TUPE: Where are we now?

What is the practical impact of January’s changes to TUPE, asks Jeffrey Jupp ‘To avoid a service provision change transfer, the activity which forms the service after the transfer must not be fundamentally the same as that before the transfer.’ It is three months since the majority of the changes to the legislation protecting employees’ …
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Maternity Rights: Surrogacy – the European and UK position

Julian Yew and Charlotte Logan discuss employees’ rights in a surrogacy situation ‘The ECJ held that a mother who has had a baby through a surrogate cannot, by definition, be subject to less favourable treatment related to her pregnancy, given that she has not been pregnant with that baby.’ The statutory rights of employees who …
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Vicarious Liability: Lessons from three recent cases

Rachel Farr considers when an employer is liable for the actions of its employees ‘An act might appear unconnected with an employee’s work but, taking the context and circumstances in which it occurred into account, it may be seen as incidental to, and within the scope of, employment.’ An employer is liable for the torts …
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Collective Consultation: A round up of recent developments

Ongoing uncertainty about employers’ duty to collectively consult staff about redundancies and business transfers means that the law in this area remains complex, warn Jessica Shemmings and Clare Davis ‘The legislation helps clarify the position on collective consultation for redundancy prior to a transfer covered by the Transfer of Undertakings (Protection of Employment) Regulations 2006.’Over …
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Parental Leave: Sharing from the start

Gary Henderson and Anita Wisby examine the draft shared parental leave regulations ‘If implemented effectively, SPL will help challenge assumptions and working practices which arguably dictate that caring for a child following birth or adoption is the exclusive responsibility of mothers.’ For some time, the government has been looking at reforming the system of statutory …
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Tribunal Disputes: An aggravating situation – financial penalties for losing employers

Gurpreet Duhra analyses the potential impact of tribunals’ new power to penalise employers for breaches of employment law ‘The new financial penalty is actually a watered-down version of what was originally proposed. The Resolving workplace disputes consultation paper recommended that tribunals should automatically levy a financial penalty if an employer loses a claim.’ A significant …
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Discrimination Questionnaires: Gone but not forgotten?

Sharon Tan and Paul McGrath weigh up the impact of the abolition of the statutory discrimination questionnaire regime and the introduction of new non-statutory Acas guidance ‘Prospective responders should not see the abolition of the statutory regime as a “green light” to ignore questions or information requests.’ The statutory questionnaire procedure has been a familiar …
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