Between 23 and 26 May coming, more than 400 million European citizens will have the right to vote in the European Parliament elections, albeit some may perhaps do so more enthusiastically than others. Among those 400 million potential voters, a fair share are in active employment. So what do you need to know about the … Continue Reading
Here is another case about how far doing your God’s bidding in the workplace protects you from disciplinary action by your employer or, put more prosaically, about the relationship between the unfair dismissal regime and your rights to freedom of religion under Article 9 of the European Convention on Human Rights.… Continue Reading
With the very kind assistance of APSCo and two members of HMRCs Employment Status and Intermediaries Policy team, we recently held two client workshops on the practical issues arising to end-users and recruiters from “new” IR35.… Continue Reading
Everyone knows that carelessly-phrased job advertisements can come back to bite you, usually through an unsuccessful candidate who is disappointed because he didn’t get the job, but sometimes also from the successful applicant who is disappointed because he did, and it is not what he thought it was.… Continue Reading
30 April is to non-recurrent results-based bonus schemes in Belgium what 29 March was to the UK: a doom and gloom deadline that turned out to be … well, no big deal, really.… Continue Reading
Beginning January 1, 2019, employees became entitled to a new benefit which must be provided by employers under Article 185.1 of the Russian Labour Code.… Continue Reading
If you have recently read the headline, say, “Directors personally liable for company’s breach of employment contract” and now quail in anticipation of a whole new avenue of attack on your business, fear not. All is not as it seems.… Continue Reading
Come April 2020, if you want to avoid having to deduct tax on invoices from J Soap & Co for the supply of Joe Soap, you will need to confident that it is in business on its own account and not just a vehicle for our Joe to minimise his income tax bill. Key to … Continue Reading
Some of the most exciting events take place only every four years: the Olympic Games, the World Cup and the Belgian social elections to name only three.… Continue Reading
When considering whether an individual would be an end-user’s employee for IR35 purposes if you took away his personal services company, HMRC will pay particular attention to how far his role can be said to be integrated into the business of that end-user. Some peripheral involvement is absolutely fine, but the greater the degree of … Continue Reading
Our Environmental, Safety & Health Practice Group has developed a suite of comprehensive UK-based training programmes to provide you with practical, commercial and tailored assistance where you might need it. These flexible courses cover various topics within the following focus areas: Health and safety Anti-bribery and corruption Food and drink/licensing Product Safety, compliance and recall … Continue Reading
Last week we issued an alert about the UK government’s plans to introduce new legislation to tackle alleged misuse of confidentiality clauses in employment contracts and settlement agreements. The consultation has been launched primarily in response to concerns that some employers are using confidentiality clauses (sometimes referred to as “non-disclosure agreements”) to “gag” victims of … Continue Reading
In an earlier part of this series I floated the question of whether you could safely omit from a contract with a personal services company some of the “quality control” wording you might see in an employment contract. After all, runs the argument, that sort of obligation must amount to control or direction, and then … Continue Reading
From April 2020, IR35 will make end-user businesses liable to deduct income tax and National Insurance on payments to personal service contractor companies where, if you took away the company, the individual whose services are supplied would be their employee. A key factor in that question is the obligation of personal service on the individual … Continue Reading
Group of 10 reaches agreement on employment conditions In the very early morning of 26 February, the Belgian social partners in the so-called Group of 10 (the main representatives of employers’ federations and trade unions) reached the bones of an agreement on employment conditions for 2019-2020. In this draft agreement, the margin for increases in … Continue Reading
Regulation 7(1) of TUPE usually makes a dismissal automatically unfair if it is for a reason connected with the business transfer. But what if the reason for the dismissal is actually good old personal dislike and the transfer is just the context in which it surfaced?… Continue Reading
If you appointed a decorator to paint your house, would you expect him to need to borrow your brushes? A window cleaner not to have his own ladders? A tax consultant to ask you to supply a calculator? Obviously (or at least hopefully) not.… Continue Reading
We said in Part 1 of this series that the application of “new” IR35 to make private sector end-users liable to deduct tax on contractor payments would depend in part upon the tasks your contractor is hired to undertake. In particular, are they at heart employee-type responsibilities?… Continue Reading
So you have identified your individual contractor and you want to agree terms of engagement with his personal services company which give you the best possible chance of avoiding direct liability under IR35 when it changes in 2020. Here are some preliminary tips:… Continue Reading
Last week it would have been difficult to miss the statistics: mental health affects 1 in 4 of us. In reality, it affects far more indirectly. Many people will have been affected by the mental health of a colleague, a friend or a family member. In addition, anyone with experience of mental health problems will … Continue Reading
The proposed extension of IR35 in April 2020 will make private sector businesses liable to deduct tax on payments to individual contractors operating through personal service companies if the individual would be deemed their employee if it were not for the PSC.… Continue Reading
The New South Wales Civil and Administrative Tribunal in Australia last year awarded an employee AU$20,000 in compensation for pain and suffering where her employer forced her onto “personal leave” for assumed mental illness based on her discussion of conspiracy theories in the workplace. Though an Australian case, it contains valid lessons for UK employers … Continue Reading
