The government has today issued a consultation “Making flexible working the default” as part of its plans to modernise
the way we work. According to the press release, the
government’s proposals are about providing the right
framework to encourage flexible working conversations rather
than prescribing specific arrangements in legislation. In other
words, despite all the fanfare from the government around
the announcement, we are talking more about tinkering
around the edges of the current Flexible Working Regulations
rather than significant legislative reform. Not least because
the government has rejected upfront the idea of turning the
current right to request into a right to have - the starting point
will remain that an employee can still make a request for
flexible working and given one or more legitimate business
reasons, an employer can still reject it.
