Before COVID-19 and the recent layoffs at Twitter Inc., the Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification, or WARN, Act maintained a low profile; the act did not garner significant media attention, and cases alleging violations of the act were limited and largely routine. An explanation for this, at least in part, is that the WARN Act … Read more

Employers may need to consider adjustments for employees with mental impairments when using interviews to select for redundancy, but this will not necessarily require the employee simply to be slotted into an available alternative role without interview, where this would impact on other at-risk employees. In Hilaire v Luton Borough Council, the EAT ruled that … Read more

The Government recently announced its support in second readings of a number of Private Members’ Bills proposing reforms originally slated for the elusive Employment Bill.  Most provide for the detail of the changes to be made by regulation and are therefore light on detail, but they do increase the likelihood of proposals actually coming into … Read more

Carrying out a fair redundancy usually involves identifying an appropriate pool from which to provisionally select employees using fair selection criteria, and then consulting with the individual(s) provisionally chosen.  A recent EAT decision has made clear that an employer may need to consult at an earlier stage, prior to the choice of criteria, if the … Read more

Employers would be well-advised to comply with the procedural steps set out in the Acas Code of Practice on Disciplinary and Grievance Procedures when dismissing, unless they can be confident that the tribunal will accept that the reason for dismissal is not within the ambit of the Code.  The Acas Code explicitly excludes dismissals on … Read more

The statutory Acas Code of Practice on Disciplinary and Grievance Procedures requires employers to offer employees a right of appeal for misconduct or poor performance dismissals;  a failure to do so will render the dismissal unfair in addition to potentially increasing the compensation awarded.   The fact that the Code expressly does not apply to redundancy, … Read more

Our September update covers the following: upcoming changes in Singapore, including workplace discrimination and the requirement to notify the Ministry of Manpower of any retrenchments (a change from the previous requirement to notify after 5 employees had been made redundant in a six month period) – see here changes to the PRC social security regime for … Read more

In the Delta FM decision, the Court confirmed the central importance of the relevant terms of an employee’s contract of employment and industrial instruments in determining whether the employee had a reasonable expectation of ongoing employment, as part of assessing their entitlement to redundancy pay. We previously published an article on the decision of the … Read more