Unfair dismissal

New and updated

• Date:

  9 May 2003

  Type:

  Employment law cases

  Time off for dependants: First consideration of dependants' leave entitlement

  In Qua v John Ford Morrison Solicitors, the EAT holds that the statutory right to take a "reasonable amount of time off" to care for dependants is a right that applies during working hours to enable employees to deal with the variety of specified unexpected or sudden events affecting their dependants, and in order to make any "necessary" longer-term arrangements for their care.

• Date:

  7 March 2003

  Type:

  Employment law cases

  Unfair dismissal: "Band of reasonable responses" test applies to reasonableness of investigation into misconduct

  In Sainsbury's Supermarkets Ltd v Hitt, the Court of Appeal emphasises that the "band of reasonable responses" test applies to the question of the reasonableness of an employer's investigations into alleged misconduct, as it does to other procedural and substantive aspects of the decision to dismiss.

• Date:

  10 January 2003

  Type:

  Employment law cases

  Public interest disclosure: Statutory elements of "protected disclosure" must be proved

  Where, in a protected disclosure case, the employee had not served the requisite qualifying period to bring an unfair dismissal complaint, the critical issue for the tribunal is whether or not the protected disclosure provisions in the Employment Rights Act 1996 have been satisfied on the evidence, and not substantive or procedural unfairness, which would have been the central issue in a claim for "ordinary" unfair dismissal, the Court of Appeal holds in ALM Medical Services Ltd v Bladon.

• Date:

  31 December 2002

  Type:

  Employment law cases

  Ngengfack v London Borough of Southwark

  In Ngengfack v London Borough of Southwark [2002] EWCA Civ 711 CA, the Court of Appeal held that an employee who had been seen working in the hairdressing salon that she owned while on sick leave from her teaching job had been fairly dismissed.

• Date:

  9 December 2002

  Type:

  Employment law cases

  Mitigation of loss: Refusing re-employment offer was a failure to mitigate loss

  In Wilding v British Telecommunications plc, the Court of Appeal upholds a decision by an employment tribunal that, by refusing an offer of part-time re-employment, an employee who had been unfairly dismissed and discriminated against on the ground of his disability had thereby failed to mitigate his loss.

• Type:

  Employment law cases

  On appeal: drugs policies and misconduct

  Continuing our series on the implications of recent significant cases, Hugh Calloway, associate solicitor in the commercial litigation department at Glanvilles Solicitors looks at issues surrounding some employment-related disputes. This week: drugs policies and misconduct.

• Date:

  11 March 2002

  Type:

  Employment law cases

  Public interest disclosure: Breach of employment contract can be a protected disclosure

  In Parkins v Sodexho Ltd, the EAT holds that a protected disclosure for the purposes of s.43B Employment Rights Act 1996 can relate to a breach of the employee's own contract of employment.

• Type:

  Employment law cases

  Case roundup: Unfair dismissal and redundancy

  This week's case roundup, covering unfair dismissal and redundancy procedures laid down in collective agreements.

• Type:

  Employment law cases

  Tribunal may leave some stones unturned

  The Court of Appeal gives important guidance on how far tribunals need to go in exploring the circumstances of a claim. Plus cases on protected disclosure, redundancy selection, discrimination by an agent, working time exemptions and constructive dismissal.

• Date:

  15 September 2001

  Type:

  Employment law cases

  Redundancy: Reorganisation of duties did not result in redundancy

  The Court of Appeal holds in Shawkat v Nottingham City Hospital NHS Trust that an employment tribunal was entitled to its conclusion that a reorganisation of the employee's duties to require him to carry out different work in part of his time, while it amounted to the imposition of unreasonable duties upon him which he had reasonably declined to carry out, did not mean that he was redundant.