Employment status: Agency worker was "employee" for specific assignment

In McMeechan v Secretary of State for Employment [1997] IRLR 353, the Court of Appeal holds that a temporary worker on the books of an employment agency may have the status of employee of the agency in respect of each assignment actually worked, notwithstanding that the same worker may not be entitled to employee status under his or her general terms of engagement. Where the agency and the temporary worker have committed themselves to standard terms and conditions which are intended to apply both to the general engagement and to the individual stints worked under it, those conditions have to be interpreted from a different perspective according to whether they are being considered in the context of the general engagement or of a single assignment.