Managing employees/workers
An industrial tribunal was entitled to find that an employee objected to transferring to a new employer and informed his employer of that objection, holds the EAT in Hay v George Hanson (Building Contractors) Ltd.
In Wilson and others v St Helens Borough Council, the EAT holds that the Transfer of Undertakings Regulations prohibit even a consensual variation in the terms and conditions of employment of employees transferred where the transfer of the undertaking is the reason for the variation
In Thames Water Utilities v Reynolds, the EAT holds that the Apportionment Act 1870 applied to the computation of a day's annual holiday pay to which an employee was contractually entitled on termination of his employment, and that the meaning of "a day" for these purposes is a calendar day rather than a working day.
Where the whole of an employer's business is transferred, all of its employees will normally be "assigned" to that business for the purposes of the Transfer of Undertakings Regulations, holds the EAT in Duncan Web Offset (Maidstone) Ltd v Cooper and others.
An employee cannot complain that he or she has been refused time off for trade union duties unless it is established that a request for time off was made which came to the notice of the employer's appropriate representative, and that they either refused it, ignored it or failed to respond to it, holds the EAT in Ryford Ltd v Drinkwater.
In Lane v The Shire Roofing Co (Oxford) Ltd, the Court of Appeal holds that a roofer hired by a company for an individual roofing job was an employee, and so the company was liable to pay damages for the personal injury he suffered when he fell off his ladder whilst carrying out that work.
The EAT holds in McMeechan v Secretary of State for Employment and another that where a temporary worker's relationship with an employment agency or business is governed by a written contract, the employment status of that worker is dependent on the construction of the contractual terms.
An industrial tribunal was entitled to find that fundamental changes in the nature of the business carried on in a hospital shop after it was contracted-out to a private operator had "destroyed" any identity between the latter business and its predecessor, holds the EAT in Mathieson and another v United News Shops Ltd.
The "Business Transfers" Directive covers a situation in which an employer contracts-out cleaning operations which were previously performed in-house, even though prior to the transfer the work was being done by only one employee, rules the European Court of Justice in Schmidt v Spar-und Leihkasse der früheren Ämter Bordesholm, Kiel und Cronshagen.
An employee who left his job because of ill health and took lighter work elsewhere before returning to his original employer, did not lose his continuity of employment, holds the EAT in Donnelly v Kelvin International Services. This is because the statutory provisions which preserve continuity during periods of sickness or injury relate to the employee's capability to perform his or her original job.
HR and legal information and guidance relating to managing employees/workers.