End of employment
In Digital Equipment Co Ltd v Clements (No.2), the EAT holds that, in calculating the compensatory award for unfair dismissal, any termination payment the employee received from the employer should be deducted from his or her loss caused by the dismissal before reducing that net loss by the percentage chance, if any, that he or she would have been retained had the employer acted fairly.
An assessment system under which employees were selected for redundancy without individual consultation on the basis of undisclosed marks awarded by their employer gave employees no meaningful opportunity to challenge the decisions made, holds the EAT in John Brown Engineering Ltd v Brown and others.
An employee who was dismissed without notice in breach of his contract of employment was released from the further performance of that contract and so was not bound by his contractual obligation to repay relocation expenses received from his employer, holds the EAT in Pearce v Roy T Ward (Consultants) Ltd.
The service contract of a company chief executive imposed a contractual obligation on his employer to review and provide an annual upward adjustment in salary, holds the High Court in Clark v BET plc and another.
In Williams and others v Whitbread Beer Co the Court of Appeal restores the decision of an industrial tribunal that an employer unfairly dismissed three employees for drunken, abusive and violent behaviour in circumstances where the misconduct took place outside work and where it was the employer who had provided the opportunity for the employees to drink.
In Selkent Bus Co Ltd t/a Stagecoach Selkent v Moore [1996] IRLR 661 EAT, the EAT set out guidance to industrial tribunals on the criteria to take into account in deciding whether to grant leave for amendment of an originating application.
In Akzo Coatings plc v Thompson and others, the EAT holds that an industrial tribunal erred in law in applying the guidelines on redundancy selection in Williams and others v Compair Maxam Ltd to the way in which an employer dealt with the possibility of alternative employment for redundant employees.
The posting in a factory of a notice which stated that accrued holiday pay would not be given to employees dismissed for gross misconduct did not amount to the requisite written notification to the workers of a contractual term authorising a deduction from their wages, holds the EAT in (1) Kerr v The Sweater Shop (Scotland) Ltd (2) The Sweater Shop (Scotland) Ltd v Park.
The unilateral imposition of a continuous rolling shift pattern in place of the traditional shifts previously worked by employees in accordance with their contracts amounted to an express dismissal of those employees, who reserved their right to complain of unfair dismissal even though they worked under the new system, holds the EAT in Alcan Extrusions v Yates and others.
There is no legal basis on which a court can, in enforcing a restrictive covenant by injunction, allow some kind of set-off against the period during which the employee has been on garden leave, holds the Court of Appeal in Armstrong and others v Credit Suisse Asset Management Ltd.
Employment law cases: HR and legal information and guidance relating to the end of employment.