Working time rights: statutory holiday and other rest
UK: employee working outside EU could not claim UK statutory holiday pay
The principle that UK laws which are derived from EU law must be construed as permitting claims in England, where English law is the proper law of the contract, only applies where the employee works in the EU. The claimant, … Continue reading
Australia: Bullying, flexible work and unions: Implications for employers regarding proposed amendments to the Fair Work Act
Industrial relations is gearing up to be a significant issue in the upcoming Federal election. The Federal Government has recently announced its plans to introduce a second tranche of proposed changes to the Fair Work Act 2009 (Cth) (the Act) flowing from the … Continue reading
Hong Kong: The year of dragon – key employment cases to note
The year of the dragon was relatively prosperous for employment law[yers] with three high profile employment case decisions (almost unheard of in Hong Kong): In the first of these cases, Cantor Fitzgerald Europe and Cantor Fitzgerald (Hong Kong) Capital Markets … Continue reading
Pay in lieu of holiday: EU law allows calculation using pay rate applicable when accrued
Employers may be able to pay in lieu of accrued but unused annual leave on termination only at the rate of pay applicable during the period the leave was accrued, rather than the rate applicable at the date of termination. … Continue reading
Holiday pay: possible challenge to calculation method in UK regulations
The Supreme Court has ruled that UK aviation working time regulations can be interpreted to comply with the ECJ’s decision that holiday pay should reflect normal remuneration, ie pay intrinsically linked to the performance of contractual tasks (in this case … Continue reading
Spain: Sick leave during holidays
The Spanish Supreme Court has declared (in its decision dated 3 October 2012) that an employee on sick leave – when this occurs during his/her holidays or event before those holidays start – is entitled to benefit from his/her holiday … Continue reading
Legislative proposals: working hours
The deadline for the European social partners to reach an agreement on proposed changes to EU working time rules has been extended from September to 31 December 2012.
Statutory holiday: employees unable to take holiday due to sick leave can carry it over into a new year without express request
Where an employee is unable or unwilling to take their EU-derived entitlement to 4 weeks’ statutory holiday in the current holiday year due to being on sick leave, an employer must allow the employee to carry over this leave into … Continue reading
Holiday: employees falling sick during statutory holiday can reschedule it
Recent case law has established that an employee who falls sick before scheduled statutory holiday should be allowed to reschedule the holiday at another time (Pereda). The ECJ has now confirmed that, as expected, the same applies where the employee … Continue reading
Rest breaks: no automatic unfair dismissal right where dismissed for sleeping
The dismissal of employees for sleeping at work was not an automatically unfair dismissal for ‘refusing’ to accept an employer’s breach of working time law (the requirement to provide rest breaks). ‘Refusal’ must be explicit and cannot be implied from … Continue reading