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IT Contractors to be excluded from Agency Workers Bill  

A Parliamentary Bill to give agency workers equal rights as full-time employees, such as pay and pensions, is likely to exclude high earning IT and engineering contractors, according to ATSCo.

Andrew Miller MP, the architect of the Temporary and Agency Workers (Equal Treatment) Bill, confirmed in a statement passed to ATSCo by recruitment consultancy Outsource that he: "...did not want to include providers of professional services who chose to work through agencies..." and that the Bill is "...designed to exclude professional IT contactors and similar people."

Ann Swain, Chief Executive, ATSCo, said: "While ATSCo fully supports protection of vulnerable agency workers, we are pleased that Andrew Miller MP has publicly acknowledged that contractors in the technology sector should be excluded from this Bill."

"ATSCo has constantly pointed out that temporary workers in IT and engineering usually earn significantly more than their full-time counterparts and choose to work as contractors because of the flexible lifestyle benefits. This message is finally getting through to UK lawmakers."

Paul Jameson, Managing Director, of Outsource, the recruitment consultancy which received the statement from Andrew Miller MP, said: "This clarification was urgently required. There was huge misunderstanding in the technology staffing industry as to the scope of this proposed legislation, which could have seriously damaged the competitiveness of UK plc."

The Committee stage of the Bill is scheduled to commence in the next few weeks.


Published on Apr 7, 2008


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