Emergency Volunteering Leave

The Coronavirus Act 2020 received Royal Assent yesterday, providing for, amongst other measures, a new temporary form of statutory leave for workers who wish to help support essential health and social care services during the COVID-19 outbreak. The leave has been aptly named “Emergency Volunteering Leave” (EVL).

Emergency Volunteering Leave

Entitlement

All workers (not just employees) are entitled to be absent from work for the purposes of EVL, provided they obtained an emergency volunteering certificate and provided one of the following exceptions do not apply:

• They are employed by a small business with less than 10 staff;
• They are employed by the legislature, for example the Crown, or if they are member of the House of Commons or Lords; or
• They are a police officer.

An emergency volunteering certificate will need to be issued by an appropriate authority, for example in England, the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, NHS and Department of Health, confirming that you have been approved by them as an emergency volunteer in health or social care and will specify the period during which you can act as an emergency volunteer.

Notification

A worker wishing to take EVL must notify their employer that they intend to be absent from work for the period specified in their emergency volunteering certificate at least 3 working days’ before the period specified in the emergency volunteering certificate begins. Employers must also be provided with a copy of that certificate.

Pay

EVL is a form of unpaid leave. The Coronavirus Act 2020 does however give the Secretary of State the power to establish a compensation scheme to compensate eligible volunteers for some loss of income and expenses incurred, for example travel and subsistence.

During any period of EVL, workers will remain entitled to the benefit of all of their usual terms and conditions of employment that they would have been had they not been absent on EVL, with the important exception of terms and conditions relating to remuneration.

So, workers will not be entitled to wages or salary as this will be treated as remuneration. However, workers will still be entitled to their usual benefits associated with their employment, for example pension and company car.

Duration

EVL can be taken in a block of 2, 3 or 4 weeks. Workers are only entitled to take one block of either 2, 3 of 4 weeks EVL in any 16-week period.

The block of 2, 3 or 4 weeks that the worker wishes to take must also begin and end in the same 16-week volunteering period.

Furlough

If you have been placed on furlough leave you can notify your employer of your intention to take EVL as set out above. Whilst on EVL, you will not be entitled to receive the pay you would have received had you been on furlough leave.

Additional protection

A worker who takes EVL will have the right to return to work after a period of EVL to the job in which they were employed before the absence. This will include with the same seniority and similar rights that they would have enjoyed had they not been absent and on no less favourable terms.

It will also be unlawful to subject a worker to any detriment because they exercised their right to take EVL.

Further, if an employee is dismissed and the sole or principal reason for that dismissal was that they took or proposed to take EVL, any dismissal will be automatically unfair. Employees will not need two years’ service to bring that claim and there will be no cap on the amount of compensation that they can be awarded in those circumstances.

Comment

Whilst the Coronavirus Act 2020 is technically in force, the provisions relating to EVL require statutory instruments to be made in order to provide further details. We will update this page as and when we have any further detail.

If you would like to volunteer for EVL you can do so by clicking here.