The woman who was called “Crazy Miss Cokehead” by her manager has been awarded nearly £3.2m by an Employment Tribunal for sexual harassment, reportedly including £44,000 for injury to feelings and a further £15,000 in aggravated damages. We originally posted a blog on this story in November 2013 https://www.employmentlawworldview.com/crazy-miss-cokehead-when-banter-goes-too-far/. Following the liability hearing, the Tribunal … Continue Reading
Most internal investigative processes are conducted in relative confidence and with as much discretion as possible. No such luxury for the BBC, forced (I will come back to that word) to carry out its process with Jeremy Clarkson in the full public gaze well before it can do so internally. Clarkson, already on a final … Continue Reading
Any skeletons in your workplace cupboards? Never too late to dust them down, it appears from the High Court’s decision in Williams -v- Leeds United Football Club earlier this month. Mr Williams had a 12 month notice entitlement from Leeds and a basic salary of around £200,000. On 23 July 2013 he was given notice … Continue Reading
Some reassuring guidance for employers on the conduct of disciplinary investigations from the Court of Appeal last week – not new law but a clear and helpful analysis of just how far you have to go to investigate an employee’s defence. Mr Shrestha was employed by Genesis Housing Association as a support worker, a role … Continue Reading
Right, that should be enough to scupper UKIP’s chances of bringing the UK out of Europe, so now onto the actual facts. The German Labour Court in Erfurt last week ordered the reinstatement of a garage mechanic dismissed for fondling the cleaner’s breasts. Cut and dried dismissal material, one might think, especially accompanied by his … Continue Reading
Every now and again you read about a case which makes you wonder whether you have just been spending time with Alice in Wonderland. The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) has recently delivered such an out-of-body experience relating to freedom of speech where an employee “bad mouthed” his employer in the national press. Mr … Continue Reading
I have forgotten many things in my time – appointments, my wife’s birthday (just the once, that would be) and most of my O Level grades. On the other hand, I am pretty sure that I have not forgotten being in a helicopter over Iraq when brought down by enemy fire. Unless I had lived … Continue Reading
In a stylish hotel in the centre of Warsaw there is a laundry where, as usual for such places, linen and uniforms of the hotel’s staff are washed. High-quality industrial chemicals are used at the laundry which are not available in regular stores. One of the employees was very impressed with the efficacy of the … Continue Reading
Some generally reassuring guidance for employers from the Court of Appeal this month concerning the level of certainty required to legitimise the starting of formal disciplinary proceedings. Dr Mian worked at Coventry University when accused of complicity in the provision of falsely favourable references for a former colleague. A preliminary investigation was carried out by … Continue Reading
There being only so much fun you can get out of someone breaking an egg on Nigel Farage, no wonder the Press has now turned to Jeremy Clarkson’s alleged use of a word beginning with N during the filming of Top Gear. Clarkson has not helped himself here, his ground shifting uneasily from (a) never … Continue Reading
While it is not beyond belief that students with tablets and smart phones might surreptitiously occupy their minds elsewhere during a lecture, this year’s Employmentlawworldview Oscar for Best Multitasking must surely go to the Swiss professor dismissed last week for watching porn while giving a lecture. What poise, what practice, what confidence that must take, … Continue Reading
A customer at a Morrisons supermarket petrol station entered the payment kiosk and asked the employee there whether it would be possible to print some documents from his USB stick. An unusual request, granted, but not in any way hostile or offensive, so the customer would surely have expected from this request no worse an … Continue Reading
Following on from Ellen Inglis’ piece on Kerry Miller, the Burton Albion Football Club administrator who sent ‘sexy selfies’ to players half her age, comes a tale from ‘football’ on the other side of the Atlantic, of players, cheerleaders, rules and mild condescension. The Oakland Raiders, with their skull and crossbones logo and rabid fans, … Continue Reading
If you have a Facebook account, you will have come across #Neknominate, the drinking game that has gone viral in recent weeks. The game involves shunning the age-old tradition of moderate drinking with friends in the same room at the same time and instead consists of players recording themselves downing an alcoholic drink and then … Continue Reading
Workplace relationships, petites aventures and flirtation between employees are a headache that many employers have to suffer. The management of workplace romance has become increasingly difficult with staff working longer hours and social media often blurring the lines between the professional and personal lives of employees. This issue was splashed across the press recently when … Continue Reading
Recently my eye was drawn to the headline: “PC caught having sex on duty reinstated because his firearm was within reach”. For purely professional reasons, obviously, one reads on. PC Shaun Jenkins was the sort of upstanding individual Gwent residents would want and expect to be a part of their local police force, a recipient … Continue Reading
Hot on the heels of the hapless Shearman & Sterling trainee and his inappropriate emails (see post 20 February), transatlantic financial news site hereisthecitynews http://hereisthecity.com/ brings word of another promising candidate for the 2012 Employment Law Worldview Career Suicide Awards. Imagine that you work for an international bank in one of the largest skyscrapers in … Continue Reading
Making a number of appearances in the press recently is the sad story of a trainee at US law firm Shearman & Sterling. He was part of a group of four City workers (two lawyers and two brokers) whose emailed list of “rules” for a lads’ holiday in Dubai went viral, ending up as national … Continue Reading
Lobbing a computer monitor over a fence is the latest employee misdemeanour to be caught on video Sky News, First for Breaking News, Latest News and Video News from the UK and around the World, as a FedEx delivery man is filmed on CCTV showing the same care and attention to the goods entrusted to … Continue Reading
Everyone wants a little more money, so it comes as no surprise that we are periodically asked to advise on cases where employees are “moonlighting”. It might be the production operative who puts in a few shifts at the local garage, the car salesman who does the odd bit of carpentry or even the employment … Continue Reading
Hard on the heels of the suggestion in my post on 24 August that dismissal for carelessness would only be fair if it related to matters of life or limb come two cases suggesting another justification – simple but overwhelming stupidity. These cases tread the difficult area between the underlying principles of fairness on the … Continue Reading
Here we go into the UK Festival Season, also known as “the Great Rains”. A long weekend in a field with several thousand others, the air full of burnt fat, off your head on junk food additives and up to your ankles in mud. Outside your tent it’s even worse. Is it any wonder that … Continue Reading
Eschewing the usual idea of taking a career break to find oneself, re-charge one’s batteries or complete that property project, one client’s employee was both bold enough to seek the time off to a spot of podium dancing in Ibiza, and lucky enough that it was still granted. However, the attractions of gyrating about in … Continue Reading
Some illuminating insights into the many and varied ways in which one can come unstuck at work appeared this week in an unattributed survey on transatlantic financial services industry website hereisthecitynews.com. The survey, jovially entitled “The thirteen most common reasons why employees get fired”, is more accurately a list of the most common forms of … Continue Reading
