This blog provides a brief overview of April’s Legal Updates, which are relevant to Quality, Environmental, Info Sec and Health & Safety to help your organisation stay aligned with the latest legal requirements.
How to use this Update:
- You should review these updates and decide whether they apply to your company.
- Add all relevant items to your legal register and document your compliance.
- Ensure all policies and procedures align with the new governance and compliance requirements.
- Provide information and training to all relevant personnel to ensure you remain compliant
- Please note that ISO 14001, ISO 45001, ISO 27001 and other standards require you to conduct a compliance evaluation.
Need assistance with these updates? We are here to help: Contact us
Environment
2nd April
UK
The Greenhouse Gas Emissions Trading Scheme (Amendment) (Extension to Maritime Activities) Order 2026
This instrument makes amendments to the legislation which gives effect to the UK Emissions Trading Scheme (the “UK ETS”). The UK ETS incentivises decarbonisation by requiring operators to purchase allowances based on emissions. The instrument expands the UK ETS to include coverage of CO2, CH4 and NO2 from maritime activities.
Link to legislation
Employment
7th April
Northern Ireland
The Statutory Parental Bereavement Pay (Employment and Earnings) (Amendment) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2026
The purpose of the Statutory Parental Bereavement Pay (Employment and Earnings) (Amendment) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2026 is to remove service‑based earnings and the reliance on actual earnings for entitlement, ensure that statutory parental bereavement pay (SPBP) operates as a genuine day‑one right, and provide clarity for employees with atypical or incomplete earnings histories. The Regulations also make technical amendments to ensure that employees working in the EEA but treated as employed in Northern Ireland for social security purposes are fully covered, including where entitlement is based on expected earnings. Taken together, these amendments modernise the statutory scheme, ensure that the recent extension of the right to include miscarriage operates coherently, and support fair and consistent access to SPBP during an acutely distressing period.
Link to legislation
Information Security
21st April
UK
The Data Protection Act 2018 (Code of Practice on Artificial Intelligence and Automated Decision-Making) Regulations 2026
This instrument requires the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO), as the independent data protection regulator, to produce a code of practice providing guidance as to good practice in relation to the use of personal data in artificial intelligence (AI) and automated decision-making (ADM) to assist organisations with their compliance with their data protection obligations. In this instrument personal data refers to any information relating to an identified or identifiable living individual as set out under sections 3(2) and 3(14)(c) of the Data Protection Act 2018. ADM refers to solely automated decisions regulated by articles 22A-22C of the UK GDPR and sections 50A-50C of the Data Protection Act 2018. Due to the fast-paced nature of AI development, this instrument does not provide a definition of AI to allow the ICO to be able to consider the latest developments in this technology when developing this code.
Link to legislation
Employment
29th April
UK
The Employee Study and Training (Procedural Requirements) (Amendment) Regulations 2026
Regulation 2 amends the 2010 Regulations to extend the time limit, from three to six months, for presenting a complaint to an Employment Tribunal in relation to an employer’s failure, or threat to fail, to comply with an employee’s right to be accompanied at a meeting to discuss study or training.
Regulation 3 provides that the extension to the time limit only applies where the failure, or threat to fail, to comply occurs on or after 1st October 2026.
Link to legislation
ISO 14001, ISO 45001, ISO 27001 and other standards require you to conduct a compliance evaluation. If you haven’t done this, we can help.
Legal Register
Assent Risk Management has made over 250 UK Legal Register entries available to search on Resilify.io’s Legal Register Database.
Need Support?
If you have questions or need guidance to navigate these updates, our team is here to help.
