A briefing from Wragge Lawrence Graham & Co suggests that many members of LLPs (who are usually referred to as partners) may be considered workers under the Pensions Act 2008 and are potentially subject to automatic enrolment.
Associative Discrimination in employment law
13 June 2014
The Court of Appeal has ruled on the question whether an employer's duty to make reasonable adjustments extends to an employee associated with a disabled person.
We are grateful to Daniel Barnett for the following case summary:
The Court of Appeal upheld the EAT's decision in the case of Hainsworth v Ministry of Defence that the employer’s duty does not extend to employees associated with a disabled person. The Appellant was a civilian employee of the British armed forces, based in Germany. The Appellant herself was not disabled, but she had a daughter with Down's syndrome. The Appellant requested a compassionate transfer to the UK to enable her daughter to access specialist education and training facilities. Her request was refused. The Appellant brought a claim alleging the refusal amounted to a breach of the obligation to make reasonable adjustments. Previous case law (Coleman v Attridge Law) had held that claims of associative discrimination can apply to direct discrimination claims. However in Hainsworth, the Court of Appeal held that the wording of the Equality Act 2010 and Article 5 of the Equal Treatment Framework Directive only applies to reasonable adjustments for the assistance of disabled employees or prospective employees, and any attempt to stretch this to cover a disabled person associated with an employee is "doomed to failure".
Does the death of a worker extinguish his or her right to paid annual leave?
16 June 2014
The European Court of Justice has ruled on the question of whether a right to paid annual leave is lost on the death of the worker.
Here is Daniel Barnett’s report of this ruling:
The Court held in the case of Bollacke v Klass & Kock B.V.that the answer was no.
Mrs Bollacke's husband was employed by the Respondent until his death in service on 19 November 2010. At the date of his death he had accrued 140.5 days of untaken annual leave (since he had been on extended sick leave). On a reference from the German court, the ECJ noted that Article 7 of Directive 2003/88, entitled 'Annual Leave', did not provide for any derogations to be made from its provisions, nor was there any qualification on the right to annual leave (save that payment in lieu could be made where the employment relationship had terminated). The Directive treats entitlement to leave and to payment on that account as being two aspects of a single right. This right is an essential principle of EU social law, and a restrictive interpretation of Article 7 could not be taken by the Court. If the entitlement to pay in lieu (of annual leave untaken on death in service) was curtailed, this would retroactively lead to the total loss of the entitlement to paid leave itself. Nor, given the wording of the Directive, could an application from the worker be a prerequisite to the entitlement to pay in lieu of untaken
CIPP Policy News Journal
08/04/2015, Page 108 of 521
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