Author : Employment Team

In the Budget address on 11 March, Rishi Sunak, Chancellor of the Exchequer, announced £7 billion of extraordinary measures to support the economy through the coronavirus (COVID-19) crisis.What Measures Have Been Announced?The following key measures were announced:The cost of statutory sick pay (SSP) for coronavirus-related abse ... Continue reading

The current strain of coronavirus, known as 2019-nCoV, is part of the same family of viruses that includes the common cold and SARS (Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome). There are now three confirmed cases of the coronavirus in the UK and the outbreak has spread across China and to at least 18 countries globally.If the new strain ... Continue reading

Earlier this month, an employment tribunal ruled that ethical veganism is a non-religious philosophical belief that should be protected under the Equality Act 2010. For a belief to be protected under the Act, it must meet several tests including being worthy of respect in a democratic society, being compatible with human dignity ... Continue reading

A recent employment tribunal, in Conisbee v Crossley Farms Ltd and others, has found that vegetarianism is not a “philosophical belief” under the Equality Act 2010. Interestingly, however, the tribunal suggested that veganism is more likely to be protected under the Act.Mr Conisbee, who is vegetarian, resigned from his ... Continue reading

In May of this year, the Court of Appeal delivered an important decision for employers who enhance maternity pay but do not mirror that enhancement for employees taking shared parental leave.The current legal position is that it is up to employers to decide whether or not to enhance contractual pay to employees on shared parenta ... Continue reading

At the end of 2018, the Government published details of its Good Work Plan, setting out its plans to introduce a number of reforms designed to improve protection for agency workers, zero hours workers, and others with atypical working arrangements.The Good Work Plan is the Government’s considered response to Matthew Taylor’s rep ... Continue reading

In November, we updated our Sickness and Absence Policy to include a section on elective and cosmetic surgery.For these purposes, cosmetic surgery may be defined as surgery which is intended to improve a person’s appearance rather than their health. Elective surgery, on the other hand, refers to any surgery that is scheduled in ... Continue reading

A self-employed/independent contractor working arrangement has considerable attractions for both the employer and the self-employed worker, but it can be difficult definitively to identify the difference between employed and self-employed status.HMRC provides helpful guidance that employers and workers can use to determine if an ... Continue reading

Just when you thought you’d seen enough emotively divisive politics to last a lifetime, with the election of President Trump following hot on the heels of the Brexit referendum; along comes a general election just to make sure that peoples’ conversations don’t stray to anything quite so mundane as the weather and the weekend’s f ... Continue reading

According to the Office for National Statistics, over 900,000 employees in Britain are currently employed on zero-hours employment contracts. Zero-hours contracts often crop up in the news, and it’s fair to say that they’ve gotten something of a bad name – often not without good reason. Particularly with the rise of the gig econ ... Continue reading