An employee does not need two years’ service to claim unfair dismissal if the reason for the dismissal is that he or she has made a public interest disclosure. One of the difficulties for employers is that an employee who makes disclosures of alleged wrongdoing may also be a difficult colleague to work with –…
When an employee is accused of serious misconduct, it may be appropriate for him or her to be suspended while an investigation takes place. This may be necessary to protect the business, or the integrity of the investigation. However, while an employer may be at pains to stress that the suspension does not indicate any…
Direct discrimination involves treating an employee less favourably ‘because of a protected characteristic’. The word ‘a’ is doing a lot of work in that definition because it makes it clear that the protected characteristic need not actually apply to the employee. An employer who rejects a job application, in the mistaken belief that the applicant…
Employers who negotiate terms and conditions with a trade union must take great care if they seek to bypass that process and make individual offers to employees when talks break down. Any offer made to a group of employees which has the purpose and effect of any of their terms and conditions no longer being…
The transfer of employment as a result of a TUPE transfer is an automatic process. When a TUPE transfer takes place, all of the employees assigned to the relevant part of the undertaking automatically transfer to the new employer. This can cause difficulties if the parties wrongly believe that an individual is not covered by…
Part-time workers are entitled to be treated equally with their full-time colleagues unless there is good reason otherwise. Generally that means applying a pro-rata principle in which the benefits that full-timers and part-timers receive are in proportion to their respective hours of work. British Airways v Pinaud In British Airways v Pinaud the employee was…
The Supreme Court’s ruling that the Employment Tribunal fees introduced by the Government in 2013 were unlawful has sent shockwaves through the world of employment law. It is important to appreciate that the Court did not simply ask the Government to amend its scheme or come up with a new one in due course –…
Employers should be aware that dismissing an employee because she is pregnant is automatically unfair – and also amounts to unlawful discrimination. But in the UK at least, the rule is that the dismissal of a woman who just happens to be pregnant is treated in the same way as any other dismissal, provided the…
Perhaps the most complicated and difficult issue in the whole of employment law is working out whether an employee, in one part of the employer’s business, can claim equal pay by comparing herself with a man working in a completely different location. Gaining a Foothold In Asda Stores Ltd v Brierly & ors, a large…
Suns out, Skirts out Warm weather turns HR specialists to thoughts of… dress codes. This summer we have had news of male employees sent home from work for wearing shorts, only to return wearing skirts instead. If women are allowed to wear skirts, they say, then why can’t men? Somewhat less dramatically the House of…