Consultation launched on workplace monitoring technologies
The government has launched a consultation on the use of workplace monitoring technologies in an effort to improve clarity, transparency and worker voice, supporting good industrial relations.
Ministers are seeking views from businesses, trade unions, and the public on how digital monitoring tools and AI are used to manage staff, to find a balance between encouraging technological innovation and protecting workers’ rights, ensuring advances do not come at the cost of fairness, trust, or transparency.
In a foreword to the consultation, employment rights minister Kate Dearden and AI and online safety minister Kanishka Narayan said: “Employers and workers should have a shared interest in workplace monitoring technologies being used transparently and in ways that are fair, accountable and reliable, so that they can support productivity and good management while maintaining trust in the workplace.”
Workplace monitoring technologies (WMT) include a range of data collection and reporting systems, from digital activity and location tracking to communication surveillance. They might be used to observe performance, behaviour, attendance and include systems that use data to inform or make decisions affecting workers.
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They may operate in physical workplaces or remotely, including through digital platforms, and can incorporate the use of automated decision making (ADM) and algorithmic management, including AI.
Estimates of the prevalence of WMT vary considerably, from as low as 20% to as high as 85%. The government believes that the responsible, transparent and proportionate use of WMT has the potential to enhance outcomes for both employers and employees, but there are potential harms when WMT is poorly designed, explained or governed.
The consultation seeks views on people’s experience of WMT, what activities take place in workplaces, for what purpose, and what information was provided when it was introduced.
Employers are currently subject to various legal requirements when using WMT. Under data protection law, organisations must ensure use of WMT and personal data processing is lawful, fair and proportionate.
Ministers are seeking views on what the responsible use of WMT looks like in practice and have come up with eight principles:
- Purpose and rationale: Employers should be clear about why WMT is being used.
- Transparency and understanding: Workers should be given clear and timely information about WMT use.
- Worker engagement and voice: Employers demonstrating best practice should engage with workers, trade unions or elected representatives when WMT is introduced or relied upon in significant decisions.
- Fairness and equality: Employers should ensure WMT is fair and does not lead to discriminatory, disproportionate or otherwise unfair outcomes
- Necessity, proportionality and privacy: Employers should consider whether less intrusive measures could achieve the same outcome and avoid “scope-creep”
- Human oversight and accountability: Employers should ensure decision-makers understand the systems they oversee
- Dignity and wellbeing: Impacts on mental health and wellbeing should be considered
- Accuracy, reliability and review: Employers should regularly assess whether monitoring remains necessary, whether it is sufficiently accurate and reliable to achieve its intended purpose, and whether it continues to operate fairly and proportionately.
The government is asking respondents to gauge how well they feel these principles are adhered to currently, and which are most important.
Drawing on consultation responses and evidence, the government will consider whether regulatory intervention is justified. It seeks views on whether there should be a statutory or non-statutory code of practice on employers’ use of workplace monitoring technologies, or whether primary legislation should impose a mandatory duty to engage with workers where WMT is introduced or significantly changed.
A statutory WMT code of practice would allow employment tribunals to take the Code into account where relevant. This would include claims such as unfair dismissal or discrimination where the use of WMT formed part of the factual background.
Where a worker succeeds in such a claim, and the tribunal finds an employer has unreasonably failed to follow the Code, it would have the discretion to adjust compensation by up to 25%.
Non-statutory guidance would provide practical support for employers on the introduction and use of WMT. While “light touch” and likely to be supported by employers, it would not create new legal obligations nor provide any additional remedy for workers where employers fail to follow it.
Primary legislation could be used to create a legal requirement that employers’ plans to adopt WMT would be subject to consultation and negotiation, with a view to agreement of trade unions or elected staff representatives.
The consultation closes on 30 September 2026.
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