End of employment
The Employment Appeal Tribunal has held that a worker absent for the whole leave year, but who does not submit a request for the annual leave before the leave year ends, does not forfeit his or her entitlement to paid annual leave.
Employment tribunals do not have to delve too deeply into the reasons why an earlier warning was issued when an employee is later dismissed for further misconduct or poor performance while that warning is still live, as we can see from this judgment. They need to look behind the original warning only in exceptional circumstances, for example where there is evidence that it was issued in bad faith.
The European Court of Justice has held that German legislation that requires civil servants to retire at 65 can be justified if "appropriate and necessary" means are used to achieve the aim of balancing the employment levels of young and older civil servants to encourage the recruitment and promotion of young people. It also stressed that budgetary considerations cannot by themselves constitute a legitimate aim in relation to a member state's social policy.
The Supreme Court has held that teachers employed by the Government to work in European Schools, which it described as "international enclaves", are entitled to bring unfair dismissal claims in the UK.
In this case, the tribunal held that a police force was entitled to dismiss a long-serving employee who admitted that she had committed a single act of dishonesty outside work.
The employer in this case unfairly dismissed an employee whom it strongly suspected of moonlighting, but where it did not have definitive proof. Although the dismissal was procedurally unfair, the claimant's compensation was reduced to zero because the employer's suspicions were later verified.
The Employment Appeal Tribunal has held that, when considering whether or not a dismissal for refusing to take a pay cut was fair for "some other substantial reason", the employment tribunal should look at the reasonableness of the employer's decision to dismiss, not whether or not the employee was reasonable in refusing the reduction in wages.
In Bowater v Northwest London Hospitals NHS Trust [2011] IRLR 331 CA, the Court of Appeal held that an employment tribunal was entitled to find that the dismissal of a nurse for making a lewd comment in the course of restraining an epileptic patient was outside the range of reasonable responses. It was intended as a humorous remark, and there was no evidence that the patient or any member of the public heard it.
The Employment Appeal Tribunal has held that the tribunal was correct to find that a termination payment labelled as "ex gratia" was not pay in lieu of notice.
Claire Benson is managing associate and Helen Corbett, Sinead Jones, Helen Ward and Tori O'Neil are associates at Addleshaw Goddard LLP. They round up the latest rulings.
Employment law cases: HR and legal information and guidance relating to the end of employment.