By Jane Stevens

Following on from my last Blog article relating to AWR (Agency Workers Regulations), I have continued to follow developments closely through market commentators, umbrella companies, the BIS and employment law experts.

To re-cap, for those who are not completely aware of the build-up regarding this legislation, The Agency Workers Directive was passed into European Law in 2008. At this point the UK then had to adopt a version of this (the UK version being called Agency Workers Regulations  - AWR) -  in fact all EU Countries will have to  implement their version of this legislation by December 2011. AWR comes into effect in this country on 1 October 2011.

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The wait is over for umbrella companies and contractors who work via umbrella companies as the Government has published their response to the ‘Conduct Regulations Consultation’. However, there is no need to get over excited as this is the initial response with a commitment from the Government that they intend to gather more evidence in the coming months. At this stage it would appear that there is no evidence to suggest that workers engaged through an umbrella companies are ‘vulnerable workers’. (more…)