First Secretary of State Louise Haigh used her Trade Union Congress address in Brighton on 15 September 2026 to do more than deliver a set-piece conference speech. After opening with condolences to Prime Minister Andy Burnham following the death of his father, she set out a cross-government argument: labour market reform, devolved decision-making, industrial policy, AI governance and foreign policy should all be read as parts of a wider effort to move power away from concentrated institutions and towards workers, communities and public accountability. (gov.uk) The most concrete new commitment was on flexible working. In the Cabinet Office transcript, Haigh said the government will strengthen the right so that an employer who wants to refuse a request must meet the employee, consider the proposal properly and explain the decision. (gov.uk)
The speech rested on a clear organising idea: trade unions were presented as institutions that help ordinary people deal with larger concentrations of power. Haigh then tied that argument to a list of measures she said the government had already delivered, including renters' rights, action on child poverty through ending the two-child cap, NHS investment, steel support, bus reform and rail public ownership. The practical point was to place the flexible working announcement inside a broader programme rather than treat it as a standalone workplace measure. (gov.uk) The transport references were not incidental. Separate Department for Transport statements show that Govia Thameslink Railway transferred into public ownership on 31 May 2026 as the fifth operator to do so under the Passenger Railway Services (Public Ownership) Act, with Chiltern Railways due on 20 September 2026 and Great Western Railway on 13 December 2026. On buses, ministers said on 7 September 2026 that Liverpool City Region services were beginning a move back under public control through franchising, backed by £86.3 million to 2029. (gov.uk)
On employment law, the speech leaned heavily on the Employment Rights Act 2025, which received Royal Assent on 18 December 2025 and is being phased in through 2026 and 2027. The government’s implementation update says repeal of most of the Trade Union Act 2016 took effect on 18 February 2026, while day-one paternity leave, unpaid parental leave and Statutory Sick Pay changes removing the Lower Earnings Limit and waiting period took effect on 6 April 2026. The Fair Work Agency followed on 7 April 2026. (legislation.gov.uk) That matters because Haigh presented the Act as the basis for a good-jobs settlement, not just a union relations bill. The Cabinet Office transcript highlights her emphasis on sick pay from day one, an end to fire and rehire, stronger dismissal protection and action against insecure hours. The government’s timetable shows some of that programme is already live, while other elements, including fire and rehire protections, a shorter unfair dismissal qualifying period and further flexible working provisions, are still staged for late 2026 and 2027. (gov.uk)
Haigh’s flexible working announcement needs careful decoding. Employees already have a day-one right to request flexible working, and GOV.UK says employers must discuss the request before refusing it and decide within two months. The reform now under consultation goes further: the Department for Business and Trade says employers would have to show that a refusal is reasonable, explain it by reference to the existing statutory business grounds and face potential tribunal challenge if a request is unreasonably rejected. (gov.uk) The consultation, updated on 15 September 2026, says the new reasonableness test is due to come into force in 2027. If adopted in its present form, a tribunal could require an employer to reconsider the decision or award compensation of up to eight weeks’ pay, currently capped at £719 a week. For employers, that points to a shift from a process right to request towards a more evidence-based duty to justify refusal. (gov.uk)
On devolution, the speech closely tracked the government’s July language on rewiring the state. Haigh argued that decisions on transport links, skills planning and town-centre revival should move closer to the places affected. That mirrors the Cabinet Office statement published on 31 July 2026, which says ministers want to shift power, funding and accountability from Whitehall to local leaders, and the Prime Minister’s 30 July announcement giving mayors a share of income tax and business rate growth. (gov.uk) The policy direction has since been extended. On 10 September 2026, the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government said mayors and foundation strategic authorities would be able to introduce an Overnight Visitor Levy, with revenue reinvested locally. Whether that amounts to durable fiscal autonomy, rather than tightly specified funding streams, remains the main implementation question; that is an inference from the design of the package rather than a stated government conclusion. (gov.uk)
Procurement was another important, if easily overlooked, part of the speech. Haigh referred to changes intended to create more good jobs in Britain through public purchasing. That matches Cabinet Office changes announced on 5 August 2026, under which the local-benefit weighting in central government contracts worth £5 million or more will double from 10 per cent to 20 per cent, with the new rules taking effect from 1 January 2027. Suppliers will be assessed on jobs, skills and pathways for groups including young people not in education, employment or training, care leavers and people with long-term health conditions. (gov.uk) A second procurement strand sits inside the employment rights timetable. The government says October 2026 will bring back the two-tier code, intended to ensure outsourced private-sector workers are not offered worse terms than staff transferred from the public sector. Read together, the speech suggests ministers want procurement to act both as an industrial policy tool and as a labour standards tool. (gov.uk)
On artificial intelligence, Haigh adopted the government’s current twin line: strong enthusiasm for public-service and business use, combined with a clear warning that security and labour-market risks need active controls. That sits alongside the AI Opportunities Action Plan progress report, which said on 29 January 2026 that 38 of the government’s 50 AI actions had been completed, and the 24 July creation of a Prime Minister’s AI Taskforce housed in the Office for the Prime Minister and the Cabinet. The same Cabinet Office release says responsibility for the AI Security Institute has already moved into that structure. (gov.uk) For unions, local authorities and employers, the policy signal is that AI is no longer being handled as a narrow technology brief. It is being connected to procurement, skills, public-service reform and national security. That makes the speech relevant well beyond industrial relations, even though it was delivered to a trade union audience. (gov.uk)
The foreign policy section aligned Haigh with measures announced by Foreign Secretary Ed Miliband on 8 September 2026. In that Commons statement, Miliband said the UK would introduce an import ban on goods from illegal settlements, ban advertising of illegal settlements in the UK, create a sanctions route against companies and individuals providing services for settlement expansion, and extend the global human rights sanctions regime to allow faster action. Haigh translated that package into a conference message about targeted pressure on illegal settlements rather than on the Israeli public. (gov.uk) The speech closed by placing unions inside a wider contest over who holds power in Britain: employers or workers, Westminster or local institutions, and democratic organisation or far-right intimidation. Stripped of the platform language, the operational points to watch are flexible working regulations in 2027, trade union access and anti-harassment duties from 30 October 2026, procurement changes from 1 January 2027, and whether devolution promises come with usable fiscal powers. That is where this speech moves from conference rhetoric to administrative delivery. (gov.uk)