The Supreme Court has upheld the decision of the Court of Appeal and EAT in Brazel v The Harper Trust that employers must calculate paid holiday entitlement for part-year (eg term-time only) workers on permanent contracts without pro-rating the full-time entitlement to reflect weeks not worked.  The Working Time Regulations (WTR) do not permit employers … Read more

Employers will welcome the decision of the Court of Appeal upholding the EAT’s decision in Kong v Gulf International Bank (summarised here).  Subject to any further appeal to the Supreme Court, the ruling confirms that an employer may be able to successfully defend a whistleblowing dismissal claim if it can show that its genuine reason … Read more

Those expecting the usual crop of government consultations on employment law reform to be rushed out before the summer recess will be disappointed this year; most of the ‘to do’ list (here) remains untouched, with just a few exceptions: The Government has finally published its response to the 2018 employment status consultation (which formed part … Read more

Two cases this month illustrate the challenges employers face in relation to employees expressing or manifesting beliefs on sensitive topics which have the potential to upset or cause offence to colleagues.  Previous case law has established that the potential for offence will not prevent philosophical beliefs from being protected within the Equality Act, with the … Read more

A recent tribunal ruling serves as a reminder that employers dealing with an employee off sick with ‘long Covid’ should carefully consider whether the individual could be disabled within the statutory definition, bearing in mind evidence that it is common for symptoms to fluctuate and that some individuals do continue to suffer for 12 months. … Read more

Employers face paying more than the statutory cap for unfair dismissal compensation in some cases, following a ruling of the Scottish EAT in Dafiaghor-Olomu v Community Integrated Care.   The statutory cap on unfair dismissal compensatory awards (the lower of 52 weeks’ pay and, currently, £93,878) applies to the overall assessment of compensation after ‘taking into … Read more

Over recent years there has been a steady flow of tribunal cases testing the boundaries of the protection for beliefs under the Equality Act.  Case law has established a clear test: to be protected a belief must be (i) genuinely held, (ii) not merely an opinion or viewpoint based on the present state of information, … Read more

An employer cannot engineer an end point to collective bargaining, to enable it safely to make a direct pay offer to employees without it being an unlawful inducement to bypass collective bargaining, simply by describing the last offer rejected by the union as its “best and final” offer.  A tribunal may still conclude that continued … Read more