Pat McFadden, the Minister for Employment Relations and Postal Affairs, has confirmed that the extension of the right to request flexible working to parents of children up to the age of 16 will be implemented in April 2009, as planned. There had been some doubt as to whether the change would go ahead following comments by Peter Mandelson in October 2008 that the Government was considering the delay of a number of measures due to the economic climate and the fact that the extension was not mentioned in the Queen's speech.

New legislation was announced in the Queen's speech that will give employees who have worked for their employer for more that 26 weeks a new right to request time off work to undertake training. Managers would not have to agree to a request if they could not see a good business reason to do so.

Employees will have the right to request the relevant training they need to improve their skills and to have these requests properly considered by their employer. Employers will not be required to pay for training. It is expected that the new right will be modelled on the existing mechanism for requesting flexible working and will be introduced in 2010.