Increase in Qualifying Period Won't be Retrospective

Jarndyce

http://www.xperthr.co.uk/article/111811/government-confirms-that-qualifying-period-increase-for-unfair-dismissal-will-not-be-retrospective.aspx

Contrary to what we'd thought more likely to happen, the new qualifying period for unfair dismissal will only apply to workers to join an employer on or after 6 April 2012.

SarEl

Hmm. They are up to something. I know they are up to something. Now we just have to figure out what it is.

moose1982

Sack on the 5th of April but re-employ on the 6th? Could be used by the companies who have done the similar thing on the agency workers.

Jarndyce

SarEl wrote: »

Hmm. They are up to something. I know they are up to something. Now we just have to figure out what it is.

I know what you mean. According to that report they're saying that it's not consistent with their objective to encourage recruitment! Yeah right!

SarEl

Nah. I reckon they've found the "golden argument" to avoid a successful "Seymour-Smith" type legal challenge. The difference between men and women having two years employment has reduced to around 1% (probably largely due to the fact that female unemployment is at a 19 year high). That pushes the legislation back to a "social impact" move - to reduce unemployment by encouraging employers to recruit (no, don't ask me to explain how it does that - this is their argument, not mine). By not applying it retrospectively they reduce the opportunity of a judical challenge being made in the next year or even two, and are gambling on having evidence it works to prove the social impact. That's my guess anyway. After all, let's face it - by that time the chances of them still being in power are minimal so any fall out won't be their problem. One way or another the Coalition will fall, and even if the Tories won an election, they would blame it all on the Lib Dems!

zzzLazyDaisy

Also it sounds like they are being all fair and responding to people's concerns...

Yet if you examine this concession, it really doesn't amount to much:

What they are saying is that they will not apply it to anyone already in employment so:

All those people who have been with their current employer more than 1 year will continue to have employment protection - but many of those will have been there more than two years so would be unaffected anyway, and of those with more than one year and less than two years, they would be covered anyway within the next few months (I am not disputing the fact that this turn-around is welcome to them, but I am pointing out that it helps only a small number of people, who fall into this transitional area), so the main people to benefit will be those who have recently started working for a new employer and will still qualify after one year. The cynic in me thinks that with fear of unemployment making people stay where they are and the low number of employers actively recruiting, even this concession is probably less than it appears on paper.

Of course anyone who changes employer is immediately hit by the new two year rule anyway.

I suspect that we will see many more unfair dismissal claims under the various exceptions to the minimum service requirement, and many more unlawful discrimination claims.

And (in my humble opinion) it isn't going to encourage employers to recruit more workers as the main reason for the high levels of unemployment has more to do with the economy than the fact that some inefficient employers can't get their act together and identify, and get rid of, poor workers within the first twelve months.

zzzLazyDaisy

moose1982 wrote: »

Sack on the 5th of April but re-employ on the 6th? Could be used by the companies who have done the similar thing on the agency workers.

That wouldn't work because of the rule on calculating continuous employment...

But provided the employer leaves at least one week, including two Saturdays, between dismissal and re-employment, that would work.

And we are likely to see a return to the practice of dismissing at 1year 11 months, and re-employing after one week had elapsed...