Labour to strengthen workers’ rights ‘within first 100 days’, Rayner says

Labour will implement plans to bolster workers’ rights within 100 days of taking office, Angela Rayner said today.

The deputy party leader told Labour’s conference that plans to boost protections for gig workers and enshrine basic employment rights from the first day of a job had not been watered down.

Media reports following Labour’s national policy forum this year had suggested the plans had been weakened.

But as Rayner took to the stage in Liverpool fresh from Labour’s victory in the Rutherglen and Hamilton West by-election, she insisted the “rumours” were false.

“Be in no doubt – not with Keir and I at the helm,” she said. “We’ll ban zero-hour contracts, fire-and-rehire, and give workers basic rights from day one.

“We’ll go further and faster in closing the gender pay gap, make work more family-friendly, and tackle sexual harassment.

“And we won’t stop there. We’ll ensure that unions can stand up for their members. We will boost collective bargaining, to improve workers’ pay, terms and conditions.”

She later added: “But it can only be completed with Labour in power – and as deputy prime minister – I will personally table the legislation implementing our New Deal For Working People, within 100 days of taking office.”

Rayner also pledged that a Labour government would “deliver the biggest boost in affordable and social housing for a generation”, including new council housing.

She said her party would reform the planning system to speed up building new social and affordable homes, as well as seeking to strengthen renters’ rights, and abolishing leasehold.

Trades Union Congress general secretary Paul Nowak said Labour’s workers rights plan was the “biggest upgrade in workers’ rights in a generation”.

He added: “We need employment standards fit for the 21st century so that everyone knows they’ll be treated fairly at work with decent pay and conditions.

“Good employers should welcome these plans. The New Deal will help create more productive workplaces and stop rogue bosses from undercutting the best.”

With Press Association – David Lynch and Richard Wheeler