Companies are entitled to protect their trading position by insisting that their former workers desist from joining competitors for a reasonable period after their departure. However, balancing such contractual rights against the liberty of workers to earn a living and…
Employers whose breaches of health and safety rules result in injury to workers are hit hard in the pocket – but, as with individuals, penalties levied are tailored to the seriousness of offences and ability to pay. In one case,…
Many employers may be surprised to note that it is inherent in the Equality Act 2010 that the duty to make reasonable adjustments may require them to treat a disabled employee more favourably than others. The point was made in…
It is a fundamental tenet of the English legal system that those on the losing side in litigation are entitled to know the reasons for their defeat. In a case which underlined that principle, a teacher who was refused permission…
This summer’s hot weather raised the issue of the law regarding temperatures in the workplace. What is a suitable environment will depend on the nature of the activity. For example, the Chartered Institution of Building Services Engineers recommends a temperature…
Four black Royal Mail employees who claimed that they had been victimised due to their race and treated less favourably than a white colleague have had their hopes of winning compensation boosted by the Employment Appeal Tribunal (EAT). The four…
In a guideline decision which reinforced the rights of agency workers, a tribunal has underlined in the context of an NHS whistleblowing case that it is legally possible to have one job but more than one employer. A forensic nurse…
Fringe benefits provided to employees are usually taxable – but there are exceptions, and one of them came under detailed scrutiny in a case involving a free bus pass issued to a local authority worker. The council had in the…
Recognition of ‘units’ of workers for the purposes of collective bargaining can be a thorny issue and that was certainly so in one case in which supermarket chain Lidl fiercely objected to 223 warehouse workers – representing only about 1.2…
In Santos Gomes v Higher Level Care Limited, the Employment Appeal Tribunal (EAT) has upheld the ruling of the Employment Tribunal (ET) that a worker who has not been allowed rest breaks under the Working Time Regulations 1998 (WTR) cannot…
