Our April 2021 update includes a case which signals a potentially significant change in approach to TUPE transfers involving multiple transferees. We also consider a recent.
Lord Rami Ranger
Credit: Avalon
A Tory peer who has championed equality and empowerment for women victimised a female employee of his multi-million pound firm, an employment tribunal has ruled.
Lord Rami Ranger used his maiden speech in the House of Lords last year to advocate for women, telling peers that empowerment and equality for women everywhere is a necessity .
However, in an intemperate phone call, he told a woman who had just complained to him that she was being sexually harassed by one of the senior executives at his Sun Mark firm that he would not spare her and criticised her for arguing with men like a proper quarrelsome woman .
Friday, April 9, 2021
The Supreme Court of the United Kingdom has held in
Asda Stores Ltd v. Brierley and others that Asda supermarket retail employees can appoint Asda depot workers as their comparators in an equal pay claim despite their working in different ‘establishments’ of the business.
When bringing an equal pay claim, claimants must choose a valid comparator of the opposite sex who is employed in ‘the same employment’. In this case, the question for the Supreme Court was whether the predominantly female store-based claimants were entitled to choose as comparators employees in positions staffed predominantly by male colleagues working in Asda’s distribution sites.
By Lauren Warner 2021-04-07T05:00:00+01:00
What a recent ruling on employment status could mean for the building industry
The Supreme Court has recently upheld the decisions of the Employment Tribunal, Employment Appeal Tribunal and Court of Appeal that Uber drivers are “workers” and so are entitled to various statutory rights including the right to be paid the minimum wage and holiday pay. The ramifications of this case are not limited to Uber drivers: there will be substantial knock-on effects in the broader gig economy, which can expect to be impacted in several ways. Against a background of technology disruption in the construction industry in particular, Uber may also be seen to have non-linear impacts on the sector.
Background
Sleep-in shifts are standard practice in the care industry, with workers required to sleep on the premises in case they are required in an emergency. Such shifts are paid at a fixed flat rate, with additional pay for any time spent actively working. The correct pay for sleep-in shifts has long been debated. Must workers be paid the NMW for the entire time spent at the workplace even when sleeping or must they be paid only for time spent awake and working? This makes a big difference to the amount that workers are entitled to be paid. Similar questions arise with respect to domiciliary carers working sleep-in shifts.