What is the Flexible Furlough Scheme?

From 8 June 2020, people entering the UK from overseas (excluding those entering from Ireland, the Channel Islands or the Isle of Man) must comply with a mandatory 14 day quarantine period. However, for those travelling to England, a number of country specific exemptions have been introduced.

A full list of the countries excluded from the quarantine provisions can be found on the gov.uk website which change on a regular basis, often on short notice.

Where a quarantine period does apply, a person will not be able to leave the place they are staying in for 14 days, except in some very limited circumstances.

These rules will apply to both British and foreign nationals, however there are some further exemptions to this rule where a person is coming to the UK to undertake a certain role (such as a healthcare professional coming to the UK to provide essential healthcare). A full list of the narrow exemptions can be found on the gov.uk website.

Before travelling, individuals will be asked to provide their contact details and information about their journey and the accommodation that they will be self-isolating in. To do this, individuals will need to fill in an online form on the gov.uk website. Individuals who refuse to fill in this form may be fined £100 and/or denied entry at the UK border should they not be a British citizen or UK resident.

The information provided in the form will ensure that the Government can check that an individual is self-isolating at the address given. Where an individual refuses to self-isolate they can be fined £1,000 if they are staying in England or Wales.

Once visa application centres re-open overseas and UK visa applications are processed, this 14 day period will need to be taken into consideration and may require employment start dates in the UK to be delayed.

The Government’s guidance says walk, cycle or drive to work and avoid public transport if you can. Businesses will need to support workers in adopting alternative travel methods to reduce exposure to the virus. You could consider staggering start and finish times for shifts to reduce commuting during peak hours, or support cycling with secure storage facilities and a drying room.

IR35 is an anti-tax avoidance regime which is intended to tackle (in HMRC’s view) the long standing issue of individual contractors providing their services or labour via an intermediary – which is usually a personal service company (referred to as a PSC). We’ll talk about PSCs here, but there are other types of intermediaries that are caught.

HMRC’s view is that this arrangement is often considered to be disguised employment and therefore a tax-avoidance arrangement.

So IR35 is essentially a test of employment status – and if, once you apply the test, the contractor should be an employee, they should then be taxed as an employee.

The Commission has provided guidance as to measures which Member States can introduce without notification. These include:

• Measures which apply to all businesses within a Member State (for example the furloughing measures introduced by the UK Government)
• Measures providing support direct to consumers
• Measures which are already exempt from the notification requirement (discussed further below).

To respond to the crisis the European Commission has also issued a temporary framework to provide a basis for emergency aid to be notified for approval. The framework is initially in place until 31 December 2020. The Commission continues to keep this under review and has twice widened its scope to allow more types of aid to be notified. The type of measures covered include:

• The provision of guarantees (including guarantees for 100% of loans)
• The provision of loans at low interest rates, at zero interest rates or subordinated to senior debt
• Measures to support liquidity needs or to alleviate difficulties caused by the current crisis
• Measures to recapitalise businesses
• Measures to assist sectors hit particularly hard by the current crisis (eg transport)
• Measures targeted at COVID-19 such as research and development or production of products related to tackling the virus

The Commission has approved a UK Government “umbrella” notification to allow UK public authorities to adopt the measures permitted by the Commission framework. Therefore public authorities in the UK can use the Framework without notifying individual measures or schemes to the Commission.

All three of the PPNs are effective immediately and apply to the following Contracting Authorities:

• Central Government Departments
• Executive agencies
• Non-departmental public bodies
• Local authorities
• NHS bodies
• The wider public sector

In regards to PPN03/20, those in scope organisations that do not currently use procurement cards are advised to immediately put in place arrangements using the relevant Crown Commercial Service Agreement (Lot 2 of RM3828 Payment Solutions).