Reforming access to the employment tribunal system

[charitynjw]

• Steptoe & Johnson LLP
• United Kingdom
• April 6 2011
• 

The Government has launched a consultation on reforming access to the employment tribunal system. Consultation closes on 20 April 2011. One of the proposals includes increasing the minimum qualifying period for claiming unfair dismissal to 2 years.
The Government has also published an employers’ charter which sets out in clear terms what employers can and cannot do when managing staff. Complimentary copies of the Consultation and Charter are available on request.

[charitynjw]

Re: Reforming access to the employment tribunal system

If you successfully apply for a new job, you usually agree to a probationary period of 3 months, 6 months etc.
Your legal rights, however, are (currently) limited until you have completed 12 months.
The proposal is to raise this to 2 years.

Why?

[charitynjw]

Re: Reforming access to the employment tribunal system

Not really a bump, more like a gentle nudge!

[charitynjw]

Re: Reforming access to the employment tribunal system

OK, one last attempt, this time with an example.
An acquaintance of mine (friend of a friend) had worked his way up in his firm to a position of assistant manager. However, his future prospects were limited (dead men's shoes).
He was head-hunted, & accepted the offer of managership of a new (local) branch for a much larger organisation in the same kind of business.
He did so with the 'blessing' of his (former) employer, who provided exemplary references.
He proceeded to work his ar......tush off, & quickly built up a thriving branch. About nine, ten months later, he was told that things weren't working out.....goodbye. His replacement was another employee of this large firm, albeit from out of the local area. It came to light that this was a tactic used by them to quickly establish a going concern, then get rid of the poor 'schmuck' & put one of their favourites in.
Fortunately, when he went 'cap in hand' to his previous employer, he was re-employed. Unfortunately, the assistant manager post had been taken (by someone whom he had trained)......he had to start at the bottom of the ladder again.
I know that you pays your money & takes your choice, but this just seems wrong.
Luckily it was for only 9 months or so.
How would you feel if it happened after nearly 2 years!
IMO the clear winners here are, not just the employers, but also the Employment Tribunals Judges (it will cut their workload dramatically).....not a lot in it for the employees, though.
(That's it...........charity will now climb down from the soapbox & exit stage lol)

[charitynjw]

Re: Reforming access to the employment tribunal system

Ooopps!!, dropped this:-

[charitynjw]

Re: Reforming access to the employment tribunal system

From today's speech at the Conservative conference

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk...s-2364889.html

"In a set of measures to assist small businesses, Mr Osborne confirmed that the minimum time for an employee to work before making a claim of unfair dismissal will be increased from one year to two.

And he announced a new fee payable by those taking cases to tribunals, which will only be returned if they win their case."

[teaboy2]

Re: Reforming access to the employment tribunal system

Pure sign of the Tories taking away more power from the average person in favour of their rich buddies that have been clobbered by employees taking them to tribunal no doubt. I fail to see how this will assist small firms after all the law is there for them to follow and if they don't then thats their choice and people should have access to seek justice.

In other words instead of increasing the qualifying period, which will lead to more unfair dismissals and more cases of people being bullied, harassed etc in work with no way of making a claim. They should decrease it to after the employees probation period in work has ended so they have maximum protection under the employment laws. With the 2 year qualifying period, employers are allowed to breach the law as they see fit. So to me the channcellor is well out of touch here and needs to give his head a shake.

Basically law abiding employers will not be effected by this change but non law abiding employers have basically been given a life line and an extra 12 months where they can continue to breach the law knowing the employee can not take tribunal action in must cases.

Its a pure sign of the tories sticking up for the rich buddies and sticking up the middle finger to the average person.

[SpringerSpaniel]

Re: Reforming access to the employment tribunal system

My understanding though is that it will continue to be the case that there is no minimum qualifying period of service for a claim related to discrimination.

[teaboy2]

Re: Reforming access to the employment tribunal system

Yes but discrimination is defined by the equilty act 2010 so bullying and harassment in general is not covered by it. I.e. if i called an employee a useless idiot on a regular basis to the point it amounted to bullying, they would not beable to make a claim under the equlity act unless they had mentall issues that made them act like a useless idiot. So if the person i called a useless idiot had an averge level of intelligence yet did occasional idiotic acts then they would have no claim, even if the regular amount of times i called him/her a useless idiot would have amounted to bullying.

Unfair dismissal itself is discrimination as you would have been unfairly treated if unfairly dismissed but that is not classed as discrimination under the equilty act 2010 which covers acts of discrimination. So incidents of discrimination in the work place where you would be allowed to claim are somewhat limited to a select few criterias

I suppose when thinking about it, the alternative route would be a civil claim via the courts rather than tribunal.

[charitynjw]

Re: Reforming access to the employment tribunal system

It has been suggested that this increase to 2 years will possibly lead to more 'unfair dismissal' claimants tagging on some form of discrimination claim in order to try & avoid the '2-year' bar

[SpringerSpaniel]

Re: Reforming access to the employment tribunal system

Bullying and harassment in the workplace cna be dealt with through the Protection from Harassment Act, as per the case of Majrowski v Guys and St Thomas NHS Trust (homophobic bullying at work). This has the advantage of 6 years not 3 months not issue the claim and bring proceedings, which is very helpful if someone is badly affected by stress etc due to the bullying they have experienced.

[teaboy2]

Re: Reforming access to the employment tribunal system

Yes but homophobic bullying would also be covered under the equilty act as sexual orientation discrimination. So as you said earlier the 2 year ban would not apply due to such a case actually falling under the equity act 2010 as discrimination. Harassment itself that is not discriminate or a form of discrimination that falls outside the protection given by the equlity act 2010 would need the employer to have worked their for 2 years or more. The protection from harassment claim, would unless the claim fell within the equilty act 2010, need the employer to have been employed for 2 years before they can make a claim, though they could go to the civil court under the protection from harassment act.

[SpringerSpaniel]

Re: Reforming access to the employment tribunal system

This case was before the equality act or the sexual orientation regs. It was brought in the County Court not the Employment Tribunal. Sorry if I did not make these points clear before.

[CleverClogs]

Re: Reforming access to the employment tribunal system

As usual from this namby-pamby lot of wet, cringing apologies for Conservatives, their reform of a corrupt system does not go nearly far enough.

Why are we squandering taxpayers' money on trying to teach the offspring of chavs and chavettes how to read, when we all know that the bone idle and stupid children will leave school barely able to spell their own names? Would it not be so much more efficient to set them to work as soon as is practicable - and would that not help the UK to work its way out from the trade depression rather sooner?

[charitynjw]

Re: Reforming access to the employment tribunal system

The rumours are -

Workers with grievances will face a fee of between £150 and £250 for lodging any claim against their employer, and a further £1,000 for proceeding to a hearing.

The exact amounts of the up-front fees and the arrangements for their payment are the subject of a consultation which will start at the end of November; fees will then start to be charged from April 2013. There may be higher fees for cases where the compensation claimed tops £30,000. Any individual who wins their case will see the fees refunded.