King –v- Sash Window Workshop Company was a particularly difficult European Court of Justice case for businesses in the gig economy. It suggested that where a worker was not provided with an adequate facility to take the paid leave to which he was entitled by that status under the Working Time Regulations (in particular, because … Continue Reading
ISS Facility Services – v – Govaerts was a European Court of Justice case in March 2020 concerning what happened where the work being done by a group of employees was split up and all sold or contracted off in different directions. Traditionally the UK view has been that the employee would go with whichever … Continue Reading
While we Belgians are generally known for being quite flexible in our use of foreign languages, we can be real sticklers when it comes to the use of language in the employment relationship.… Continue Reading
Flowers –v- East of England Ambulance Services NHS Trust this month concerned a claim by a number of workers in the Trust ambulance service that their holiday pay should include an allowance in respect of overtime, both non-guaranteed and voluntary. For these purposes, voluntary overtime was work which the employee was under no obligation to … Continue Reading
“Bosses can ban burkas, scarves, crosses” shouts the front page of last Tuesday’s Metro, followed by a commentary far too short to explain that this is almost always untrue. This is the resurrection of an old debate concerning the extent of your right to manifest your religion at work through how you dress. When last … Continue Reading
As we have said many times before on this blog, it is all very well for the Courts and Tribunals to say that overtime must be “taken into account” for holiday pay purposes. What is missing for employers are answers to the key issues of how and when, the practical questions which all the senior … Continue Reading
If you drive from your home to your office and then your office to your client, only the second trip counts as working time for the purposes of the EU Working Time Directive. But what if you don’t have an office and so drive straight from your home to your first customer and at the … Continue Reading
Reflecting perhaps a quiet summer in domestic UK employment law terms, much energy has been expended in recent weeks by commentators on the possible ramifications for HR of a European Court of Justice Case on Bulgarian electricity meters. In reality, however, there may be rather less to this in practical terms than meets the eye. … Continue Reading
So that turned out to be a lot of fuss about not very much, didn’t it? USDAW – v – Ethel Austin, better known as the Woolworths case, was a challenge by trade union USDAW to the established reading of Section 188 of the Trade Union and Labour Relations (Consolidation) Act 1992. This requires collective … Continue Reading
In the end, the Advocate General reached the inevitable conclusion – that obesity by itself is not automatically a disability, but can be if and when it “hinders full participation in professional life on an equal footing with other employees”, or (translated into the UK Equality Act’s definition) has a substantial adverse effect on a … Continue Reading
Schlecker v Boedeker C-64/12 concerned a dispute over the correct law applicable to an employment contract in the absence of an express governing law clause; the dispute provided the European Court of Justice with a timely opportunity to reiterate the correct application of the Rome Convention to employment contracts. The Convention allows parties to a … Continue Reading
