Key employment law differences in Northern Ireland 


Employment law in Northern Ireland is broadly the same as that of the rest of the UK but there are some important differences. These result from Northern Ireland not having enacted several of the employment law changes dating from the Conservative/Liberal Democrat Coalition government of 2010. Here are the main differences:


• one year’s service, rather than two, is required for an ordinary unfair dismissal claim (see Chapter 10);


• Northern Ireland has a statutory minimum discipline and grievance procedure (see Chapter 10);


• collective redundancy consultation period remains set at 90 days where over 100 redundancies are proposed (see Chapter 11);


• there have never been employment tribunal fees in Northern Ireland;


• the changes to TUPE that were made in the rest of the United Kingdom in January 2014 were not made in Northern Ireland (see Chapter 12);


• Northern Ireland has specific laws to protect people from workplace discrimination based on their political beliefs, enforced by the Fair Employment Tribunal (see Chapter 7);


• the “protected conversation” regime under section 111A Employment Rights Act 1996 does not apply in Northern Ireland (see Chapter 14); 


• the gender pay gap regulations are not yet in force in Northern Ireland. When they do come into force, they are expected to be wider and have more teeth than the equivalent regime operating for the rest of the UK. In particular, the Northern Ireland regulations will require information to be broken down by sex, ethnicity and disability and will demand an action plan to eliminate gender pay differences (see Chapter 7);


• regulations limiting to two years the series of wage deductions (including statutory holiday pay) that can be recovered in the employment tribunal have not been enacted in Northern Ireland (see Chapter 4); 


• the Trade Union Act 2016, which covers strike ballots and notice, picketing, trade union funding, facility time and check off, does not apply to Northern Ireland (see Chapters 5 and 6).