Remploy factory closures risk jobs of 1,500 disabled workers
Remploy is to consult with unions over the proposed closure of 36 of its 54 factories due to government funding cuts, which could lead to compulsory redundancies among more than 1,500 disabled workers. Remploy factories were established 66 years ago as part of the creation of the welfare state in order to employ disabled […]
Somerset Council pulls HR out of Southwest One shared service
Troubled shared service operation SouthWest One has hit another speedbump, with one of its customers, Somerset Council today announcing that it is to bring some services, including HR, back in-house. According to the BBC, the decision was taken after a council review concluded that it was failing to perform and it was unlikely to achieve […]
EU proposals for female board quotas a “mistake”
A European Union-wide consultation on whether to introduce mandatory quotas to try and increase the number of women on company boards has been branded a “mistake” by the coalition government’s boardroom diversity champion. Lord Davies of Abersoch admitted that the move by the EU’s Justice Commissioner, Viviane Reding, “raises the temperature” on organisations that […]
Ask the Expert: Can an employee legally refuse an order to move desks?
The question I am an HR Assistant and am slightly upset at the treatment of one of the girls in the office. She came on board about six months ago to act as team support and is line-managed by one of the PAs. But there seemed to be friction from the start between […]
Unions reject MoD assurances about outsourced HR staff
Unions have raised concerns that the Ministry of Defence’s decision to outsource functions such as HR to a private contractor will lead to “further attacks” on employees’ terms and conditions despite ministerial claims to the contrary. Serco has won a £36 million deal to run a shared services organisation, Defence Business Services in a bid […]
Best Practice: Diamond Jubilee holiday guidance from Acas
Acas has issued guidance about how to deal with the holiday issues raised by the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee celebrations as a result of growing numbers of calls to its employer helpline. The occasion will be marked by a four-day long weekend for some workers due to the creation of an extra bank holiday on Tuesday […]
Legal Insight: How to guard against constructive dismissal claims
Lord Sugar is as famous for his business success as he is for his “You’re Fired” catchphrase on ‘The Apprentice’. Seven series of the popular BBC television show have produced seven winners, but only one still works for him. However, viewers of the last series will know that the winner no longer takes it […]
Inclusion: Reaping what you sow
From the rallying cry of the Lord Davies report calling for more women to join British boardrooms to the abolition of the official retirement age, diversity has been in the full glare of the media spotlight over the last year. Yet the story at ground level is rather different and the key theme in […]
Racism claim upheld after pub manager calls black worker “Sooty”
A pub manager repeatedly called a black employee “Sooty” and told him to stand under a light when she spoke to him so that she could see him, an employment tribunal has heard. But according to the Daily Telegraph, when the staff member, Joel Perry who is of Jamaican origin, made a formal complaint about […]
Blog: Diversity is good for business
I have watched with amusement these past few weeks the reaction in the sports world to the phenomenon called Jeremy Lin. Not being much of a sports fan (especially basketball), I had to delve a little deeper than the normal fan. Chinese-American and Harvard-educated does not normally equal star in the NBA — or at […]
Ask the Expert: Can we buy back chunks of carried-over annual leave?
The question I have recently commenced working for a company, which has a policy allowing staff to carry over their unused annual leave into the first three months of the new year (the leave period runs from August to July). If the leave is unused by the end of the three months, it is […]
Legal Insight: Can UK staff be sued for stealing Twitter followers?
Another week, another story about Twitter – this time from the US, where an employer has sued a former employee for allegedly stealing the companies followers. Noah Kravitz, who worked as a reviewer for Phonedog Media for more than four years, created the Twitter account in 2007 when he first started to work at the […]
New employers liable for prior unfair dismissal claims under TUPE
Under TUPE legislation, liability for unfair dismissal claims automatically passes to any new employer, making businesses that have sacked staff in anticipation of a transfer less attractive to potential buyers, the Court of Appeal has ruled. The Court confirmed that it did not matter whether the new employer was known, had been identified or even […]
Unpaid overtime saves employers £29.2bn each year
One in five workers regularly work unpaid overtime saving employers a huge £29.2 billion per year, with older workers and long-servers by far the most likely to offer their services for free. According to an analysis of official government figures undertaken by the TUC to mark ‘Work Your Proper Hours Day’, some 5.3 million people […]
HR ‘out of touch’ with workforce realities, claims report
Evidence of a “striking mismatch” between what HR professionals perceive to be key issues and the reality on the ground means that they simply must make more effort to understand their workforces, a report has warned. According to a survey of 350 senior HR practitioners, all too many are out of touch. They are failing […]
Lincolnshire to see biggest ever transfer of police staff to private sector
An outsourcing deal allowing a private security company to design, build and run a police station in Lincolnshire is expected to result in the biggest ever single transfer of police staff to a commercial firm. The agreement between G4S and Lincolnshire Police is thought to be the first of its kind in the UK and […]
Employer sues former worker for “stealing” its Twitter followers
A mobile phone news site is suing a former employee after claiming that he refused to hand over a Twitter account and stole thousands of its followers after leaving the company. Noah Kravitz, who worked as a reviewer for Phonedog Media for more than four years, created the Twitter account in 2007 when he […]
Talent Spot: Kate Russell, the HR Headmistress
Although officially Kate Russell is managing director of her own consultancy, Russell HR Consulting, she’s better known as the HR Headmistress – a nickname coined by friends to describe her no-nonsense manner that has refused to budge. “It’s my own fault,” laughs Russell. “I’m short and very middle class in my accent, but with rather […]
The HR Headmistress: How to deliver compliance training with aplomb
Compliance training is like visiting a difficult family member. You may not really like spending time with them, but your mother insists. Topics such as health and safety, data protection, food hygiene and employment law evoke a similar rather less-than-thrilled response in a ‘we do it because we have to, but don’t expect us to […]
Ask the Expert: When should we CRB-check our site engineers?
The question We are currently looking into whether we need to undertake CRB checking for some of our site engineers, but are not 100% sure if we require it? As a company, we occasionally (and I have to highlight that it is only occasionally) send engineers out to schools or attend calls in […]