{"id":488655,"date":"2025-10-10T15:28:11","date_gmt":"2025-10-10T15:28:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/488655\/"},"modified":"2025-10-10T15:28:11","modified_gmt":"2025-10-10T15:28:11","slug":"south-africa-can-provide-learnings-for-uk-on-day-one-dismissal-law-changes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/488655\/","title":{"rendered":"South Africa can provide learnings for UK on \u2018day one\u2019 dismissal law changes"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/p>\n

The new Employment Rights Bill (ERB)<\/a>, currently making its way through the UK Parliament, looks set to remove the current two-year continuous service requirement for claims of unfair dismissal.<\/p>\n

Companies would still be able to dismiss employees during a probationary period, if a valid reason \u2013 such as workplace conduct relating to the employee \u2013 is given.<\/p>\n

The new legislation, when enacted, would impact from October 2027 as part of the phased approach to the ERB\u2019s changes \u2013 but in South Africa, a reverse of the UK\u2019s situation is emerging.<\/p>\n

Read more on UK employment law reforms <\/p>\n

The laws which currently provide protection from unfair dismissal to employees working under South Africa\u2019s employment law regime from day one are now the subject of a proposed amendment which would withdraw an employee\u2019s right to refer an unfair dismissal dispute to the Commission for Conciliation, Mediation and Arbitration (CCMA) if the dismissal occurs in the first three months of employment or, if longer, during the employee\u2019s probationary period.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe UK and South African positions are interesting. While South Africa is looking to move away from a day one right to claim unfair dismissal, the UK is moving towards just that,\u201d said David Woodhouse<\/a>, an employment law expert with Pinsent Masons in South Africa.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn South Africa, employers may be given more flexibility when dealing with new hires, albeit probationary periods are likely to receive more scrutiny where they extend the length of time during which an employee does not have a right to refer an unfair dismissal dispute to the relevant employment tribunal for resolution.\u201d<\/p>\n

Laura Kennedy<\/a>, an employment law expert with Pinsent Masons in the UK, said the ERB would mean employers would need robust recruitment processes going forward.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe ERB means UK employers will need to adopt new procedures regarding new hires: such as, in seeking to assess suitability, more effectively diagnosing misconduct versus training needs; and applying the process to be fixed for what will effectively be a statutory probationary period,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhile having robust recruitment processes has always been important for employers, with day one dismissal rights coming into force these are going to come into sharper focus. Employers would be well advised to review their recruitment processes to ensure that they are robust enough to support hiring managers in making the right decisions. It goes back to the saying \u2013 prevention is better than the cure.\u201d<\/p>\n

According to Woodhouse, the amendment will raise issues for UK employers which their South African counterparts have already had to deal with.<\/p>\n

\u201cUK employers will inevitably see an increase in unfair dismissal claims in the initial months of employment, something experienced in South Africa,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

\u201cThose cases often require a close assessment of whether workplace discipline or performance management is appropriate to remedy the situation. <\/p>\n

\u201cIf the proposed amendments in South Africa are passed, it is anticipated that the amount of discrimination and automatically unfair dismissals claims brought in the first few months of employment would increase: such claims are often seen in the UK where employees do not have the service to bring \u2018standard\u2019 unfair dismissal claims.\u201d <\/p>\n

\u201cBoth countries should learn from each other\u2019s experiences,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The new Employment Rights Bill (ERB), currently making its way through the UK Parliament, looks set to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":488656,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,4],"tags":[748,393,4884,1144,712,16,15,1764],"class_list":{"0":"post-488655","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-uk","8":"category-united-kingdom","9":"tag-britain","10":"tag-england","11":"tag-great-britain","12":"tag-northern-ireland","13":"tag-scotland","14":"tag-uk","15":"tag-united-kingdom","16":"tag-wales"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/488655","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=488655"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/488655\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/488656"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=488655"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=488655"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=488655"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}