Member

I understand that my noble friend has included in her amendment provision for ensuring that no employee will receive less SSP as a result of these changes. That point was raised by my noble friend Lady O’Grady. I assure the Committee that, by removing the waiting period, no employee will be entitled to less SSP for the first three weeks of sickness absence, which, from a survey of UK employees, represents 80% of all sickness absence. In fact, the vast majority will receive more than they do now as a result of these changes. I assure the noble Baroness, Lady Smith, that we are not cutting SSP for hundreds of thousands of workers.