A new Acas code on trade union time off becomes legally binding in nine days, replacing a version unchanged since 2010. Its own Parliamentary paper promised the consultation response "in due course" back in July; due course has not arrived.
Estimated reading time: 6 minutes
In short. A revised Acas Code of Practice on time off for trade union duties and activities takes legal effect on 30 October 2026, replacing the version in force since 1 January 2010 [1]. The Code itself says it "will be taken into account by employment tribunals in relevant cases" [2] (p.1), and from 30 October it is the employer, not the union representative, who must show in any tribunal claim that time off taken was not reasonable [2] (p.33). The Explanatory Memorandum laid before Parliament alongside the Code on 7 July 2026 promised that "the response to the consultation will be published in due course, setting out further details" [3] (p.3). Over three months later, with the Code nine days from binding effect, no such document exists on Acas's own consultation page, on GOV.UK, or anywhere else searchable [4]. Two documented mistakes: four stars.
The Employment Protection Code of Practice (Time Off for Trade Union Duties and Activities) Order 2026 was made on 21 October 2026 and appoints 30 October as the date the revised Code takes effect, replacing the one that has stood unchanged for sixteen years [1]. It is one of three pieces of secondary legislation built on the Employment Rights Act 2025's trade union provisions this autumn: alongside a new statutory right of workplace access and a strengthened existing right to paid time off, the Act creates, for the first time, a statutory entitlement for union equality representatives to take reasonable time off during working hours [3] (p.1). Equality representatives did not exist as a legal category before this Code; learning representatives have had a right to time off since 2003, but nothing equivalent covered a representative whose job is "carrying out activities promoting the value of equality at work" or "providing information, advice or support to qualifying union members relating to equality at work" [2] (p.10).
This is not a minor administrative update. The Code is statutory guidance under section 200 of the Trade Union and Labour Relations (Consolidation) Act 1992, and its own introduction states plainly that it "will be taken into account by employment tribunals in relevant cases" [2] (p.1). It also tightens the evidential position for the roughly 6.6 million UK employees who were trade union members in 2025, 22.4 percent of the workforce [5]: where a representative complains to a tribunal that their employer refused reasonable time off, the Code now states "it is for the employer to show that the amount of time off was not reasonable in these claims" [2] (p.33), a reversal from the representative having to prove their request was reasonable in the first place.
A promise with a date, and one without
None of that detail is contested here; what this piece tests is a single, narrower undertaking the government made to Parliament about how this Code came to be written. Acas ran an eight-week public consultation on the draft Code from 20 January to 17 March 2026, receiving 47 responses: 14 from unions, 11 from employers, 7 from trade associations or professional bodies, and 15 from individuals [3] (p.3). The Explanatory Memorandum that accompanied the finished Code when it was laid before Parliament on 7 July 2026 summarises what those responses said, in six short paragraphs covering agreement rates on clarity, structure and examples [3] (pp.3-4). Then, in the very next paragraph: "The response to the consultation will be published in due course, setting out further details" [3] (p.4).
"In due course" carried no date. The Code it introduces does: 30 October 2026, set in statute by this week's Order [1]. Acas's own consultation page, checked directly, still shows nothing beyond "this consultation closed on 17 March 2026" and a note that Acas "will consider any representations made" before finalising the draft, nearly seven months after that close date and with the finalised Code already laid in Parliament [4]. GOV.UK's publication page for the draft Code lists three documents, the Code itself, a large-print version, and the Explanatory Memorandum, published 7 July 2026; no fourth document answering "in due course" has been added in the three and a half months since [2]. Whatever internal analysis produced the percentages in the Explanatory Memorandum's own paragraph 7.2 to 7.7 exists; it has simply never been shown to the 47 people and organisations who took the time to write in.
The second gap: no checkpoint before year five
The Explanatory Memorandum also sets out how this policy will be checked once it is live. Its answer is a single sentence: "The approach to monitoring this legislation is a Post-Implementation Review (PIR) of the policy which will be undertaken 5 years following introduction" [3] (p.5). That timetable applies equally to the union equality representative right, a category of workplace representative that has never existed in UK law before 30 October 2026. There is no earlier checkpoint proposed anywhere in the Code, the Order or the Memorandum, no interim data-gathering exercise, and no named body asked to report on take-up, disputes or employer compliance before 2031. A genuinely new legal right, created without precedent to measure it against, is set to run for five years before anyone formally checks whether it is working.
The claims, tested
| The Parliamentary paper's own promise | What exists, checked 21 October 2026 | Verdict |
|---|---|---|
| "The response to the consultation will be published in due course, setting out further details" [3] (p.4) | No consultation response document on Acas's consultation page, GOV.UK, or anywhere else found by direct search, three and a half months after the promise and nine days before the Code binds [4] | A dated legal obligation met an undated public promise; only the obligation arrived on time |
| Monitoring is set as "a Post-Implementation Review... undertaken 5 years following introduction" [3] (p.5) | The union equality representative right is entirely new in UK law; no earlier checkpoint, interim data collection or named reporting body appears anywhere in the Code, Order or Memorandum | A brand new right gets the same five-year silence as a routine update to an existing one |
Credit where due
The missing response document is not evidence that the consultation was ignored; the opposite, in fact, appears to be true. The Explanatory Memorandum's own summary shows the draft Code changed in response to what the 47 respondents said. Fifty-five percent disagreed with combining guidance for equality and learning representatives into a single section, so the finished Code sets them out separately while keeping the shared qualifying criteria together [3] (p.3). Respondents who found the examples too narrow saw them expanded to cover more proactive duties [3] (p.3), and feedback on training guidance led to it being split into two clearer sections [3] (p.3). That is a materially different picture from a consultation whose clearest results were simply overridden. The gap here is narrower and more specific: the formal written account of that process, promised to Parliament by name, has not been published, even though the government's own summary shows the underlying analysis already existed in July.
Verdict
Four stars, from two documented mistakes. The Code itself is a workable, evidently consultation-shaped piece of guidance, and the Explanatory Memorandum is unusually candid about what 47 respondents said and how the drafting changed in response. But a formal Parliamentary document that names a specific future action, in this case a published consultation response, and then does not deliver it before the law it accompanies takes binding, tribunal-admissible effect, is a transparency gap this site tracks regardless of how reasonable the underlying policy is. Pairing that with a five-year review window that treats a wholly new legal right the same as a routine amendment compounds the same problem: this is a policy that asks to be trusted on "in due course" twice over.
The star score counts two documented mistakes: (1) the Explanatory Memorandum laid before Parliament on 7 July 2026 promised a published consultation response "in due course"; as of 21 October 2026, nine days before the Code takes binding effect, no such document has been published on Acas's consultation page, GOV.UK, or anywhere else checked; (2) the Post-Implementation Review for this policy is set at five years following introduction, with no earlier checkpoint for the brand new union equality representative right, which has no prior UK legal precedent to measure against. Two falls in the 1 to 3 band: four stars; the bands are on the ratings page. Checked directly against the Order, the final laid Code of Practice (44-page standard PDF), and the Explanatory Memorandum, all fetched 21 October 2026. The document is tracked in the Daily Register; any further revision, including a late-published consultation response, will get a diff entry.
Sources
- Department for Business and Trade, "The Employment Protection Code of Practice (Time Off for Trade Union Duties and Activities) Order 2026" (made 21 October 2026, in force 30 October 2026). https://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2026/1104/made
- Acas, "Draft Acas Code of Practice on Time Off for Trade Union Duties and Activities" (PDF, 44 pages, laid before Parliament 7 July 2026). https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/6a47d0a1045e1108aaa5eb5e/acas-draft-code-of-practice-on-time-off-for-trade-union-duties-and-activities.pdf
- Department for Business and Trade, "Explanatory Memorandum to Draft Code of Practice on Time Off for Trade Union Duties and Activities" (PDF, 6 pages, 7 July 2026). https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/6a478ea8e50f952c9b89e44b/explanatory-memorandum-to-draft-code-of-practice-time-off-for-trade-union-duties-activities.pdf
- Acas, "Consultation: draft Code of Practice on time off for trade union duties and activities" (consultation page, closed 17 March 2026, checked 21 October 2026). https://www.acas.org.uk/about-us/acas-consultations/code-of-practice-trade-union-duties-2026
- Office for National Statistics / Department for Business and Trade, "Trade union membership, UK, 1995 to 2025: statistical bulletin" (published 28 May 2026). https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/trade-union-statistics-2025/trade-union-membership-uk-1995-to-2025-statistical-bulletin