What issues should employers be aware of when employing young workers?

As an employer, it's your legal responsibility to care for all staff. This means being aware of their employment rights and ensuring you comply with relevant legislation, especially when hiring young workers.

With Gen Z said to make up 20 percent of the UK workforce, engaging more young people is an obvious means of gaining an additional flexible staffing option, offering up new perspectives and being cost-effective. However, they also have their own set of employment rights that need to be upheld.

Age Limits

Under the Working Time Regulations 1998, a young worker is defined as: “a worker who has attained the age of 15 but not the age of 18 and who, as respects England and Wales, is over compulsory school age”. To work full time, young people must be over compulsory school age. In England and Wales, compulsory school age ends on the last Friday in June of the academic year in which they turn 16.

When hiring a young worker, it is important to remember that it is compulsory for them to be in education or training until the age of 18, that means they must do one of the following until they are 18:

• stay in full-time education, for example at a college;
• start an apprenticeship or traineeship; or
• spend 20 hours or more a week working or volunteering, while in part-time education or training.

Working Hours

Young workers may not generally work more than eight hours in any day or 40 hours in any week (Monday to Sunday). In contrast to adult workers, whose weekly working hours are averaged over a reference period, there are no averaging provisions for young workers. The 40-hour limit applies to each individual week.

Children (below compulsory school age) may not work during school hours on school days. Also, they may not work before 7am or after 7pm on any day. Work on a school day may not be for more than an hour before school. There are limitations on the number of hours children can work on school days and on weekends (between two and eight hours depending on age and whether it is term time) as well.

Rest Breaks

Young workers must also have, as a minimum:

• a 30-minute break if their working day is longer than 4.5 hours;
• 12 hours' rest in any 24-hour period in which they work (for example, between one working day and the next); and/or
• 48 hours' (two days) rest taken together, each week or – if there is a good business reason why this is not possible – at least 36 hours' rest, with the remaining 12 hours taken as soon as possible afterwards.

This rest period may be interrupted in the case of activities involving periods of work that are split up over the day or are of short duration. In regard to the weekly rest, the rest period may also be reduced where this is justified by technical or organisational reasons, but not to less than 36 consecutive hours.

Pay

The rate of the national minimum wage is age dependent. There is a “young workers” rate (currently £5.28 per hour) for under 18s who are above compulsory school age, a “development” rate (currently £7.49 per hour) for 18- to 20-year-olds and a standard rate (currently £10.18 per hour) for workers aged 21 and 22. Different rates apply to apprentices. The national minimum wage does not apply to under 16s. National insurance is not applied to their pay and so their pay only needs to be processed through payroll if their total income exceeds their personal allowance (currently £12,570).

Exceptions

There are some exception that cover young workers depending on the areas of work they will be working in such as mobile (road transport and aviation) services, armed forces or police and civil protection services, or domestic service.

There is an exception for "force majeure", also known as “Acts of God”, that disapplies the daily and weekly working time limit, the night work restrictions, the daily rest period and the rest breaks. There must be work of a temporary nature which no adult is available to perform, that must be performed immediately, and which is occasioned by unusual and unforeseeable circumstances beyond the employer's control, or exceptional events whose consequences could not have been avoided. Compensatory rest must be given within three weeks if the young worker works during what would otherwise have been a rest period or rest break.

The daily and weekly work limit may be disapplied where necessary to maintain continuity of service or production or to respond to a surge in demand for a product, if no adult worker is available and the young worker is not adversely affected.

Benefits of Younger Workers

As long as you have complied with legislation, there are several benefits your business might gain from hiring young workers. They include:

• Offers fresh perspectives: Employing young workers can allow for new perspectives and fresh ideas from a different generation – with different ways of thinking.
• Willingness to develop: Young employees can also be seen as a blank slate to mould practices and preferences into, without having to break bad habits from their previous workplaces or work experiences.
• Cost-effective solution: Employing someone under 18 can often be a cot-effective solution since they have a lower national minimum wage rate.

If you have concerns or questions about young workers in your workplace or are interested in any further information about young workers, please contact our Employment Team by emailing employment@warnegoodman.co.uk or calling 023 8071 7717.