The Times quotes Nick Hurley on new powers afforded to the FWA under the Employment Rights Bill

Officers enforcing Labour’s workers’ rights overhaul will reportedly have the power to enter people’s homes and seize documents and laptops while investigating potential breaches of new laws.

The Times reports that enforcement officers for the Fair Work Agency (FWA), the quango tasked with overseeing the new rights, "will be given powers of arrest on par with the police and will be able to enter people’s homes in the course of their investigations."

The new powers were set out in amendments made by the government to its Employment Rights Bill.

Nick Hurley, Partner and Head of Employment, comments in the article by The Times, arguing that the consolidation of existing powers into one agency makes “good sense, but of understandable concern is what appears to be an over-arming of the FWA, creating a body that is too muscular in its powers”. He explains:

Libertarians and most right-minded employers will be alarmed by powers of entry — particularly in homes — search, seizure and arrest, as these are powers more typically reserved for the police or equivalent bodies that are subject to regulation and guidance that carefully limit the use of their more invasive powers.

"Whilst employers that wilfully disobey the law should be punished, the actions taken against them ought to be proportionate and a clear threshold of ‘necessity’ should be made out for the application of more extreme powers.

Read the full article in The Times here (subscription required).