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Trade unions and trade union recognition

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  • Date:
    2 April 1985
    Type:
    Employment law cases

    Industrial action: Injunctions restraining unlawful picketing

    In what was perhaps the most significant of all the cases arising out of the miners' dispute, Thomas & others v National Union of Mineworkers (South Wales Area) & others, the High Court grants injunctions restraining picketing of colliery gates in numbers greater than six.

  • Date:
    6 December 1983
    Type:
    Employment law cases

    Industrial action: POEU dispute not related mainly to redundancy fears

    The Employment Act 1982 narrowed the definition of a trade dispute so that a dispute must now relate wholly or mainly to one of the specified matters. In Mercury Communications Ltd v Scott-Gamer and The Post Office Engineering Union, the Court of Appeal examines documents and letters written on behalf of the union and concludes that the POEU probably could not show that the dispute arose from fear of redundancies rather than from its political objections to the Government's policies.

  • Date:
    26 July 1983
    Type:
    Employment law cases

    Industrial action: Byelaw renders picketing unlawful

    Peaceful picketing at or near a person's own place of work for the purpose of obtaining or communicating information, or persuading others not to work, is lawful if it is in contemplation of furtherance of a trade dispute. However, this does not give the right to contravene byelaws made in pursuance of a power conferred by statute, holds the High Court in British Airports Authority v Ashton and others.

  • Date:
    28 June 1983
    Type:
    Employment law cases

    Contracts of employment: Contracts unaffected by employers' termination of collective agreement

    Where the terms of a collective agreement are incorporated into employees' contracts of employment, they may be varied from time to time by agreement between the trade unions and the employers, so that the individual contracts are also varied. But, says the Court of Appeal in Robertson and Jackson v British Gas Corporation, if the collective agreement is terminated by the unilateral withdrawal or its terms varied by unilateral action to which the other side does not agree, the individual contracts remain unaffected.

  • Date:
    1 January 1980
    Type:
    Employment law cases

    MacShane and Ashton v Express Newspapers Ltd

    In MacShane and Ashton v Express Newspapers Ltd [1980] IRLR 35 HL, the House of Lords held that the Court of Appeal had erred in granting an interlocutory injunction restraining the defendants from instructing NUJ members employed on national newspapers to "black" copy from the Press Association.

  • Date:
    1 January 1974
    Type:
    Employment law cases

    JE Broome v Director of Public Prosecutions

    In JE Broome v Director of Public Prosecutions [1974] IRLR 26 HL, the House of Lords held that the appellant had no authority or excuse under the Industrial Relations Act, section 134 for willfully obstructing free passage along the highway contrary to the Highways Act, section 121.

  • Date:
    31 December 1972
    Type:
    Employment law cases

    Secretary of State for Employment v ASLEF (No 2)

    In Secretary of State for Employment v ASLEF (No 2) [1972] 2 All ER 949 CA, the Court of Appeal held that works rules or job descriptions are not of themselves contractual. They are guides as to the way in which work should be performed and should be interpreted in a reasonable way. If interpreted in an unreasonable way in order to disrupt employment this will be breach of contract.

  • Date:
    31 December 1931
    Type:
    Employment law cases

    Young v Canadian Northern Railway Company

    In Young v Canadian Northern Railway Company Limited [1931] AC 83 JCPC, the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council decided that a collective agreement was not intended to be legally binding between the parties to it. In addition it held that the employee could not claim that those parts of the agreement concerning employee benefits were automatically included in his contract.

  • Date:
    31 December 1909
    Type:
    Employment law cases

    Conway v Wade

    In Conway v Wade [1909] AC 506 HL, the House of Lords held that a jury was entitled to find that the conduct of an individual in attempting to induce an employer to dismiss an employee was not conduct in 'contemplation or furtherance of a trade dispute' and provided guidance as to the meaning of those words.

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