Six months on from the Davies report, Women on Board’, how much progress has been made towards the diversity at the top of UK plcs? Women are under-represented on the boards of UK companies. In 2010, only 12.5% of members of FTSE 100 companies' corporate boards were female ...
Many commercial property owners and occupiers whose businesses have been destroyed or impacted during this summer's riots are just beginning to come to terms with the true cost of the damage caused. A number of individuals whose homes have been affected also face the severity of the impact ...
Despite complying with conditions attached to planning permission for an onshore wind farm development, developers, landowners and operators may find themselves defending an action for nuisance if the noise from the wind turbines unreasonably interferes with the use of another's land ...
The government has recently published a consultation document seeking views in relation to its proposals for business rate retention ("BRR") in England and options for enabling local authorities to carry out Tax Increment Financing ("TIF") within the business rates retention system. The business rates consultation may interest developers, the public sector and those involved in renewables or regeneration, particularly those considering Tax Increment Financed projects ...
The decision to outsource is often dictated by financial considerations, with cost saving usually a major incentive, while other important factors might include innovation in service delivery and improvements in service quality. While employment issues are rarely the primary driver in the decision, they can be of vital importance to the success of the project and should be addressed when the transaction is at an early stage ...
Last year’s takeover of Cadbury by US firm Kraft left a bitter taste in many mouths, not least the Cadbury workers in the Somerdale Plant near Bristol who were promised their jobs were safe but were then ultimately ‘rationalised’ by the American food giant ...
The past year has seen a significant rise in the uptake of mediation as an alternative means of dispute resolution and this is a trend which is likely to continue. Designed to resolve disputes to the (relative) satisfaction of both parties at an early stage, mediation uses an independent, specially trained third party mediator to facilitate private and confidential settlement discussions between parties ...
While water resource management can, ironically, be one of the driest of topics in mixed company, thefuture supply of fresh water is becoming an increasingly critical global issue. This week experts from around the globe are converging on Dundeefor an international conference, discussing security and sustainability issues around water ...
In conjunction with the Bribery Act 2010 coming into force on 1 July 2011 the Scottish Crown Office has now issued Guidance confirming that it will trial (up to 30 June 2012) a self-reporting mechanism for business in relation to incidents of corruption. In broad terms, the initiative allows companies to self-report incidents of bribery to the authorities with the possibility of obtaining leniency in terms of penalties ...
Employers are likely to let out a collective groan of exasperation over the recently launched consultation on shared, flexible parental leave and the extension of the right to request flexible working to all employees ...
Employers are likely to let out a collective groan of exasperation over the recently launched consultation on shared, flexible parental leave and the extension of the right to request flexible working to all employees ...
Recent cases in which employers have successfully defended their decisions to enforce dress and diversity policies against Christian employees have led to comments by Christian campaigners that there is "disproportionate animosity" towards the Christian faith in the UK courts ...
The Court of Appeal has confirmed that a failure by the transferor to provide the information required by Regulation 13 of TUPE does not render the transfer ineffective (Marcroft v Heartland). The underlying dispute in this case concerned the enforcement of restrictive covenants in Mr Marcroft's contract. He had been employed by PMI in its commercial insurance business ...
In Watson v University of Strathclyde, the Employment Appeal Tribunal held that the inclusion of a particular member of staff on a panel to hear an appeal against a grievance amounted to a fundamental breach of contract, so that the employee who had brought the grievance was constructively dismissed ...
It is well established that an employer who provides a reference owes the employee who is the subject of the reference a duty to take reasonable care in preparing the reference ...
The Court of Appeal has ruled that career-long compensation will only be awarded in cases where an employee has little to no prospect of ever finding an equivalent job. (Wardle v Credit Agricole Corporate and Investment Bank). Mr Wardle, aged 44, brought a race discrimination claim against his employers, the French bank Credit Agricole, when a French candidate was awarded a promotion ahead of him ...
In a welcome decision for employers, the Employment Appeal Tribunal has considered the extent to which employment tribunals should investigate the employer's marking and scoring process in a redundancy procedure and held that detailed judicial scrutiny of the scores awarded in a redundancy process is inappropriate (Dabson v David Cover & Sons Ltd). Mr Dabson argued that he had been dismissed unfairly for redundancy ...
The Empoyment Appeal Tribunal has held, in the case of Burns v Santander UK plc, that an employee who is remanded in custody for 6 months while awaiting trial was not entitled to claim wages for that period. Mr Burns was arrested and charged with various criminal offences. He remained in custody for 6 months until his trial. Santander wrote to him to say that he would not be paid while he was in custody ...
The Government launched its consultation on modern workplaces on 16 May 2011. The consultation contains proposals for a system of shared flexible parental leave, the extension of the right to request flexible working to all employees, changes to the Working Time Regulations to deal with the interaction of holiday and sickness absence and proposals to require employers to carry out equal pay audits if they lose an equal pay claim ...
The Department for Business Innovation and Skills has now published its final guidance on the Agency Workers Regulations, which come in to force on 1 October 2011. The final guidance makes the provisions and requirements in relation to pay between assignments clearer especially in relation to annual leave. There has also been a minor change to remove one-off non-contractual bonus payments from the definition of pay ...
Guidance to assist with determining who falls within the definition of a disabled person under the Equality Act 2010 came into force on 1 May 2011. It sets out the constituent parts of the statutory definition and provides examples to help to determine whether a person is disabled or not ...
The national minimum wage will increase from 1 October 2011 as follows: The adult rate (age 21 and over) will increase to £6.08 per hour. The development rate (for 18 to 20 year olds) will increase to £4.98 per hour. The rate for young workers (16 to 17 year olds) will increase to £3.68 per hour ...
The TUC and CIPD have updated their guidance on managing age to take into account good practice developments since 2006 and the phasing-out of the default retirement age from 6 April 2011. It supports the Acas guidance on managing without a retirement age and reflects the business case for extending working life and employing people of all ages ...
Recent cases in which employers have successfully defended their decisions to enforce dress and diversity policies against Christian employees have led to comments by Christian campaigners that there is "disproportionate animosity" towards the Christian faith in the UK courts ...
The Court of Appeal has confirmed that a failure by the transferor to provide the information required by Regulation 13 of TUPE does not render the transfer ineffective (Marcroft v Heartland). The underlying dispute in this case concerned the enforcement of restrictive covenants in Mr Marcroft's contract. He had been employed by PMI in its commercial insurance business ...
