Managing employees/workers
This week's case of the week, provided by DLA Piper, covers suitable service provision changes under TUPE.
The Employment Appeal Tribunal has held that employees who resigned after being faced with a change of place of work to a different part of London because of a TUPE transfer were constructively dismissed.
The Employment Appeal Tribunal has held that the dismissal of employees transferred to a company that engaged individuals only under a franchise agreement could amount to an economic, technical or organisational reason (ETO) for dismissal entailing changes to the workforce.
The employer in this case fell into the trap of assuming that, as long as it waited for a while (one year in this case) after a TUPE transfer, it could detrimentally alter the contractual benefits of employees who had transferred, in a bid to harmonise its workforce's terms and conditions.
The European Court of Justice has said that it is contrary to the Working Time Directive (03/88/EC) for national legislation to make entitlement to paid annual leave conditional on a worker having worked a minimum of 10 days for the same employer in the holiday year.
The tribunal's reference to the European Court of Justice (ECJ) in this case could result in women who have a child through a surrogate mother being entitled to the same employment protection under EU law as conventional mothers.
The European Court of Justice has suggested that it may be possible for employers to justify engaging an individual for more than four years on a succession of fixed-term contracts as he or she moves around to cover work for different absent employees.
Chris McAvoy, Sarah Wade, David Rintoul, Helen Corbett and Kristin Aarvik are associate solicitors at Addleshaw Goddard LLP. They round up the latest rulings.
The Employment Appeal Tribunal has held that a worker who had not opted out of the 48-hour working week did not suffer detrimental treatment when his employer refused him the opportunity to work voluntary overtime on a rest day.
Employers should not be too hasty in holding a disciplinary hearing in an employee's absence, as this case demonstrates.
Employment law cases: HR and legal information and guidance relating to managing employees/workers.