The following changes come into effect in early April 2025:

National minimum wage (NMW)

The new NMW rates which will apply from 1 April 2025 are as follows:

Rate	From 1 April 2025
National Living Wage age 21+	£12.21
Age 18-20	£10.00
Age 16-17	£7.55
Apprentice rate	£7.55
Accommodation offset	£10.66

 

Neonatal care leave and pay

Regulations implementing the Neonatal Care (Leave and Pay) Act 2023 come into force on 6 April 2025 and apply to babies born on or after that date.

Neonatal Care Leave will apply to parents of babies who are admitted into neonatal care up to 28 days old and who have a continuous stay in hospital of 7 full days or longer. These measures will allow eligible parents to take up to 12 weeks of leave (and, if eligible, pay) on top of any other leave they may be entitled to, including maternity and paternity leave. Neonatal Care Leave will apply in respect of children who are born on or after 6th April 2025. The entitlement does not increase in the event of multiple births.

The right to Neonatal Care Leave will be a day one right, but employees will only be entitled to statutory neonatal care pay (at the same rate as statutory paternity pay) if they have 26 weeks’ service and give notice to their employer.

The leave must be taken before the end of 68 weeks beginning with the date of the child’s birth.

Employment Tribunal awards

The limits which apply to certain Employment Tribunal awards and other sums payable under employment legislation increase with effect from 6 April:

• The limit on a week’s pay for the purposes of calculating the basic award for unfair dismissal and statutory redundancy pay (SRP) increases from £700 to £719. This means that the maximum basic award and SRP increases to £21,570.
• The limit on the compensatory award for unfair dismissal increases from £115,115 to £118,223.
• The limit on the compensatory award for failure to allocate and pay tips fairly increases from £5,000 to £5,135.

Statutory payments

The rate of statutory maternity pay, paternity pay, adoption pay, shared parental pay and parental bereavement pay increases from £184.03 to £187.18 on 6 April 2025.

The rate of statutory sick pay increases from £116.75 to £118.75 on 6 April 2025.

National Insurance contributions

From 6 April 2025, employer’s contributions on salaries above £5,000 will rise to 15%.