The Employment Rights Act 2025 and the rise of union access rights

Answer

Given the Labour Party’s historic connections with trade unions, it shouldn’t have come as a surprise that increasing trade union power relative to employer power would’ve been something on the political agenda. The Employment Rights Act 2025 makes amendments to a number of existing trade union rights and regimes, but is also introducing a brand-new concept of ‘access agreements’. These will permit access for trade unions to an employer’s workforce, in person by coming onto an employer’s premises and/or via digital means (with digital ‘access’ meaning online meetings and employer dissemination of communications to its staff on behalf of the trade union).

The government went out to consultation last year on some of the finer detail around how access arrangements would work and is now consulting on a new code of practice.

The new access agreement concept, which will come into effect in October 2026, will be most impactful for the following employers:

• Employers with low levels of union membership but who don’t already recognise a union
• Employers in sectors where the general view is that workers are exploited
• Specific companies that attract negative attention for their working practices

These employers are most likely to be the targets for access agreements because of the higher prospects for the trade unions of successfully turning workers into members and access into recognition. In effect, access agreements are a recruitment tool.

Employers that already have recognition agreements in place would tend to have already agreed some sort of rules around access, but recognised unions that would like greater access might use the access agreement regime to try and achieve an improved position.

How will an access agreement get put in place?

In the first instance, the government hopes that an employer will be able and willing to agree access where a trade union requests it. There’ll be encouragement to agree a voluntary access arrangement without even needing to trigger the first step in the new statutory process. However, assuming that access can’t be achieved on a purely voluntary basis, the first step in the statutory process will be for a trade union to make a written request for access to the employer. This will have to include various pieces of information, including:

• who – does the union want to have access to;
• where – which workplaces or online;
• when – how frequently; and
• why – for what purpose (eg, meeting workers, supporting workers, recruiting or organising workers, representing workers or facilitating collective bargaining).

Even with the extension that the government is now proposing, the employer will have a relatively short period to decide whether to allow access (ie, 15 working days, up from five originally). There’ll then be a further period where employer and trade union seek to agree the terms of that access if the employer is amenable in principle. Model terms will be made available as a starting point. Where the employer doesn’t respond to a request, or it responds affirmatively but then access terms can’t then be agreed, the Central Arbitration Committee can be brought in to determine the matter. Employers should expect the default to be that the Central Arbitration Committee will order access where it can’t be agreed.

What will be the key components of an access agreement?

Two key components will be frequency and privacy. For both of these, the government’s perspective may be doubted by employers.

On frequency of access, the government’s view is that access an average of once a week could and should be granted. The government’s view is that that frequency wouldn’t be unreasonably disruptive. However, before employers get too alarmed, the practical reality is that once a week access is unlikely for the following reasons:

• Union resources: in the short-medium term, the reality is that most unions will not have enough officials to be able to access multiple workplaces/workforces with any degree of frequency. Particularly when, for each employer, they’re going to be encouraged to arrange access for rest periods (eg, lunch breaks) or towards the end of a shift to minimise business disruption.
• Worker interest: for a lot of organisations, not much is changing on a week-by-week basis such as to make union access once a week worthwhile, or to persuade employees to regularly use unpaid time to attend such frequent meetings.

The government also believes that access arrangements will foster trust between employers and employees. However, employers will have to accept a relative shroud of secrecy around what’s discussed as part of any meetings held under an access arrangement. Managers and supervisors may attend only by invitation, and employers should enquire about what was discussed only if there’s a need to investigate the conduct of a meeting (eg, because of an allegation of harassment).

Will access agreements change anything?

Ultimately, there’s likely to be an initial flurry in access agreements being sought and agreed, as trade unions look to test out the new concept and see what it achieves. However, if a union can’t convert the workers it has access to into fee-paying members then it may be the case that a union uses the access it’s been granted less and less frequently because it turns its limited resources and attention to another employer to try and achieve a better conversion rate there.

Arguably, it’s changes in trade union recognition arrangements that’ll have the greater impact on employers because recognition gives trade unions power whereas access doesn’t.

Kirsty Thompson is a partner in Devonshires’ employment team.