Employment status

New and updated

• Date:

  23 May 2003

  Type:

  Employment law cases

  Employment status: Agency worker was an employee

  In Dacas v Brook Street Bureau (UK) Ltd and another, the EAT holds that an employment tribunal erred in law when it found an agency worker not to be an employee of the agency during the course of an individual assignment, in circumstances where an application of the test of the two minimum requirements of the degree of control and mutuality of obligations pointed overwhelmingly towards the existence of a contract of employment.

• Date:

  10 January 2003

  Type:

  Employment law cases

  Illegal contracts: Employee's participation in tax fraud rendered contract illegal

  In Soteriou v Ultrachem, Solvo Ltd and Ultracolour Ltd, the EAT upholds an employment tribunal's decision that an employee's knowing and active participation in the deception of the tax authorities as to his employment status was primarily for his own benefit.

• Date:

  9 December 2002

  Type:

  Employment law cases

  Employment status: Agency worker was not client company's employee

  The EAT holds in Esso Petroleum Co Ltd v (1) Jarvis and others (2) Brentvine Ltd that an employment tribunal which expressly found that there was no contract, either written or oral, between a client company and a worker supplied to it by an employment agency, erred in law in going on to rule that the existence of factors consistent with a contract of employment subsisting, and the fact that the worker had worked continuously for the client company for nine years, made her an employee of the client company.

• Type:

  FAQs

  When does a casual worker become an employee?

• Date:

  15 December 2001

  Type:

  Employment law cases

  Employment status: Computer specialist not an employee as no contract of any kind existed between the parties

  In Hewlett Packard Ltd v O'Murphy, the EAT holds that a computer specialist was not an employee of the company to which he provided his services - Hewlett Packard - as there was no contractual relationship of any kind between them.

• Date:

  15 April 2001

  Type:

  Employment law cases

  Employment status: Insufficient control meant that worker was not employee of agency

  A person who found work through an employment agency and remained in that same job for more than two years was not employed by the agency, holds the Court of Appeal in Montgomery v Johnson Underwood Ltd.

• Date:

  15 January 2001

  Type:

  Employment law cases

  Employment status: Client of employment agency had sufficient control to be employer of agency worker

  In Motorola Ltd v Davidson and another, dealing solely with the issue of control, the EAT holds that a client of an employment agency had sufficient control over the worker assigned to it to sustain a finding that it was in fact the employer of the worker.

• Date:

  1 January 2000

  Type:

  Employment law cases

  Employment status: Tour guides engaged on "casual as required basis" were not employees

  In Carmichael and another v National Power plc, the House of Lords holds that two women who accepted a company's written offer of employment as tour guides "on a casual as required basis", and then worked as guides on invitation when they were available and chose to work, were not employees under contracts of employment.

• Date:

  15 April 1999

  Type:

  Employment law cases

  Employment status: Controlling shareholder could also be employee

  In Secretary of State for Trade and Industry v Bottrill, the Court of Appeal upholds an employment tribunal's finding that a controlling shareholder of a company could also be an employee of that company for the purposes of the employment protection legislation.

• Date:

  15 June 1997

  Type:

  Employment law cases

  Employment status: Agency worker was "employee" for specific assignment

  In McMeechan v Secretary of State for Employment, the Court of Appeal holds that a temporary worker on the books of an employment agency may have the status of employee of the agency in respect of each assignment actually worked, notwithstanding that the same worker may not be entitled to employee status under his or her general terms of engagement.