First 1,000 equal pay claims against Tesco 13 July 2018
Leigh Day law firm has announced that it has now lodged the first 1,000 equal pay claims against Tesco on behalf of female members of staff in potentially the largest ever equal pay challenge in UK history.
The legal action has been estimated as potentially costing the supermarket giant £4bn in compensation to workers.
According to the law firm they have received thousands more enquiries and expect the number of claims from Tesco staff, over the disparity in pay between store staff and those in the predominantly male dominated distribution centres, to continue to rise. Following the announcement in February 2018 that the firm was taking this legal action, lawyers in the employment team at Leigh Day have hosted meetings across the country and created a specialist unit to handle calls from women and men who work in the stores and are paid considerably less than their colleagues in the distribution centres.
Paula Lee one of the lawyers handling the Tesco claims at Leigh Day, said:
“We’ve had an incredible response to the announcement of this legal action. Many proud members of staff have realised that this claim is not anti-Tesco, but it is to ensure that the work done in stores and distribution centres is recognised as being of equal value; not the same work, but work of equal value and that they should be paid the same as their colleagues in distribution.
Both store staff and distribution staff play an essential role in making billions of pounds for Tesco executives and shareholders, they should both be paid equally for what they contribute to the business.
The concept of ‘women’s work’ is an outdated approach to employment from the middle of the last century which needs to be corrected.”
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The Equality Act 2010: caste discrimination 17 August 2018
Following consultation the government has decided that it will not amend or introduce new legislation to deal with caste discrimination but will rely on developments in case law instead.
Caste discrimination is not expressly prohibited under UK equality legislation, although section 9 of the Equality Act 2010 , as amended, currently requires the Government to introduce secondary legislation to make caste an aspect of race, thereby making caste discrimination a form of race discrimination. The Coalition Government initially indicated that this legislation would be introduced to Parliament during summer 2015. The Conservative Government reviewed its position on the need to introduce legislation, following the Employment Appeal Tribunal’s decision in Chandhok & Anor v Tirkey [2014]. In that case the Employment Appeal Tribunal noted that caste discrimination is capable of being unlawful under current law, provided that the circumstances of the case fall within the existing prohibition of race discrimination. On 2 September 2016 the Government announced that it would conduct a public consultation on the issue. The consultation was published March to September 2017 and offered two choices on how to provide the necessary legal protection against caste discrimination:
The Chartered Institute of Payroll Professionals
Payroll: need to know
cipp.org.uk
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