Employment Rights Bill: Motion to disagree with Lords Amendment 60

What happened: The House of Commons voted on 15 September 2025 to disagree with Lords Amendment 60 to the Employment Rights Bill, passing the motion by 318 votes to 170. This meant the government successfully rejected a change that the House of Lords had made to the Bill, keeping the government's original text intact on the provisions covered by that amendment.

Why it matters: The Employment Rights Bill is one of the most significant pieces of labour legislation in a generation, and Lords Amendment 60 represented one of several points of contention between the elected Commons and the appointed Lords over the Bill's final shape. By voting to disagree with the Lords amendment, the Commons sided with the government's version of the relevant employment rights provisions rather than accepting modifications introduced by peers. The practical effect is that workers and employers will be governed by the government's preferred framework rather than the version the Lords sought to impose, though the exact policy content of Amendment 60 relates to specific provisions within a wide-ranging Bill covering areas such as trade union rights, zero-hours contracts, and other employment conditions.

The politics: The vote divided almost entirely along government-versus-opposition lines. Labour and Labour and Co-operative MPs voted unanimously in favour at 310 combined ayes, with no defections to the No lobby. The Conservatives (83 No), Liberal Democrats (66 No), Scottish National Party (8 No), Reform UK (6 No) and smaller opposition parties all voted against. Four independents and all three Green MPs supported the government. The result reflects the broader pattern of parliamentary ping-pong (the back-and-forth process between Commons and Lords when one chamber rejects the other's amendments) that has characterised the Employment Rights Bill's passage, with related divisions in December 2025 showing similarly consistent government majorities on other Lords amendments to the same legislation.