Monthly Highlights – UK Employment Law – April 2026

In this month’s highlights, our team summarises the latest developments in UK employment law and their implications for employers. Catch up on March's highlights here.

Gender Pay Gap and Menopause Action Plans: A Six-Step Guide for UK Employers

The UK Government has published guidance on how employers with 250 or more employees can now voluntarily produce action plans addressing gender pay gaps and menopause support in the workplace.

Plans must be submitted through the government's online gender pay gap service, where they will be publicly available alongside the employer's gender pay gap data.

Action plans are expected to become mandatory from Spring 2027, and so employers should engage and familiarise themselves with the framework early.

The plans must address two core areas:

1. Closing the organisation's gender pay gap; and
2. Supporting employees who are experiencing menopause.

The following summarises the UK government's step-by-step guidance to creating action plans:

Step 1: Identify your organisation's issues

Employers should review workforce data and engage with their employees to understand the specific challenges that their organisation faces: why is there a gender pay gap and what is being done to support employees experiencing menopause?

Employers should engage staff at all levels—including senior leadership, HR and line managers—and consult with employee representative groups (such as trade unions, employee networks and working groups) early in the process. Employers can train senior leaders and managers on workplace gender equality to help strengthen understanding and commitment to these initiatives.

Step 2: Identify and choose actions

After identifying key issues, employers must select a minimum of two actions to include in the plan. Employers are encouraged to go beyond the minimum of two actions and select additional actions where possible:

• At least one of these actions must be aimed at addressing the gender pay gap.
• One must be aimed at supporting employees experiencing menopause.
• At least two of the selected actions must be classified as "new or in progress," meaning the employer will be undertaking them for the first time or building on existing work.
• In addition to the minimum two “new or in progress" actions, employers may also include actions that are already "embedded" within their organisation, meaning they are an established part of working practice. Including such embedded actions can provide a more complete picture of what the organisation is already doing.

The government has published a list of 18 evidence-informed actions that employers may choose from.

Step 3: Write supporting narratives for each action

When submitting an action plan, employers may need to prepare supporting text for each action:

For each action added to the plan, employers may include up to 100 words of supporting text.

Additionally, employers may provide an overall supporting narrative of up to 200 words covering background information and wider organisational objectives for gender equality.

The supporting narrative(s) will be published alongside the employer's gender pay gap data and can help provide context for the figures reported. Employers are encouraged to consider making the action plan available on their own website and to provide links to any relevant equality policies or strategies.

Step 4: Submit your plan

Action plans are submitted via the government's gender pay gap service, where they will be published alongside the employer's gender pay gap data:

• For "new or in progress" actions: employers must provide supporting text explaining why the action was selected and how they intend to track whether it is improving gender equality.
• For “embedded actions,” employers may include explanatory text about how the action was implemented and what results it has produced.

Before submitting, employers should ensure they have selected their actions, drafted their supporting narrative, and identified the "responsible person" who will approve the plan.

The “responsible person”—a director, partner or senior officer (in the private or voluntary sector)—must approve the plan and confirm that the information is accurate.

Step 5: Track your progress

The starting point is to record a set of baseline metrics before any actions are implemented, so that changes can be tracked after actions have been implemented. Once actions are underway, employers should establish a system to measure and monitor progress:

• Monitoring should be conducted at regular intervals (monthly or annually where feasible).
• Employers should use the same analysis at each interval, so that results are comparable.

Where possible, existing administrative workforce data should be used before investing in new data collection processes.

Step 6: Review and update your plan

Action plans are not meant to be static. Once the plans become mandatory in Spring 2027, employers will be required to review and update their action plan every reporting year. Further detail on employers’ obligations at the review stage is expected to be clarified in future legislation.

Upcoming Reporting Requirements for Ethnicity and Disability Pay Gap Reporting

The government has published draft primary legislation and a consultation response outlining a new framework for mandatory reporting obligations relating to ethnicity and disability pay gaps. Although the implementation date is not yet confirmed, employers can begin taking steps to prepare in advance. Below are the key features of the proposed framework and practical steps employers can take now to get ready.

Which employers will be affected?

Only organisations with 250 or more employees (covering the private and voluntary sectors) will fall within scope, mirroring the existing obligation thresholds for gender pay gap reporting.

What will employers be required to report?

Employers will be required to publish data relating to ethnicity and disability pay gaps, as well as workforce composition data. However, a reporting obligation will only arise where there are at least 10 employees in each relevant comparison group. The minimum threshold of 10 employees may change once legislation is finalised.

The specific metrics which employers must collect are the same as those already required for gender pay gap reporting. Employers must record:

• the mean and median hourly pay differences,
• the mean and median bonus pay differences,
• the proportion of employees receiving bonus pay; and
• pay quartile distribution breakdowns.

Ethnicity pay gaps

Employers will need to conduct two comparisons:

• First, a binary pay gap: white employees vs. all other ethnic groups combined.
• Second, employers will need to make pay gap comparisons between employees across the five broad ethnic groups used by the Office for National Statistics ("ONS"): White; Asian or Asian British; Black, Black British, Caribbean or African; Mixed or multiple ethnic groups; and Other ethnic groups.

Comparisons are only required where each group being compared includes at least 10 employees. For example, ethnicity-based comparisons across ONS categories are only required where each category (White, Asian, Black, Mixed, and ‘Other’) has at least 10 employees. The minimum threshold of 10 employees may change once legislation is finalised.

Disability pay gaps

Employers will need to make a binary comparison between the pay of disabled and non-disabled employees, applying the definition of disability under section 6 of the Equality Act 2010.

As is the case above, this reporting requirement is only triggered when there is a minimum of 10 employees in each group (i.e., at least 10 disabled and 10 non-disabled employees).

Workforce composition data

Along with pay gap metrics, employers will also need to submit data on the overall composition of their workforce by ethnicity and disability and they must also report the percentage of employees who chose not to disclose their data.

How will data be collected?

Employees will be asked to share their ethnicity and disability status on a voluntary basis, and a "prefer not to say" option must be provided by the employer.

With regards to ethnicity status, employers must collect this data using the same questions set out by the Government Statistical Service's ethnicity harmonised standard.

Will employers be required to publish 'action plans?’

Yes. Action plans, which will become mandatory for gender pay gaps and menopause support in 2027, will also be extended to include ethnicity and disability pay gaps.

The implementation date for ethnicity and disability action plans is not yet confirmed.

The process will be harmonised: employers will submit a single action plan covering all four areas (menopause support, as well as gender, ethnicity, and disability pay gaps).

How can employers begin preparing?

Disability and ethnicity pay gap data collection and reporting is inherently more complex than gender reporting, as employees may be reluctant to disclose sensitive information about their ethnicity or disability status.

Maintaining and protecting anonymity in this process is crucial to building employee trust for future disclosure. Employers should therefore start early in driving employee disclosure by creating a culture of trust, clearly communicating to employees why and how data is being collected and what steps the employer is taking to safeguard this data.

Employers should also review their data infrastructure to ensure that their systems can capture ethnicity data in line with ONS categories and disability status in line with the definition under section 6 of the Equality Act 2010.

Additionally, employers can start analysing their workplace to identify any issues related to disability or ethnicity which may result in pay gaps. They can use this analysis to help outline what actions might be necessary to resolve these gaps and start drafting action plans early.

Collective Redundancy Consultation in Insolvency: Employers Required to “Project Forward” When Proposing Dismissals

In the case Ellard & Ors v Alliance Transport Technologies Ltd, the Employment Appeal Tribunal ("EAT") ruled that an employer entering administration was "proposing to dismiss" 20 or more employees within a 90-day period. This therefore triggered the duty to collectively consult under section 188 of the Trade Union and Labour Relations (Consolidation) Act 1992 ("TULRCA"). This was the case even though the proposal to dismiss the employees was provisional, and alternative options such as selling the business remained open to the employer.

What led to the dispute, and why is the outcome significant for employers?

The respondent, Alliance Transport Technologies Ltd ("ATT"), entered administration in May 2023. On the same day, 15 non-business critical employees were made redundant, including the three appellants (Ellard and “ors”). At this time, ATT was awaiting a response to its offer to sell the business as a going concern. When it became clear that there would be no buyers of the business, the majority of the remaining workforce was made redundant as well.

No collective consultation was conducted for any of the dismissals. Ellard and ors, together with six other former employees, brought claims for a protective award under section 189 TULRCA.

The Employment Tribunal (ET) held in favour of the six former employees and awarded them a 90-day protective award, but dismissed Ellard and ors' claims. Their reasoning was that ATT's intention was to sell the business as a going concern – therefore it cannot be said that there was a "proposal to dismiss" 20 or more employees at that time. They also stated that the likelihood of the sale of the business was immaterial in this context.

On appeal, the EAT would find in favour of Ellard and ors and substitute its own decision, holding that Ellard and ors were entitled to a protected period of 90 days commencing on 2 May 2023. The EAT came to this conclusion for the reasons outlined below.

1. The EAT found that the ET erred by asking whether a fixed proposal to dismiss existed on each individual date of dismissal, rather than applying the correct statutory test under section 188 TULRCA. The test under section 188 TULRCA is not whether there was "a proposal" to dismiss as of a particular date, but rather whether ATT was proposing to dismiss 20 or more employees within a period of 90 days. The difference between the wording of "a proposal" and "is proposing" is not merely semantic: the EAT noted that "proposing to dismiss" involves a current and ongoing consideration of future events.
2. The ET misapplied the test in Coal Mining Ltd v NUM (Coal Mining Ltd). In Coal Mining Ltd it was held that the duty to consult is not triggered only when closure or mass redundancy is a certainty, but also when redundancy dismissals are fixed as a clear, "albeit provisional," intention. The ET had erred in omitting the words "albeit provisional," which made the test overly stringent and in effect required an actual decision to dismiss rather than the lower threshold which Coal Mining Ltd sets out.
3. The ET was wrong in not considering the likelihood of the sale of the business in making its decision. The evidence showed that when ATT went into administration, closure was expected if the single remaining interested potential buyer did not proceed with the purchase. With this evidence in mind, the EAT therefore decided that there was likely a fixed and clear, albeit provisional, intention for closure, therefore triggering the duty to consult under section 188 TULRCA.

Takeaways

Referencing the decision in Keeping Kids Company v Smith, the EAT reiterated that employers must "project forward" and assess when a consultation should start, to ensure that it begins early enough for meaningful consultation to occur. Depending on the facts of the case, this means that employers may be expected to start consultation before all information is available, and where uncertainties or contingencies (like ATT's potential business sale) still exist. Failure to do so may result in protective awards for each affected employee.