August 2009 Archives - 2/2 - Employment Law Advocates

Concessions

12-Aug-2009 / James Medhurst / No Comments

The case of Bowers v William Hill is interesting, not because it is likely to be reported but because the situation is unusual. The respondent made a concession that the claimant was disabled but the tribunal nevertheless found that her case failed, seemingly on the basis that the Respondent could not have known that her condition was going to¬†last for twelve months at the time that it carried out the alleged discrimination.¬†This bizarre conclusion appears to be an extrapolation of ...

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Dark law between the lines – James v Greenwich Council

06-Aug-2009 / James Medhurst / No Comments

This case is reported, among other places, in the Industrial Relations Law Reports at IRLR 302. When it appeared, it frustrated¬†many commentators¬†because it appeared not to resolve a conflict in the authorities between those cases in which a contract of employment was implied between an agency worker and an end user, such as Dacas v Brook Street Bureau, and those in which it was not, such as James itself. It contained an intriguing comment from Lord Justice Mummery that, ...

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Good industrial practice

/ James Medhurst / No Comments

The managing director of Employment Law Advocates is Rad Kohanzad,¬†who¬†was involved in a dramatic case¬†at the Court of Appeal last week. The principle from the case of Norton Tool¬†is that¬†compensation for an unfair summary dismissal can include¬†the equivalent of a payment in lieu of notice, even where the dismissed employee has found another job during what would have been the notice period, and consequently¬†recovers more than the amount lost.¬†The reason for this is¬†that it is deemed to be good industrial¬†practice ...

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Costs again

02-Aug-2009 / James Medhurst / No Comments

Further to my discussion about Daleside Nursing Home v Mathew here, it was inevitable that the issue of costs would rear its head again. In Dunedin Canmore Housing Association v Donaldson, the Scottish Employment Appeal Tribunal followed Mathew if, that is, it is possible to follow a decision¬†that purports to¬†establish no principle of law. In this case, the claimant tried to enforce a compromise agreement in circumstances in which she was in breach of its terms relating to confidentiality. There ...

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