It is common ground that TUPE does not apply to share transfers, or so you thought. The recent EAT case of Jackson Lloyd Ltd and Mears Group Plc v Smith shows that matters may not be so straight forward. In this case, the Mears Group rescued the ailing business of Jackson Lloyd and acquired its […]
More employment legislation
Another Bill has been published, the Small Business, Enterprise and Employment Bill which makes changes to employment law. A number of new provisions are proposing to be introduced for employers and employment lawyers to get to grips with next. Firstly, the Bill defines a zero hours contracts and renders any clause which tried to stop the […]
Employment Practices Bill
The Employment Practices Bill 2014-15 has been published in draft. The bill has been little publicised and has been introduced in an attempt to tackle the potential exploitation of migrant workers but applies to all employers and workers. The main provision of the Bill relates to employers who offer an employee residential accommodation as part of […]
Employment Tribunals
By way of an update, the Ministry of Justice has published tribunal statistics for January to March 2014 which show a continuation in the reduction in the number of claims since fees were introduced in July 2013. This time the drop was around 59% for single individuals compared with the same period in 2013. Unison […]
Holiday pay and death
A recent ECJ decision has confirmed that if a worker has accrued but untaken statutory annual leave entitlement at the time of their death then the estate is entitled to payment in lieu in respect of untaken holiday. The right does not die with the employee. The ECJ in the case of Bollacke v K […]
Flexible working
The new rules regarding flexible working came into force on 30th June 2014. Now all employees with 26 weeks service have the right to request to work flexible. Prior to this they had to be the parent or responsible for a child or disabled child or be a carer. Employers can also sigh relief at […]
Reasonable adjustments
It has long been established that an employer is under a duty to make reasonable adjustments for disabled employers. The case of Coleman v Attridge Law held that those with direct discrimination claims do not themselves need to be disabled but can be associated with a disabled person. In that case it was Mrs Coleman’s […]
Automatic pension enrolment
This month’s business briefing is on the topic of auto-enrolment of pensions. It explains the obligations on employers when it comes to auto-enrolment. What is auto-enrolment? From a date after October 2012, businesses will be required to automatically enrol eligible “jobholders” in a pension scheme. A “jobholder” will include permanent, fixed-term and temporary […]
Confidentiality in employment
In what appears to be one of the few times that a judge has felt justified in allowing the inspection and imaging of employees’ computers in the case of Warm Zones v Thurley and another, the High Court has ordered that an employer may instruct an independent computer expert to inspect and take images from […]
National Minimum Wage shame
The Government has released its latest list of 25 employers who have failed to pay their staff the national minimum wage and have been issued with a Notice of Underpayment (NoU) following calls to the Pay and Work Rights Helpline by the workers. The cases have been investigated and notices issued. Once again the names on […]