In this case, a security company told workers that their 28-day entitlement to annual leave would be reduced because they were paid double for working bank or public holidays. The Northern Ireland industrial tribunal found this to be a breach of the workers' statutory right to a minimum of 28 days' annual leave.
The Court of Appeal has held that an NHS worker who was absent for the whole leave year and who did not submit any requests for annual leave during her absence was entitled to holiday pay on the termination of her employment.
The European Court of Justice has confirmed that a worker who is sick during a period of annual leave cannot be precluded from taking the holiday at a time other than that originally scheduled, irrespective of when the incapacity for work first arose.
In Russell and others v Transocean International Resources Ltd and others [2012] IRLR 149 SC, the Supreme Court held that offshore workers' regular onshore field breaks constitute annual leave for the purposes of the Working Time Regulations 1998.
The European Court of Justice has held that German legislation allowing for a carry-over period for untaken holiday of nine months, with the result that public servants forfeit their leave if it has not been taken within the period of nine months after the end of the leave year because of sickness, is unlawful.