January 2027 it flips: 6 months is enough in Great Britain, while Northern Ireland stays at 1 year.
England, Wales and ScotlandMost claims 3 months less 1 day. 6 months less 1 day where the act is on or after 1 October 2026. Notify Acas first.
Northern IrelandMost claims stay at 3 months less 1 day. From 1 October 2026 only minimum wage claims and two working time rules for ships and aircraft get 6 months. Notify the Labour Relations Agency (LRA) first.
In Northern Ireland claims go to an industrial tribunal, and religious belief or political opinion claims at work go to the Fair Employment Tribunal.
What this means for you: The move to 6 months in Great Britain does not help most claims in Northern Ireland. If you work there, assume 3 months less 1 day.
England, Wales and ScotlandFrom your first day. 2 requests in any 12 months. Decision within 2 months, including any appeal.
Northern IrelandAfter 26 weeks' service. 1 request in any 12 months. Meeting within 28 days, decision within 14 days of it.
The legal steps and deadlines your employer must follow are different, not just the waiting time.
What this means for you: If you start a job in Northern Ireland, you wait 26 weeks before you can make a statutory request. You can still ask informally.
England and Wales6 years for most contract debts (Limitation Act 1980). After that the creditor cannot make you pay through the courts, but the debt still exists and you can still be asked to pay.
Scotland5 years without a relevant claim or acknowledgment, and the debt prescribes: it is extinguished and no longer exists (Prescription and Limitation (Scotland) Act 1973).
Northern IrelandGenerally 6 years (Limitation (Northern Ireland) Order 1989). As in England and Wales, the debt still exists.
In England, Wales and Northern Ireland, a payment or acknowledgment made before the time runs out starts the clock again.
What this means for you: Do not pay or sign anything about an old debt until you have checked the dates for your nation.
England and WalesThe small claims track, for most claims up to £10,000.
ScotlandSimple procedure in the sheriff court, for claims of £5,000 or less.
Northern IrelandThe small claims court, for claims of £5,000 or less.
A £7,000 claim for unpaid work is a small claim in Cardiff but too big for the small claims routes in Edinburgh or Belfast.
What this means for you: Check the limit for your nation before you start. It decides the court, the forms and your risk of paying costs.
EnglandFrom 1 May 2026, no Section 21 "no-fault" notices. The landlord must give a Section 8 notice naming a legal reason (a ground).
WalesA landlord can still end a periodic contract without a reason with a section 173 notice, giving at least 6 months' notice, and not in the first 6 months after you moved in.
ScotlandA notice to leave must name one of 18 eviction grounds, and only the First-tier Tribunal can order an eviction, after deciding it is reasonable.
Northern IrelandA written notice to quit of 4, 8 or 12 weeks, depending on how long you have lived there, and then a court order.
In every nation, evicting you without the proper legal process, or harassing you to make you leave, is an offence.
What this means for you: A notice running out does not by itself mean you must leave. Contact your council's housing team (the Housing Executive in Northern Ireland) as soon as you get one.
England and WalesOnly if it meets the conditions in Schedule 4 of the Protection of Freedoms Act 2012, including strict time limits for its notice.
ScotlandSchedule 4 does not apply, and the Scottish keeper liability scheme is not in force.
Northern IrelandSchedule 4 does not apply. Ask Advice NI or a solicitor whether the keeper can be made to pay.
A council parking ticket (a penalty charge notice) is different: it follows its own rules in each nation.
What this means for you: Never ignore a ticket. But if you were the keeper and not the driver, the nation where the car was parked changes what a private company can do.
England, Wales and ScotlandCouncil tax, billed by your council. You can get 25% off if you are the only adult in the home, or every other adult is not counted.
Northern IrelandThere is no council tax. Homes pay domestic rates, run by Land and Property Services.
So the council tax discounts in our guides do not apply in Northern Ireland.
What this means for you: If you live in Northern Ireland, your bill comes from Land and Property Services, not your council.
England, Wales and ScotlandDay-one paternity leave, the Fair Work Agency, a 6-month unfair dismissal period from 1 January 2027, and the other changes on this page.
Northern IrelandMost of the Act does not apply. Most employment law is made and enforced in Northern Ireland, through the LRA and industrial tribunals. Statutory sick pay from the first day of sickness does apply there too.
News about new UK employment rights is usually about Great Britain only.
What this means for you: If you work in Northern Ireland, check a Northern Ireland source before you rely on a new right.
25 checked contradictions
Every card was checked on 28 September 2026 against the official sources linked on it (legislation.gov.uk, GOV.UK, nidirect and the bodies that run each system) and against our own verified guides.
This page sets out what the law says and what the government has said it will do. It does not comment on whether a policy is right.
Before acting on your rights, get advice from Acas (England, Wales and Scotland), the LRA (Northern Ireland) or Citizens Advice.