Latest case reports added to HR & Compliance Centre

We provide a round-up of case reports added to XpertHR this week, covering: holiday pay; disability discrimination; unfair dismissal; and termination dates. 

  • Holiday pay: Unpaid holiday pay can be claimed as unlawful deductions from wages In HM Revenue and Customs v Stringer and others sub nom Commissioners of Inland Revenue v Ainsworth and others [2009] IRLR 677 HL, the House of Lords held that a claim for unpaid holiday due under the Working Time Regulations 1998 can be brought as an unlawful deductions from wages claim under ss.13 and 23 of the Employment Rights Act 1996. (Employment Review)
  • Disability discrimination: "Likely" means "could well happen" In SCA Packaging Limited v Boyle [2009] UKHL 37 HL, the House of Lords held that "likely" within the meaning of paras.2(2) and 6(1) of sch.1 to the Disability Discrimination Act 1995 means "could well happen". In doing so, it overruled previous case law and disapproved guidance to the effect that "likely" means "more probable than not". (Employment Review)
  • Unfair dismissal: Range of reasonable responses test of no application in establishing constructive dismissal In Bournemouth University Higher Education Corporation v Buckland EAT/0492/08, the EAT held that the well-established contractual test for determining whether or not constructive dismissal has occurred should not be embellished by the introduction of the range of reasonable responses test, a concept that is properly confined to the law of unfair dismissal. In doing so, it declined to follow the EAT decisions in Abbey National plc v Fairbrother and Claridge v Daler Rowney Ltd. (Employment Review)
  • Termination dates: when a dismissal letter is read is deemed to be the key date In Gisda CYF v Barratt [2009] EWCA Civ 648 CA, the Court of Appeal held that the effective date of termination of an employee who was dismissed for gross misconduct was the date on which she opened and read the letter from her employer informing her of the dismissal. (Personnel Today)

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